Engaging Externally And Sharing Professionally Beyond Trinity Grammar School

Participation in externally-led research

This Semester, Trinity students and PDHPE teachers have engaged in the respectEd project which is being conducted by The Matilda Centre at the University of Sydney. We also are participating in a research project being conducted by academics at the Australian Catholic University along with Associate Professor Chrissy Monteleone from LaTrobe University, ‘Sustaining Partnerships through Work Integrated Learning’. A/Professor Monteleone is a member of The Hurlstone Centre’s External Advisory Group.

We also are awaiting the outcome of an ARC Linkage grant submission, being led by Professor Tonia Gray from the Western Sydney University, ‘Creating Learning Environments and Risk Taking (CLEAR)’. Trinity’s Field Studies Centre, led by Tim Knowles, is the school partner in this project, which we are hoping will be successfully funded in 2027 and beyond.

Conference Presentations and Guest Lectures

While a number of Trinity staff have presented at conferences to-date this year, some of these presentations have shared research-aligned initiatives at Trinity.

Natalie Bluhdorn, Dean of Professional Pathways, and English teacher Carolena Kostas presented on Trinity’s involvement in the University of Newcastle’s Quality Teaching Rounds for Early Career Teachers research project at a QTR breakfast.

Dr Kimberley Pressick-Kilborn presented recently at the 2026 Research-Invested Schools network Gathering, sharing Trinity’s approach to collaborative writing for external publication.

Headmaster Tim Bowden contributed to a panel discussion at the IBSC Annual Conference in South Africa in July, sharing the way that Trinity has engaged with IBSC research through our PLTs. Mikaela Janes, the Preparatory School’s Head of Academic Care, presented her action research project, ‘Built Through Play: Supporting Emotion Awareness and Control in a Year 1 Classroom’, at this same conference.

Debbie Williams, Deputy Headmaster – Academic, and Natalie Bluhdorn will present our research-informed Professional Growth Framework at this year’s Independent Schools NSW Research and Leadership Symposium. Dr Kimberley Pressick-Kilborn will give the closing ‘Provocation for Practice’ on leading research-engaged practices in schools at this Symposium alongside the Director of the Pymble Institute, Dr Sarah Loch.

Nadene O’Neill from the Preparatory School is both presenting her IBSC action research project and leading a panel discussion on practitioner research at this year’s Teachers’ Guild of NSW Research Conference. Dr Kimberley Pressick-Kilborn is giving an opening keynote presentation at this same conference with Dr Sarah Loch from the Pymble Institute and Professor Matthew Winslade from CSU.

Lily Young, the Leader of Teaching and Learning (Arthur Holt Library), and Dr Kimberley Pressick-Kilborn are presenting on the research-informed process of developing Trinity’s Academic Scholarship Continuum (Years 7-12) at the Australian Library and Information Association LARK (Library Applied Research Kollektive) Symposium.

Dr Kimberley Pressick-Kilborn, along with Trinity’s Head of Visual Arts Nicole DeLosa and Mikaela Janes, will present a guest lecture on practitioner research at Trinity to Master of Teaching students at the University of Sydney in September.

An article published in Independence

In May this year, our collaboratively written article ‘Place-based education in action: One school’s approach’ was published in the journal Independence. This article was produced during the Field Studies Centre PLT workshops in Semester 2 of 2025. Congratulations to Leah Arthur, Craig Douglass, Elzani du Preez, Stacey Dubois, Cindy Ham, Tim Knowles, Neil Van Heerden and Dr Kimberley Pressick-Kilborn. The article can be accessed here.

Professional engagement

With character formation one of The Hurlstone Centre’s current research priorities, our focus in this area has brought us together with the Sydney Character Initiative (SCI), which was established in 2025 with Trinity as one of the Founding School Members. Deputy Headmaster – Academic Debbie Williams, along with Senior Chaplain, James Harricks and Head of Research and Professional Growth, Dr Kimberley Pressick-Kilborn, have been actively involved in SCI meetings representing Trinity. In Term 1, Kimberley was appointed as the Associate Director – Education of the SCI and in Term 2, Trinity hosted the SCI Founders’ Meeting. In Term 3, Director of the SCI Professor Phil Cummins was the guest researcher who spoke at our whole school staff day. Professor Cummins is also a member of The Hurlstone Centre’s External Advisory Group. We currently are reviewing expressions of interest from Trinity staff who are seeking to join the SCI’s Teaching Fellowship Program in 2027-2028.

We also have been pleased to connect with colleagues in other schools, whose interest in the work of The Hurlstone Centre has brought them to Trinity, either virtually or in person. In Semester 1, we have enjoyed conversations with Melissa Lang, Dean of Professional Practice and Research, St Stanislaus Bathurst; Andrés Forero Gómez, a scholar based in Colombia who is about to lead a new research initiative at Gimnasio La Montaña, one of the top private schools in Colombia; and Madeleine Dwyer, Director of Teaching and Learning (7-12) from Tintern Grammar School in Victoria.