By Lucy Carroll
Just over 20 years ago, the state’s Education Department was confronting an exodus of students from public high schools on the lower end of the northern beaches peninsula.
To claw back student numbers amid a drift of enrolments to private schools, the NSW government resolved to create the multi-campus Northern Beaches Secondary College.
The five-school model – which includes Balgowlah Boys, Mackellar Girls, Manly Selective, Cromer High and Freshwater Senior Campus – was hailed a success within a few years, and was widely credited for drawing students back to the area’s state high schools.
Students at Freshwater Senior Campus have slammed a decision by the NSW government to make the campus a year 7 to 12 school.Credit: Dion Georgopoulos
By 2007, Freshwater Senior Campus, a comprehensive public school catering for years 11 and 12, was attracting 40 per cent of its students from the independent sector.
The school has since skyrocketed up the Herald’s HSC league tables, ranking in the top 15 public non-selective schools last year and outperforming high-fee private institutions such as International Grammar School.
But last week, NSW Education Minister Prue Car announced the dedicated senior school would be no more. From 2027, it will expand to take students from years 7 to 12.
Freshwater students and parents have fiercely opposed the decision, with a petition in support of retaining the senior campus garnering more than 1500 signatures in a week.
“It’s absolute insanity to do this,” said Liz Nable, whose daughter will leave a private all-girls school to start at Freshwater next year. “Finally, we have an incredible, unique education offering on the northern beaches. It’s this magical formula and the government want to step in and stuff it up.”
One signatory said they wanted the department to “focus on fixing what’s wrong with our public education system instead of messing with what’s right”.
The decision, part of the Labor government’s election promise guaranteeing access to co-ed high schools, was announced despite most parents, teachers and students at the high schools in the area not supporting the move.
A department survey of parents and students from northern beaches public high schools found the preferred option for expanding co-ed access was to adjust the catchment zones for Cromer High and Forest High. Over 90 per cent of students at Freshwater said turning the school into a year 7 to 12 campus was “completely unacceptable”.
Parents of preschool and primary students in the area said they preferred the option of making Freshwater a 7-12 school, though they added that adjusting school intake areas would be “least disruptive” and avoid costly upgrades.
Balgowlah Boys and Mackellar Girls – also top HSC performers – will remain single-sex after intense backlash to the proposal to merge them.
Frank Pikardt, Freshwater’s principal from 2007 to 2021, said the Northern Beaches Secondary College model was established to save public schools that had suffered heavy enrolment losses in the 1990s. “They did it because public education in the area was struggling. School closures were inevitable. It was going the way of the eastern suburbs,” he said.
Former principal of Freshwater Senior Campus, Frank Pikardt, says removing the senior school model that caters to years 11 and 12 is illogical.Credit: Dion Georgopoulos
When Freshwater Senior Campus opened in 2003, it replaced the ailing Freshwater High School and Beacon Hill High. Both were unviable due to low enrolments.
“It was a risk to create the Northern Beaches multi-campus model. But the public system in the area went from being an educational backwater to an educational leader. Within a few years at the senior school, we started to get hundreds of applications,” Pikardt says. The new school network helped to re-energise teachers and offered students a broader curriculum.
NSW has about 12 public senior campuses that cater just for years 11 and 12. Freshwater takes about 340 students a year and offers almost 35 HSC subjects.
Less than a year ago, NSW education bureaucrats were praising the school for fostering a strong sense of belonging and being third in the state for attendance.
Pikardt said students enrolled in part for the subject choice – including VET, languages and extension courses – which is possible due to a large intake. Timetables are tailored to suit HSC study.
Freshwater students Sasha Danilo and Poppy Lill say students and teachers are devastated at the decisionCredit: Dion Georgopoulos
“Having the five schools, and a senior campus, led to better outcomes and results for kids. Removing the senior school loses sight of the original intention of college. It’s a huge backwards step. Why are they fixing something that isn’t broken?”
A NSW Education Department spokesperson said it held comprehensive consultation with the northern beaches school communities.
“Co-educational schools were preferred by the majority of those surveyed and there was strong support from local public primary and preschool parents for the expansion of the Freshwater campus to a 7-12 co-education campus,” they said.
Year 12 Freshwater student Sasha Danilo said students and teachers were devastated by the decision.
“Everyone loves the environment and culture here,” she said. “This will destroy a public school that focuses on the senior years. “By changing it to years 7 to 12, they are going to have to add more teachers and build new facilities. It will change the entire structure of how the school runs.”
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