Will Mercer - Assistant Director of Boarding - Prince Alfred College, Adelaide

The Visit Stuart returns to Prince Alfred College (PAC) in Adelaide — a school he last visited in 2019 when the boarding house had just opened. The episode combines a campus walkthrough with a sit-down interview with Will Mercer.

Campus & Facilities The tour covers an impressive set of facilities: a 25-metre pool, multiple basketball courts, a gym, a brand-new golf simulator, rowing equipment, and a main oval reportedly rivalled only by Adelaide Oval. The boarding house itself is a five-storey, 150-bed building with 13 wings — more hostel than traditional boarding house — featuring kitchenettes, study rooms, ice baths, a coffee machine, and even a resident chicken coop.

Will Mercer's Journey Will boarded at Churchie in Brisbane during high school, went on to a career in elite beach and indoor volleyball (including the world tour), had a brief stint at the Royal Military College, and eventually found his way into teaching in 2017. He returned to Churchie as an English teacher and housemaster before landing the Deputy Director role at PAC in 2022.

Running the Boarding House Will overhauled PAC's academic support model — restructuring homework into two focused one-hour blocks around dinner, and introducing small-group tutoring through a program called A-Team, initially for Year 10s and later expanded to Years 11 and 12. He also introduced graduated technology restrictions (device lockboxes for younger students, more autonomy for older ones) and year-level transitions designed to build independence.

Challenges Two main pressures: enrolment — rising costs are squeezing rural and farming families, with more scholarship applications coming in; and wellbeing — cohorts whose middle schooling was disrupted by COVID show gaps in resilience and social skills that require ongoing support.

Life in Adelaide Will previously lived in Adelaide as a beach volleyball player, so the city wasn't unfamiliar. He and his family enjoy cycling, the beaches, and the hills — and were expecting their third child imminently at the time of filming.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Welcome, you're Mr. John Judy, the absolute podcast. We explore the prebook, practices, and audience typing boarding across Australia. Thank you for joining us. The podcast over the last few years has been an amazing insight into boarding in Australia. It's something that uh as a as a previous head of boarding, I always enjoyed listening to. Using the video format will give us an opportunity to see inside these boarding houses that people talk about. Um today will be the first video that we'll be doing will be that of uh Prince Alfred College in Adelaide. I personally was lucky enough to go to Prince Alpha College in 2019 when it first opened up. So it's good to go back, see what's changed, see how they've uh uh adjusted, how they live, um, but also to get a bit of an insight from their assistant director of boarding, Will Mercer. We also had an opportunity to walk around the school and see the facilities that Prince Alfred College has. Uh it's beautiful in near uh central LA, and it was an opportunity just to spend a bit of time walking around, and hopefully, you enjoy what you see. The first few shots will be as we walk around the school, and then we'll sit down with Will and just talk about his journey from uh school and then boarding in uh Brisbane right through to now in Adelaide with his family and enjoying the experiences of Prince Alfred College. Sit back, relax, and enjoy, and um I look forward to speaking to some of you very, very soon. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 2:38

Whole school assemblies happening here, so um how many courts are in there? So two basketball courts, yep, and there's you can run two with plays or for like show games and everyone running plays. Um big grandstands come out. Because it's small enough.

SPEAKER_02 3:03

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 3:04

Um go off to the point center in North Adelaide or 25 metre pool.

SPEAKER_02 3:13

Nice eight lanes. And this was Stadium 2, which was another participle called the original tenor, uh, which is now returned to a gym to ride almost in so when you look at these gyms, at what point did the kids start utilising this with the A S T?

SPEAKER_00 3:42

Uh the beginning of this term.

SPEAKER_02 3:44

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:44

Um and then Scott Baker, who's the head of Athletic Development, uh, ironically was the statistics cycling S C guy when I first did the play vegetable with Australia cycling and China cycling.

SPEAKER_02 4:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:04

So he came to artists from the Chinese Audit Committee. Oh wow. Uh and he now heads up our athletic development program. So the ergo room move in the other road. There he is. Um to upstairs. The old gym is up in those top windows. It's now devoted to rowing and Palmarty studio just next door.

SPEAKER_02 4:30

So when was the golf sim put in?

SPEAKER_00 4:32

This was finished two weeks ago.

SPEAKER_02 4:33

Two weeks ago.

SPEAKER_00 4:37

So it's very well used by the boarders. And their select cohort have had access to it at this point.

SPEAKER_02 4:44

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 4:45

Yeah. It is the hottest stick in town. So old old scholars can sign up for a membership. It's a Red Centre Old Scholars membership. And that gives them access to full, gym, oh, facilities. It's essentially a health plug membership, um, but I only for old schools.

SPEAKER_02 5:06

How do you go in rowing? So the uh eight?

SPEAKER_00 5:09

Very strong. Yeah, though, ahead of the river changes again this year. The eight and the overall. Um we are, yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 5:20

What a great view. So from the gym straight into the is that with the first the back oval, so this is the sort of like second junior school. Right.

SPEAKER_00 5:33

And you'll see the front the front oval is supposedly only rivaled by the the oval uh Adelaide Oval.

SPEAKER_02 5:42

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_00 5:44

Yeah, so it's famous for the Chapel brothers who come to school here. Oh, fantastic. One of the original headmasters was the Chapel.

SPEAKER_02 5:52

So the Kriger program strong. How beautiful is this building? This area is lovely. So green. So how many students are packed?

SPEAKER_00 6:09

Uh technical school is actually asked about 900 across the whole college. We're about 12, just over. So compared to an school smaller.

SPEAKER_01 6:21

A bit smaller, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:23

But we are pushing up limit to the power. And then I will lay out how they still get at the top of the old building.

SPEAKER_02 7:26

So it's one of the oldest schools in South Australia.

SPEAKER_00 7:40

Um the original building, so fun enough to the original school building, which had a number of extensions.

SPEAKER_02 8:00

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 8:00

And where we're standing is the original quite a lot.

SPEAKER_02 8:09

Right. Oh, what an oil looked mine oval. Hey, thank you so much, Will, for your walk around. Now I guess I want to know your journey from a school through to working and boarding. How did that start?

SPEAKER_00 8:40

Um so I went to church here in Brisbane and I was a day boy for a number of years and then uh started playing sport quite a high level in year 10. Uh, so made the decision to move into boarding. So I grew up in the western suburbs of Brizzy, but boarded in the eastern suburbs, um, which got me a bit closer to training for my my sport at the Queensland Academy of Sport, um, and loved my time in boarding. So I spent two years, year 10 and 11, um, until I had a driver's licence in uh in boarding, and it was brilliant. Like the I was in Goodwin House at the time, um, Wayne Gore, who's still at the college at the school, was the head of house. Um, and at the time Tim Browning was the director of boarding, um, who's in South Australia with us here as well. So uh then went off after school, had a career in indoor and beach volleyball, um, so travelled overseas extensively, um, played on the World Tour for beach volleyball, uh, played in Europe for indoor volleyball right at the end of my career, um, had a mislaid adventure into the Defence Force and spent some time at the Royal Military College in Canberra. Uh, and then by 2016 was back in Brisbane, um, had done a number of different degrees at university, didn't really know where I was going to land. Um, by then I was I was with my now wife Megan, who's a PE teacher, um, and I'd had to make a decision about what I wanted to do. So I spent a day uh observing classes at her school, uh, which was St. John's Anglican College in Forest Lake in Brisbane. I spent one day there observing English and history classes and knew immediately that teaching was something I wanted to do. So I was the last graduating cohort of the Diploma of Education in Queensland. Um so I finished my dip ed mid-year 2017 and was lucky enough to pick up a job at the Gap State High School that mid-year that year. Um I remember vividly the July school holidays, maybe 48 hours from the start of term, and my teacher registration still hadn't come through. Stressing had come on. And it was quite literally the Friday before term started again. A phone call from the Queensland College of Teachers saying we've rushed through your registration, here's your number, you won't you won't get the email until next week. Um, so I was able to start teaching at the Gap State High straight away. Spent six months at the Gap and then was offered a role uh at Churchy as an English teacher. Um, Megan and I were actually on our honeymoon when Andrew Wheaton called uh to offer me the job at Churchy. Um and I took it up, of course. I couldn't couldn't resist going back to my old school. I spent one year as a boarding uh academic tutor and a and a full-line English teacher, and then after one year I stepped into the role of assistant housemaster in Goodwin. Um I was back in my old house. The only thing that changed was air conditioning. Uh outside of that, the furniture was the same, rooms were the same, everything was the same. Um, and yeah, that's and then that's how I and how long were you in Churchy before you came across the park? Uh four years at Churchy. Um so lived through the start of COVID, um, a full retrofit renovation of Goodwin House, um, which was a saga in itself. So we lived lived in a half-renovated boarding house for eight months, um, as they did a wing at a time. So we had some interesting, interesting experiences. We had a number of weeks there with no alarms, so we had overnight security uh for the boarders, um the usual delays on construction that meant we had sort of 50% of the the total number of bathrooms um through that period of time. Uh, and then towards the end of 2021, um we'd had two kids in boarding by that point. Um, so our our daughter and our son were both born into the boarding house. Yes. Um, and when I hit the four-year mark, it was it was time to spread my wings a little bit, and I would have loved to have stayed at Churchy for you know for the rest of my career, but um it was time to do something a bit different. So my wife shortlisted the cities and I I started applying to boarding jobs in those cities, so um missed out at Toowoomba, missed out in Geelong, and then landed this job in Adelaide. So started 2022, um, came down here to be deputy director.

SPEAKER_02 13:27

It's uh it's an amazing facility which opened in 2019. 2019, yeah. Um so how have you found working in a newer facility compared to obviously Goodwin, which you rent you knew before renovation, then renovation, you walked into a relatively new facility. How have you found it?

SPEAKER_00 13:44

Yeah, I think the coming down here was really exciting. I'd I'd lived in Adelaide for five years when I was playing beach volleyball. Okay. Um so the Australian Institute of Sport was is based here for Beach. Um so I had a cohort of friends here who still live here. Um so it made the move to Adelaide a little bit easier.

SPEAKER_02 14:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:04

Um the only thing that was intimidating about this job when I took it was the scope of this building. Like it's it's not like any other boarding house um that I've ever toured or or worked in. Um it's five floors, yeah, 150 beds under one roof, 13 wings. Um, the boys share a bathroom between two. Yeah, uh, they have an awful lot of privacy. Um the it's easy for boys to sort of hide away in their rooms.

SPEAKER_03 14:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:36

Um, and as a result, we have a staffing model that that ensures that there's essentially a staff member on every floor during the busy points of the evenings in particular.

SPEAKER_03 14:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:47

Um I didn't have experience in in boarding of this scope. Um and the the year I arrived we had 156 boarders.

SPEAKER_02 14:58

Full house.

SPEAKER_00 14:59

So we had a more than full house. We had the the we have an another 10-bed villa across the road.

SPEAKER_03 15:04

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 15:05

That is year 11s and 12s only. Yes. Um, and as soon as we roll over 150, we open up that space over the road. So this year we're down, so we're just everyone's under the one the one space. Which is a lot easier for supervision. Uh far easier for supervision.

SPEAKER_02 15:20

Yeah. So with that uh model, uh what obviously you you gotta supervise it differently. What is what has been the main challenge?

SPEAKER_00 15:31

When I so when I arrived, there were a couple of things. The the academic portfolio for boarding was was given to me on top of deputy director. So my day-to-day role is um running the operational side of boarding, so rostering, staffing, um, and then the homework process in the evening, so prep process, academic support, that sort of thing. So my two goals were to one, just look at the staffing model and make sure the coverage is appropriate across the different spaces, um, and what we were doing to support the younger boarders. Um nature of South Australia is year ten is our biggest single intake year into the boarding house. So we have very small numbers of boys in seven to nine, and they are essentially integrated into the rest of the building. So having come from the east coast uh and the year seven centre model that a lot of schools have gone gone with, um, finding some ways to have those younger boys not be completely integrated with the with the older lads, um, just because we've got 12-year-olds and 18-year-olds living living in the same space. So um so finding some house parent staffing hours to support those guys, particularly late in the evenings, um, was a change to the roster, um, and then a sweeping change to what academic support looked like. Um so when I arrived, Borders I only did between an hour and 90 minutes of homework four nights a week. Um, and the the dinner process and homework process just lacked a bit of structure and rigour to it. So we spent one year just carrying on through COVID because it was a very disrupted year anyway. Um the end of 2022 trialled a completely different homework process, um, and that's what we've continued with today.

SPEAKER_02 17:20

So uh and how does that work? How does that look with it?

SPEAKER_00 17:23

So we we used to have split homework sessions, so boys could elect to do homework in the library immediately after school uh or during prep session after dinner. Um that was a 90-minute, straight 90-minute session after a 5.30 pm dinner. Um there were difficulties in tracking who hadn't hadn't completed homework in the afternoons. We had to have boarding staff over in the library in the day school in the afternoon when there are day students there, so there's in terms of um who's responsible for which group of students became complicated. Um and it was usually the same boys ducking and weaving homework sessions across the board. So the there were a couple of goals. One was to to bring a bit more rigour and formality to what prep looks like, uh, and to increase the total hours of prep time to two hours per night, Monday to Thursday. Um it was very obvious that the um the academic profile of the boys here are not one that would be able to do a two-hour homework session in that one tilt. Um, so we just changed the routine. So the boys now do an hour of homework 5:30 to 6.30. We then have a break 6.30 to 7 for dinner, and then the second hour 7 to 8. Um, in terms of the model, what lots of schools do, so year seven to 10 over in the library, um, supervised by a mix of boarding staff and day school teachers, um, year 11 and 12 here in the boarding house, um, and we have a similar academic support here. Um, once we'd done that for a year, we brought A-team tuition in. Ah, fantastic. So we have uh we started off with three tutors four nights a week, yeah, which is quite rigorous, um, working exclusively with year ten.

SPEAKER_02 19:10

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 19:10

Um that's the year level that you felt the need of the a few a few challenges with our enrolment model, because we we essentially double from year seven to ten. So we start with five year sevens, ten year eights, twenty-year nines, forty year tens.

SPEAKER_03 19:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:26

Um if we offer intensive academic support any earlier than year ten, we're gonna miss 50% of the boys who graduate in year 12. So we had no choice but to but to do it at year ten level. Um, and because of that, we went away from the sort of large study room with tutors circulating. Yeah, and they they work in small groups, so they're in groups of five to seven, depending on academic ability. Yeah um at the moment the uh the process is three nights per fortnight. So every year ten student will complete three nights across a rolling fortnightly roster in a group of five to seven with an A-Team tutor in the boarding house study rooms.

SPEAKER_03 20:08

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 20:09

Um and it's anecdotally in the first year, the boys are really happy, and the parents were very happy with the extra support offered.

SPEAKER_03 20:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:17

Umce we had cohorts then moving through A-Team in year 10 into year 11 and 12, they were asking for access to A-Team in Year 11 and 12, which we have done. So we've modified our academic support offering to Year 12 students in particular to give them targeted access to their A-Team tutors in the lead-in to examinations.

SPEAKER_02 20:38

Has that gone away from that model of um three in over three days, or have you bought additional ones in to do one-on-ones? I know A-Team does that one-on-one.

SPEAKER_00 20:50

So we we offer A-Team as one-on-one tutoring to boys who are seeking a one-on-one shooter, um, but it's a relationship between A-Team and the family. Yes, yes. Um we when we offer A-Team to year 12, um, we just remove the year tens from that week, basically. So year 10s. Um we use it as an opportunity to transition year tens into studying in their rooms. Yes. Um, because the some of the feedback we got a few a few years ago was some boys finish year ten with highly supervised homework, and then they start year 11 and suddenly they're on their own. Um so transitioning them through that process so they develop good study habits when they're in their own space. Um, the other thing we still do is bring day school teachers to run in to run master classes.

SPEAKER_02 21:34

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 21:34

Um, we went away from day school teachers supervising to more targeted master classes so that that that teacher from that faculty comes ready to deliver content rather than just a drop in focus, if that makes sense. So um this year's year twelve cohort are the first year twelve group to have gone through A Team in Year Ten.

SPEAKER_02 21:55

Ah, fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 21:56

Uh how the results will be the results are strong. Um Um last year was our strongest boarding ATAR for some time, median ATAR for some time. But yeah, the proof will be in the data at the end of this year.

SPEAKER_02 22:10

But it takes time to change culture and change the way you can. Correct.

SPEAKER_00 22:14

Yeah. I think there's there's been noticeable change, not just in academic culture, but across the board since I arrived, for sure.

SPEAKER_02 22:22

Having that focus, knowing that the period, this is where I've got to focus in my studies. Yeah. It's uh bit of the challenge. Yeah. So what are what are the things that uh coming to Adelaide that you've really enjoyed? Yeah. The change from uh Brisbane to Adelaide, wine, the food that I enjoy, but what have you as a family experience? It's been fun.

SPEAKER_00 22:45

I think we like I was I was very familiar with Adelaide moving here. Um but when I first lived here I lived in the western suburbs, sort of the beachside western suburbs, and there's a real split between east and west in Adelaide. Yeah, you're either a west coaster or you're you're a leafy eastern suburb, and the two don't mix. So I I I used to work just around the corner in a function centre, and that was as far east as I ever came. Um so I never despite living in in Adelaide for five years, I had no knowledge of of PAC when I PAC's existence when I moved here. Um it was a change. Obviously, COVID, we were right in the heart of COVID when we moved here. Yes. Um we started my first term here as deputy director with year seven and twelve being the only year levels completing on-site school.

unknown 23:37

Right.

SPEAKER_00 23:38

Um, all other year levels were completing school at home through Zoom. Wow. Um, but we opened the boarding house. So we had a full boarding house with the majority of boarders completing school over Zoom from their bedrooms. Um which was a really odd experience. Um we we didn't close or send international students home through COVID. Um so we had a number of international students who finished a few years ago who between term one year eight and term one, uh term four year ten didn't go home. That's right. Um so sort of two and a half, three years without going home.

SPEAKER_02 24:18

Um personally had Christmases with borders. Yeah. And that was uh our experience is very, very similar. Internationals didn't go home.

SPEAKER_00 24:27

No, so we yeah, it was it was a big celebration the first holidays when we sent sent a couple of internationals home who hadn't seen their parents for two years. Exactly right other than online. So um outside of that, I think around that. With those boys? Yeah, so they they use at the time Zoom was the premier um online conferencing. They uh had some significant periods of time to Zoom home. We had a concerted effort to share images and videos of what what boarders were doing during the holidays. Um primarily that was through Facebook, but that's not accessible to um families in mainland China. Um so we essentially bolstered a newsletter offering um to give them more access to what's going on.

SPEAKER_02 25:16

And how did you support their well-being? Because that was that was a start.

SPEAKER_00 25:20

Lots of challenges, lots of challenges. Um we're we're lucky that we have a large international cohort here, so we're just under 20% international students in the boarding house. Fantastic. Um, which means there's a community there.

SPEAKER_03 25:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:35

Um the we have an international student coordinator over at school who's a Mandarin speaking staff member, okay, who does a lot of work with the the Chinese and Hokanese international boys. Yes. Um we have a school counsellor who comes into boarding every Monday night now.

SPEAKER_01 25:54

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 25:54

Um has a service dog, Bungie, who's very, very popular. Um and so Peter Gifford is our is our counsellor. He works pretty much not exclusively with boarders, but boarders seeking uh pastoral support and well-being support will see Pete.

SPEAKER_02 26:09

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00 26:10

Um and he knows the boarding program really well now. Um we also have a Mandarin speaking residential staff member.

SPEAKER_02 26:18

Oh, that's good.

SPEAKER_00 26:19

Um, who lives in this building, which is very, very, very useful for us.

SPEAKER_02 26:24

So your international students are they're primarily from China or Southeast Asia or what whereabouts are?

SPEAKER_00 26:30

Yeah, primarily so primarily mainland China and Hong Kong. Yes. Um at the moment we've got one student from Thailand. Okay. Um now and then we'll have a student from Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, um, those areas.

SPEAKER_02 26:42

So it really is a growth area through that Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia area. Correct.

SPEAKER_00 26:48

Um yeah, so moving to Adelaide, I think is I I'm a cyclist. Yeah. Adelaide is very cycle-friendly.

SPEAKER_03 26:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:56

Um, I've not been out on the real road as much as I would like. Um, boarding being boarding. Um but we enjoy the beaches, like playing beach volleyball, we get down to Glenelg. Um, we have a property in the southern beaches, um, which are beautiful area, halfway down to the Florida Peninsula.

SPEAKER_03 27:15

Nice.

SPEAKER_00 27:16

Um so and then the the Adelaide Hills are always a nice place to take take children.

SPEAKER_03 27:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:21

Um if you're raising young kids, Adelaide is a fantastic town because there's lots going on, and we're right in the heart of the city here. We can we can walk into town.

SPEAKER_02 27:32

And it's just so green. It's amazing. Not in summer, it's very brown in summer. Well, you won't have the uh humidity that you do in Queensley. No, that's right. That'd be a great change. Yeah. Uh so what are what are you uh looking forward to the next 12 months here?

SPEAKER_00 27:51

Well, we've got another child coming. So Mercer Baby number three is due imminently in the next few weeks. Um I'm gonna enjoy a couple of weeks away from work um with a new baby. Um look, I think we there's been a l a huge amount of cultural change in boarding and at the college over the last four years. Um, all for the better. Um we toured earlier today. The facilities that the college offers are uh are second to none.

SPEAKER_02 28:24

Unbelievable.

SPEAKER_00 28:25

Um this boarding house is it's it's a hostel, it's it's not a boarding house. Um I guess for me the I'm really looking forward to seeing the academic outcomes for this year's year 12 cohort.

SPEAKER_03 28:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:39

Um the college has put in a lot of work to support academic pathways for boarders. Um so last year was the the first year of a pathway to trade program for year 10 students who've now moved into year 11 and um can pursue a vet focused um pathway through school, which for some of our rural boys is exactly what they need. Um you know as well as I do, there's there's plenty of boarders who are in a conventional school who just aren't built for conventional schooling. Um so it gives those boys a sense of belonging and a break from the day-to-day school environment one or two days a week to head out and do some of the things that they really love.

SPEAKER_02 29:21

Um whether it's digital fitting or whatever. Now these days is opening up to different options in your vet pathway now, especially for your real remote kids, because that's what they want, and you having that facility there to be able to give the students and their families what they want from an education perspective. It's instead of putting a round peg into a square hole, you're actually adjusting that peg for them. It's good.

SPEAKER_00 29:46

Um the college this year started a pilot programme for ag science. Oh wow, that's fantastic. And next year we'll offer um full curriculum agricultural science starting at year 11, um, which is very popular with the the boarders. The the um science staff member who's been tasked with piloting that is going through the process of focus groups with boarding families and including boarding families who work in the industry in helping to write the curriculum for the Ag Science Program, um, organizing site visits to properties of boarding families and that sort of thing. That's brilliant. Um we we offer a tour of Marcus Alden and Longeron agricultural colleges um each year for your 11 and 12 boys. Um shows their pathway. Which shows them their pathway, and we've got lot lots of old scholars and current parents um who went through those two institutions. Um so it's a real focus for us. The um the SACE allows boys early access to university subjects, um, and then we're in IB school as well. So in terms of the pathways that the boarders can choose, there's there's endless options, um which is good.

SPEAKER_02 31:00

And so um I g I guess uh looking at uh where you are now and and and you're in looking towards the future with your goals academically, etcetera, what are what's the big challenges that you see?

SPEAKER_00 31:13

Um enrolments. Reporting enrollments. Yeah. Yeah. We through COVID there was a lot of work done to hold on to in enrolments. Yes. And we enjoyed through um 2022 up until last year, an above full student number. So over 150 for us is is uh considered above full. I think with tough times on the land in South Australia, um increasing increasing cost of living, particularly fuel costs for for boarding families. Um we've seen an uptick in in scholarship applications for boarding. Yes. Um and the college offers an extensive range of of boarding scholarships, um, particularly for isolated and remote students. Um but the the cost of sending a student to boarding is growing and it's putting pressure on families, and we're seeing that in in enrollment numbers. Um I think for for us it's continuing to offer what we offer, but keeping in mind the the pressure that is on families, um, which is often an easy forget. I use the example with day school staff who haven't necessarily worked in boarding, and I kind of say, well, for your average family living in the city, an unforeseen expense this week might be a hospitalization and it might cost you a grand. You know, for a boarding family. The header's just blown up. Yeah, the header needs new new tyres, there's a quarter of a million dollars. So we or you know, the the price of grain has changed by two cents.

SPEAKER_02 32:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:52

There's half a mil. Yeah, that's exactly right. So it's it's it's a totally different world of financial family management. Um so that's I think that's a big challenge. And then the second one is well-being. Yeah. Um I think we we can never offer enough well-being support for boys. Um we've now got cohorts of boys who completed their middle schooling almost entirely online, yes. Um, who are not struggling, but there are some nuanced aspects to their social integration and and how they get to know other people.

SPEAKER_01 33:26

Levels of resilience.

SPEAKER_00 33:27

Level of resilience, how they're interacting with technology, yeah. Um lots of work to be done.

SPEAKER_02 33:33

And that technology point, where where do you guys sit with the with with your taking in devices, um, limiting limitations around use of devices?

SPEAKER_00 33:43

Yeah, so we we're lucky enough to have a PC LOX box for every student, charging box with an individual access code. Um year twelves have unfettered access to their devices unless they identify themselves as needing a bit more support around sleep, academic achievement, um or or managing their time. Um year seven to ten hand in all devices every night of the week. Yes. Um there's some scope for year tens to hold onto laptops if they need to genuinely need to do work, but they need to have shown that they're working on whatever that thing is through the night. Um so that's everything. That's smartwatches, iPads, laptops, phones, anything anything that connects the internet goes into the box. Um and they open up quite early. So if a boy's got rowing training at 5 a.m., they can access their device before they head off to training in the morning. If a boy wants to get up early and do some study, they can still access that device. So um at the year 11 level, we have a technology contract that allows year 11s access to their phones on a Friday and Saturday overnight. And that contract basically just outlines our expectations of a year 11. Um, and again, similar to sort of year 10's transitioning to study in their own rooms, is a transition for year 11 students so that they don't hit year 12 and suddenly have access to all this distraction. They've developed some good habits through through year 11. Um exit weekends, we relax our tech restrictions a little bit.

SPEAKER_02 35:20

Do you do most kids leave during the exit weekends? Or do you still have a handful of internationals?

SPEAKER_00 35:25

International students usually all stay. Um international students who've developed relationships with day boys will often go and stay um stay off-site with day students. Um at the moment we've got 130 or just under 140 boarders. Yeah. Um the long weekend exit last term, we had 40 in. Okay. Um so we don't close entirely, but numbers do drop significantly.

SPEAKER_02 35:50

So do you do offer weekly boarding or is it just full-time Mondays? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:56

Full-time only. Um we do have some boarders who live sort of in the surrounding areas of Adelaide, so McLarenvale, Barossa, the Clare Valley. Um, they often will go home on weekends. Yeah. Um, we don't restrict weekend leave, yes, as it is. I could kind of think about the days when I was a boarder where you know I was boarding in East Brisbane. My parents lived in Indrapilly. Two weekend leaves per term, sir. Um so it was those those days are behind us. Um but we encourage those boys as much as possible to particularly the first weekend of each term, to stay in. Stay in. Um and a lot of them will stay for school sport, um, stay Friday night, play sport Saturday, head home Saturday afternoon.

SPEAKER_02 36:39

Families can come watch them then before the dress sports. Yeah, fantastic. So uh I'm looking forward to having a bit of a look around, as I mentioned before. I had uh seen the facility when it just opened in 2019, so it'd be great to see how it's being utilized now and and just to hear about different things. Like we all know when we build something that there's looks good on paper, but reality when it's been used, things change. So it'd be great to see how uh the facility is looking now. Brilliant. Thank you, sir. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 37:09

Daniel, yeah, cool. So this is main reception. Um boys can only come and go through this door and and sign in. Um, like most or like every boarding house I've been to, the signing in and out to school is mildly and consistent. Yes. Um so we do our do our best to keep track of them. We had a fire alarm at 8 15am last week. That big timing. That really highlighted to us who had and hadn't signed out to school.

SPEAKER_02 37:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:36

Um, it was a chance for us to give that feedback to the boys. So um boys come through here, we've got main reception, um, so Sam Bromley, our we do use Aura as well, but just the well-being aspects. Okay. Um, and mostly just for our new boys for their first uh semester with us, um, and for boys who are well-being at risk next time. So they can do the well-being check-ins through nurture in Aura. Um, and we as boarding staff get those notifications as we go. Yeah. Um, the main common space is through here, so we have three wings, the building's shaped like an arrowhead, um, three wings on each floor, 13 wings total throughout the whole building, um, and 150 beds under one roof. So, this is the Max Wellington room. We use this for supper in the evenings, um, each evening at eight o'clock. Our house parents run cooking classes to baking classes in the works. Boys come down and can use the treatments and things. Uh, and then Saturday and Sunday breakfast is self-served down here so boys can eat at their time appropriate to get off the sport, and often boys are sleeping in on a Sunday morning. There's a coffee machine which is very heavily used. Courtesy the boarders' parents. Nice. Yeah, yeah. Coffee caffeines doesn't mix and then main court. Yeah, so again, our boarders' parents committee are very supportive. Ice ballots are courtesy of the old old scholars footy club and we have six residents.

SPEAKER_02 39:18

It's a great space.

SPEAKER_00 39:44

So in the building is what do we got? One, two, three, four, seven residential units.

SPEAKER_02 39:51

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 39:52

So myself and Phil Mobile direct reporting in the ground on level one at the end of two of the wings. Yes. Uh and then above us is a series of three bedroom and single bedroom units that are occupied by a mix of uh senior boarding staff who are also teachers, uh, as well as our full-time boarding to one more residence on the other side of the road in the school. Uh it's occupied by Debbie King, who's an English teacher as well, she takes care of the villa, which is our accommodation on the other side of the road. Laundry Lockers. Laundry Lockers um this was redeveloped two years ago to expand our number of lockers because we were up over 150. We had originally only built 150 lockers and we've got lots of lockers. So we've had a few instances of parking with their last bit. Um locker, uh and all the laundry is done as well. So lovely laundry lady here at 5.30 each morning. Boys are responsible for sorting their own laundry. A cam watch. A small laundry for their own watch, so 40 GMZ is being used twice in a weekend. Yep. They can kind of do their own motorwatching or very expensive design feature.

SPEAKER_02 41:32

It's a great open space to start with the reception.

SPEAKER_00 41:36

There's not many boarding houses that have two elevators. Um we'll head up to level four. There's a great deal, it's the college.

SPEAKER_02 41:49

Fantastic. So the boys can use the lifts at any time? Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 42:00

Okay. Unless you're you're broken. Um level four, so three wings. Um wings are named after donors to the boarding house build. So Lord Wing, named for Ken Lord.

SPEAKER_02 42:17

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 42:17

Chapman Wing, um Tory Chapman, and McBride Wing, so the McBride family are a prominent um pastoral family in South Australia.

SPEAKER_02 42:26

What are the uh the breakout are the breakout study areas?

SPEAKER_00 42:29

Yeah, so each we have this sort of this is called the tower, so central place for recreation on each floor. So there's a pool table and table tennis table on every level, um, as well as the PC locks towers. So it's mostly year twelves on this floor, so we've only got one tower here. Okay. Every other floor has two. Um, these are the study rooms we use for 18. Oh, yes. So these are the group boys for their 18 nights. Um, and then the rooms are set up so that tutors can sort of monitor what boys are doing on their laptops.

SPEAKER_02 43:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:02

And then some of the curriculum posters and the A-Team student agreement wall. And then each wing has a study room as well. Oh, okay. We overflow it with study spaces.

SPEAKER_02 43:21

Uh, the smellable boys.

SPEAKER_00 43:24

Yep. Um, a lot of these boys have come back from out the red lately.

SPEAKER_02 43:29

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00 43:30

Um and then it's the other inside kitchenette in every wing. That's a good art spice. Yes. Umarty V in every wing.

SPEAKER_02 43:44

Great view back to the college. So how the the spices are well used?

SPEAKER_00 43:55

Yeah, very well. So in winter in particular. Um Thursday night footy gaps on the telly. So we have a agreement that if homework's conducted well on a Thursday night, we can knock a little bit early so boys can get stuck into watching the footy game. We probably just nip into this room.

SPEAKER_02 44:18

Yeah. Great space for an in- Oh, so you shared bathroom between two.

SPEAKER_00 44:28

And then we have a bit of a legacy arrangement when boys graduate. They get to stick their name and graduation year.

SPEAKER_02 44:35

Ah, fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 44:38

That's a great idea. And then each boy keeps their keeps their slide up.

SPEAKER_01 44:46

Nice.

SPEAKER_02 44:54

So you having such a room and kids studying, so how do you supervise this for the study of a night time with all the kids in their individual rooms?

SPEAKER_00 45:02

Yeah, so you the reason we have the A-team rooms on level three and four, because it's majority year 11 and 12 rooms. Yep. So we just have a staff member on each floor during prep. Yes. Who are responsible for the wings.

SPEAKER_02 45:15

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 45:16

And the A-teams. So Year 11 doors open during study. Year 12s can have their doors closed. And we're pretty pretty strong on absolute silence in the space. Does get challenging with boys sort of coming back late from sports training and that sort of thing. But the nature of the individual rooms makes it easier to keep it relatively quiet.

SPEAKER_02 45:43

This is a great space in here too. Golf clubs?

SPEAKER_00 45:47

Golf clubs, footy bags. If it was summer, we'd just room it before the cookie bags.

SPEAKER_02 46:01

So this is year 12 primarily. So they what individual rooms plus shared bathroom. If I remember rightly, the younger grades have two per room, so there is no divider.

SPEAKER_00 46:13

Correct, yeah. So level three and four, which is majority year 11 and 12.

SPEAKER_02 46:17

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 46:18

There's a dividing wall. So they still still have the walkthrough bathroom. Yes. But they have the dividing wall at the back, so it's a little bit more privacy than their roommate.

SPEAKER_02 46:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:30

Younger boys in particular, it's important that they interact with their roommate. Yeah. It's very easy to hide away in individual rooms.

SPEAKER_02 46:41

The social and emotional thing with friends and having this and talk to them.

SPEAKER_00 46:46

So particularly those first few weeks of term one and transition weekend in November. New boys were pretty selective with who they have as a roommate. Okay. We try to pick boys with common interests. And we try as much as possible to keep them engaged and active in that period of time so they don't buy the way.

SPEAKER_02 47:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:08

So it's in now level two. And then we're going down the last last wing we haven't seen yet.

SPEAKER_02 47:23

Don't see any cult supporters in humanity. Richmond here. So how is the competitiveness between the boys when the crows play port?

SPEAKER_00 47:38

It's pretty short. You'd be surprised how many boarders from South Australia don't support crows and ports. Oh wow. We do have a large number of borders from Victoria, so Mildura in particular. Yes. And and surrounds. Who support Victoria and 45.

SPEAKER_02 47:55

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:57

But for coins I know I'm out of my own here. So you're not a line supporter? No, there's as and funnily enough, there's a few boarders who support the lines.

SPEAKER_02 48:16

Is that jumping on the premises bandwagon?

SPEAKER_00 48:19

So we have a square wall.

SPEAKER_02 48:21

Yeah, definitely. So it literally is just the wall between the two spaces. It's a great size for young boys, you don't want it too big because they'll just club it with mess.

SPEAKER_00 48:44

Sons? Yeah. One of that lads from um P Okay.

unknown 49:00

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 49:01

This is fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 49:03

It's easy to get lost. I'll forget what level you're on.

SPEAKER_02 49:07

Oh, okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:08

Because they're all identical. Um so you have to uh now and then on on shift in the evening, if it's been a busy night, you have to walk to the centre to find out what floor level. And then we put up, we try to advertise as much as possible of our activities. Um that's a great activities chart. So we generally run about we run six per weekend. Uh two on each day, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.

SPEAKER_02 49:40

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 49:40

Uh except for the two exits.

SPEAKER_02 49:43

Yeah. It'd be just played by you, you're not sure which the kids are around.

unknown 49:48

Correct.

SPEAKER_02 49:49

Alright. Do the boys use the stairs much?

SPEAKER_00 50:00

They do actually, yeah, because because we've got, you know, it's 150. You've got to wait for the line. Yeah. Um the the boys like to see how many you can get in an elevator.

SPEAKER_02 50:14

Um get to that max.

SPEAKER_00 50:17

And they they find out the limit pretty quickly now and then. Um but it's there's just no way, like five five-story boarding house.

SPEAKER_02 50:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 50:28

Um, there's no way to not have two elevators.

SPEAKER_02 50:32

Yeah, exactly right. Thank you so much for your tour. It's uh been a pleasure, yeah. And um, yeah, so I look forward to uh seeing more of Pat in the future. Okay, thanks, mate. Thank you so much, Will, for your tour of your boarding house as well as the college grounds. Prince Alfred's College is a beautiful college, um, and I recommend that anyone who is in Adelaide go speak with Will, speak with Phil and get a chance to go see a wonderful facility. Talk to them about how they do their boarding houses, how they run their sessions, their tutoring sessions. They use amazing partners of ours, AT tuition. Um and the what they've set up for the tutoring and the support academically for their students is wonderful to see. It is a great facility, and it's certainly changed over seven years since I first saw it. It is a facility that looks and feels like it's got a life, it feels like the borders are living the best life in within those facilities. The drawing room is out at the back now, where that was just the park and the little area to see previously. The the kitchen area down the bottom floor is where the kids can grab and gather and spend time together, breakfast is on the weekends is a great place and a great communal feel to it. Thank you so much for showing me around and getting to know you better. Please keep looking at our socials. I have another webinar podcast organized, and so we'll be doing these quite regularly now. And as we're as we have to move around Australia, I would love to come and see your boarding houses, get to know you better, and and do a podcast. It's just an easy way uh to get to know each other and and as well as other people throughout Australia get to know you and your facility. Thank you so much, and I look forward to speaking to you again.