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Form of workThe East Gippsland Specialist School provides a comprehensive and innovative curriculum for primary and secondary students with intellectual disabilities. The school recognises that every child is special and that our students require additional resources and individual and innovative support to enable them to succeed.
The school encourages a supportive environment where teamwork between members of the school community is paramount to foster an environment of ability where every student fulfils their full potential. Our belief that every student can achieve is fostered in a strengths based, stimulating, caring and secure atmosphere. We promote values of safety, respect and learning, attitudes of cooperation, responsibility and respect for self, for others, for culture and religious diversity, for property and environment through the PBS framework.
Students are taught in small groups and are supported by a multi-disciplinary team including teachers, assistants, allied health professionals and other specialists. The school is committed to providing a progressive, stimulating and safe school environment that takes into account sound management practices, good communication between all members of the school community, best practice in delivering the curriculum and innovative community partnerships. The school has introduced the STAR and LINKS programs for students with Intellectual Disabilities (including Autism Spectrum Disorder) in 2016. These programs were developed by STAR Autism Support and are comprehensive behavioural teaching practises that incorporate the Applied Behaviour Analysis strategies of: Discrete Trial Training, Pivotal Response Training, Teaching Functional Routines and the Academic Skills.
East Gippsland Specialist School is situated in the thriving town of Bairnsdale which is also the commercial centre of East Gippsland. The town itself has pleasant wide streets set around historical, award winning, Main Street Gardens. It is the gateway to Australia’s largest and most beautiful inland waterways, the Gippsland Lakes as well as beautiful beaches and Victoria’s High Country. The environment lends itself to many leisure opportunities including fishing, sailing and boating, riding, cycling, bush waking, climbing and skiing.
The East Gippsland Specialist School was built in 2003 and has been steadily growing since this time. It now has 75 students and 43 staff with state of the art facilities, extensive IT resources and specialist sensory resources.
