1985 School Magazine

Mrs Hancock, Dr Gehrman n, Members of t he Board of Trustees, Distinguished Guests, Members of the Staff, Parents and Gi rl s: I am very p leased to have t hi s opportunity of returning to my o ld school, and to have t he honour of addressing you this afternoon. I was a day gir l at the Brisbane Girls' Grammar School for t hree yea rs from 1963 to 1965 . Before this I had attended a country high school and I came to Grammar after my fami ly moved to Brisbane. One aspect of the Gir ls' Grammar Schoo l then wh ich particular ly impressed me was the high expectations by the schoo l of the students. These were expectations of us of good behaviour, observance of un iform, se lf-d iscipline in doing schoo l work and homework, and also expectations that we would be thoughtful , both in our attitudes to our work and in our relationships with other peop le. I can't imag ine t hat those expectations have changed- of course the uni fo rm itself has changed a bit: Grammar gir ls in my time were ca ll ed " licorice legs" because of their b lack stock ings. It has been shown that, on the average, girl s have less self- confidence and have a lower expectation of success tha n boys and I also believe t hat girl s are encouraged to be less assert ive than boys. It may be easier for many girls to achieve success in their studies by having a few years in an all-girl school like this one where there is freedom to be competitive and independent and the re is not so much pressure to be submi ss ive and unassertive. That may have been the case with me. I found at t he Grammar Sc hool a freedom to enj oy my school work - literatu re, languages, history, art, sc ience and mathematics. Th ere was not st igma attached to hard wo rk; it was qu ite acceptable. I found that I needed to wor k hard for various reasons: fo r examp le, time-tabling prob lems mea nt that I had to drop geog raphy and do a two-yea r hi sto ry course in one year, largely by myse lf. Also I think I was born with a stubborn streak in me: I found the presence of many good students very stimulating and I know that I worked ve ry hard to see if I could be as good as they were. The good att itudes to study and the good study habits which we lea rn at school are invaluable late r in our lives- they are part of the so- called " hidden curriculum" of our sc hooling . But for a young person somewhat unsure of her ab iliti es, all of this work and study probably would neve r get done unless there was some hope of success. In my case I ca n never underestimate the importance to me of the encouragement, support and faith given to me by my parents, my teachers at this school and at the University of Queensland, and later by several of my mathematical colleagues. I remember, for example, my Engli sh teacher in the upper school, Mi ss MacMillan - my first contact with her was when I was a 4th Former taking some leaves off a tree outside the old library. My art teacher had sent the class outside to find some leaves to draw and we mu st have looked quite odd to Miss MacMillan loiteri ng and tampering with the garden. I was so terrified and tongue-tied when she asked what I was doing that I could scarcely exp lain . She retained her aura of authority for th e girls in my c lass throughout our years at school ; we came to admire her and respect her enormously. It was after I left school , as I kept contact with her through Christmas letters and once having lunch at her home, that I rea lised how much she cared that we should continue to learn and grow and achieve.

SPEECH FOR END OF YEAR ASSEMBLY 23RD NOVEMBER 1984 Professor Cheryl Praeger Professor Cheryl Praeger M.Sc. , Ph.D. was invited to address the students and present th e prizes at the 1984 End-of-Year Assemb l y and also the Valedictory Dinner. Professor Praeger is a past pupil of Brisbane G irls' Grammar School (1963-1965) and received her tertiary educa tion at the University of Q ueensland and St Anne's Co llege, Oxford. In 1983 she was appo inted to th e position o f Professor of Pure M athematics at the University of Western Australia. Professor Praeger is married, with two young children, and most competently combines the demands of a professional ca reer with ~h e resp onsibilities and loya lties of family commitments. In these endeavours she rep resents a most desirable life mode l for st udents. 7