Gold Coast Women of the Year 2021: St Hildas private school principal Wendy Lauman opens up

The head of a prestigious Gold Coast private school has opened up on the challenges of teaching during the pandemic, meeting community expectations and how to best engage students in 2021.

THE principal of prestigious Gold Coast girls school St Hilda’s was thrust into the top job 24 months ago.

Wendy Lauman was deputy principal at the time she was made ‘acting’ in 2019. Then, 12 months later, she was officially appointed principal in mid-2020 amid the first throes of the Covid pandemic. Since then she has been nursing the school through it and meeting high expectations of an engaged parent network.

In a frank interview as her two years at the helm looms, the lifelong learner and school figurehead reflected on the pandemic challenges, the importance of connecting with students in order to teach them and the competing demands of her role.

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St Hilda’s School principal Wendy Lauman: “I felt those girls who had graduated the year before (the pandemic) were in many instances perhaps having a more difficult time because their expectations of going to university, of travelling overseas to take up scholarships and positions they’d earned with a lot of hard work hadn’t been realised.” Picture: Glenn Hampson

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“It was important to be decisive but also flexible (with the pandemic). The government was saying vulnerable children are able to be on campus – there’s no black and white with that, you need to be open to understanding what being vulnerable can mean in different family situations.”

Ms Lauman believes the upheaval of 2020 would have been tougher for the St Hilda’s 2019 graduates: “I felt those girls who had graduated the year before (the pandemic) were in many instances perhaps having a more difficult time because their expectations of going to university, of travelling overseas to take up scholarships and positions they’d earned with a lot of hard work hadn’t been realised. Their ability to meet new people and form new relationships, hadn’t been realised.”

Winners of the Harvey Norman Gold Coast Women of Year awards - sponsored by St Hilda’s School - will be announced on July 16.

Hers is a role constantly subject to scrutiny: “I’ve always been someone who has sought a lot of feedback and I think it’s only in recent times I’ve understood sometimes in seeking feedback there is an expectation you’ll be able to do everything on everyone’s wishlist – and that’s not always what you’re able to accomplish.”

She recalls studying community expectations of a private school in a previous teaching job when a former principal told her “different stakeholders want different things and you have to remember that when you’re trying to decide on the direction you are working with”.

“I always remember that chat and how much that challenged my assumptions because sometimes you think this is the way it should be – but you understand that there are a lot of people who have different expectations. It is challenging because while some will want in 2021 a very traditional model of education, others will be wanting a much more innovative approach. You need to be constantly assessing how are you going to meet the needs of that diverse expectation.”

St Hildas principal Wendy Lauman: “I felt there was even more I could learn to be of assistance to those girls so I studied for a couple of years of an evening.” Picture Glenn Hampson

She still remembers walking onto the St Hilda’s grounds on arrival in 2014: “The first thing I noticed was how beautiful the environment was. I came up through the boarders quad and saw the water feature and was absolutely blown away by the lovely atmosphere and the friendliness of the girls.”

The former state government stenographer, who privately taught drama, completed her teaching degree while her now adult children were still young – and finished two masters degrees while working.

For a selfless Ms Lauman, whose first job was a drama-English teacher, she felt the more she studied, the more she could help: “I felt there was even more I could learn to be of assistance to those girls so I studied for a couple of years of an evening.”

St Hilda’s School. Photo: Richard Gosling

She pursued counselling and organisational behaviour to Masters level plus “co-curricular engagement for girls and how that opportunity can really help build young people’s confidence and sense of self”.

“It enables you to have a number of strategies you’re going to use to help people to feel comfortable talking to you about what’s happening for them and what they’re wanting in their life and walking alongside them so they realise they have the power to achieve what they want and to identify the support that will help them to get there.

“You’re not teaching a subject, you are teaching people. You have to remember that if you don’t establish that relationship with a child, then you’re not going to get very far in helping them to do the learning you want them to have – they need to feel comfortable within themselves and you – so it’s a great privilege.”