Type Government Phone +61 2 9949 4200 Founded 1954 | Enrolment 637 (2015) Number of students 637 (2015) | |
Address 27 Maretimo St, Balgowlah NSW 2093, Australia Similar Northern Beaches Secondar, NBSC Mackellar Girls Cam, Northern Beaches Secondar, Northern Beaches Secondar, Mosman High School Profiles | ||
Balgowlah Boys Campus is a boys public secondary school for students in years 7 to 12 located in Balgowlah, New South Wales, Australia. It is a part of the Northern Beaches Secondary College, a five-campus college across Sydney's Northern Beaches, formed in 2003. The school was previously known as Balgowlah Boys High School.
The school has engineered significant cultural change in the past few years under the stewardship of Dean White and Paul Sheather. Once known as a bastion of Northern Beaches sporting success, and rarely acknowledged for its academic prowess, Balgowlah Boys Secondary Campus has emerged as an academic leader in NSW in recent years, leading the state in 'value added' literacy improvement in NAPLAN testing 2009, and maintaining this development through to the HSC.
In 2011, Balgowlah Boys Secondary Campus achieved its best-ever HSC results, continuing a surge through state school ranking system that began in 2010. Students achieved significant success across all subject areas, particularly in English, Visual Arts, Mathematics, Industrial Technology and Ancient History. Notably, Balgowlah Boys Campus placed 1st in NSW among comprehensive boys' schools for English. This included Merit List success in consecutive years for Advanced English and English Extension 1.
In the 2012 HSC, Balgowlah Boys campus retained its place as the top comprehensive school in the NSW for English and 41st in the state overall. Remarkably, this placed them well above a number of selective schools, including Penrith, Girraween and Gosford, as well as numerous private institutions.
Analysis of statistical data suggests the recent success of the school is largely due to the innovative, energetic and collaborative pedagogical philosophy of the teaching staff and executive. The increasingly aspirational culture of the school appears to challenge the contumacious adherence to egalitarianism that promotes mediocrity in the government school system, while simultaneously embracing a brand of boys' education which values diverse forms of achievement in both traditional and vocational learning.