E&OE...
Thank you very much Mr Tulley, my colleague Senator Gary Humphries, Alex and Courtney, the two school captains, students, staff and parents, it is a real pleasure for me to spend a few moments at this school, a very large school, obviously a very well respected school and in the short time I've been here I've seen something of the diversity of the education that is offered. I'm greatly encouraged by the fact that this is a school that offers school based apprenticeships because it's very important as we look forward, we understand the critical need to have more apprentices in this country and the importance of elevating technical education to a higher level of respect and esteem in our country.
I also want to take this opportunity, because this is a school within the Catholic education system of the ACT, to pay tribute to the extraordinary strength and at times stoicism of the Catholic education system over the years in this country. And this is a school that instructs students, and leads them to adulthood within the values of the Catholic Church, and they are proudly taught within the school and they are values very widely respected in the broader community.
As I look around this room and particularly to the groups of older students one thinks of many school gatherings that I've been to as Prime Minister. I went to one last weekend which celebrated 50 years of Epping Boys' High School, which is my electorate in Sydney, and one of the things that warmed me, and I was reminded of it when the hands went up a few moments ago, was when I met one of the prefects, I asked him what he wanted to do and he said I want to be a science teacher and I want to come back and teach at Epping Boys' High, which said to me that he'd had a great experience. And we would all hope those of us interested in education that the thing that students most wanted....would want to do is to identify like that with their own school. Now I'm not suggesting that all of you should aspire to be science teachers and come back and teach at St Xavier's. But my point is that if you feel part of a school community and you feel that it is enriching your life, it's something you want to retain a connection with for the rest of your life.
But as I look particularly at the older students, I think of the world that they will enter when they leave, some at the end of this year, some at the end of next year. It'll be a world fortunately that provides greater employment opportunities than at any time over the last 30 to 35 years, and that is terrific thing. When I left school, quite a number of years ago, employment opportunities were then very good, and then we went through a bit of a dip, and now they've come back and come back very strongly. And the opportunities that are available, and I encourage you all to take advantage of opportunities as you leave school, they can be university opportunities, they can be opportunities in technical education, but whatever they may be, grab hold of them, and do them and take advantage of them now because it's always a lot harder to return to some kind of disciple learning later in your life.
I guess there are just two other things I'd like to say to you and that is the importance in your lives of teachers. Parents and teachers, obviously parents come well before teachers, much in all as we respect teachers, parents and teachers are the people who are the most important, formative and guiding influences in your lives. You may not always recognise that, particularly in relation to your teachers and occasionally in relation to your parents, but the guidance and care that teachers display towards their students is something that you should value very greatly and I suspect you'll value even more greatly when you leave this school. And teaching is a really wonderful profession and I suspect that teaching as profession is required to shoulder even greater burdens now than perhaps it was required to shoulder many years ago.
And the last thing that I want to say to you is to echo something that your Principal said in his introductory remarks when he spoke about respect and kindness towards each other. It's something that I say almost every time I address a school gathering, and that is that no matter how you may from time to time think poorly of some of your classmates, and be aggravated by their behaviour, try ever so hard to see something positive in everybody that you relate to. I found when I was in younger life and I've found it in later years that the people who are the happiest, and the best adjusted, and the most contented people on earth are the people who always look for and find something positive, even in the most aggravating person they might come across. And we all occasionally come across people who we find a little aggravating. So the next time that happens to you try and think of something that is really good about that person, and there always is something good about somebody, even though on the surface they may appear a little aggravating. And the great thing about that I found is that it ends up making you a lot happier than you might otherwise be and the happiest people I've found in life are the people who've had a positive view about the character of everybody they relate to.
I want to thank you for the opportunity of coming here today. It's an opportunity to experience a school that is a cross section of the community of Canberra. It's obviously as I said a very popular school, it's a school that's expanded, it's a school that has a good spirit, it's obviously very well led and it is a school that very importantly is not just teaching you to be people who can have a career, and earn a living, and raise a family, which is, of course, very, very important, it is also teaching you about the values of life, it's teaching you about honesty and good ethics, it's teaching you about courtesy and respect and tolerance and it's teaching you to be in every rounded way, very good members of the Australian community. And I pay tribute on behalf of the Government, I pay tribute to the quality of the education that you are receiving here, it will fit you in every way for your future lives. I wish all of you very good fortune for the years ahead. Thank you.
[ends]