JULIE Rovere has been recognised for 40 years of service to public education, having taught at Swan Hill College – back when it was Swan Hill Tech – since 1982.
In 2021, Ms Rovere retired from Swan Hill College’s main campus but continued teaching with school’s Flexible Learning Options (FLO) program.
The FLO campus is where the old tech school used to be, and so Ms Rovere said in a way her career has come full circle.
“The rooms I teach in now are the rooms I started teaching in,” she said.
“It’s the kids that I keep coming back for, the kids keep you young. It’s never boring and you never know what’s going to be next.”
Over the course of her career, Ms Rovere has been on around 30 different year seven school camps and seen the digital revolution from inside a classroom.
When Ms Rovere started in the early 80s, she was employed as a teacher and librarian.
“I started in the library, and it was just catalog cards and the Dewey Decimal System,” she said.
“I remember the excitement the first time I saw a CD-ROM; we had the world book on it.”
Slowly the library was digitised, and with the advent of the internet Ms Rovere said teachers today face a different set of challenges.
“It’s really interesting, technology certainly helps you to a point,” Ms Rovere said.
“But there are students who are good at computer games, not necessarily at finding information.
“It’s not so much about finding content, but their problem solving – working out what is real news and fake news.
“Sometimes students will come in and say blanket generalisations. We ask, ‘how do you know that’ or ‘where did you get that from’ and it’s just something they heard on TikTok.
“We still do reading, but it’s more about comprehension and understanding.
“Looking at their beliefs, where they get their beliefs, and trying to show them that they end up getting most of their information from an algorithm that’s fed to them.”
Ms Rovere said it is especially important for young men to learn how to be discerning on the internet, in an age where many are influenced by unsavoury actors online.
“It’s about building relationships in the classroom, and building that respect students have towards each other,” she said.
“We have quite a lot of guest speakers come in to address the issues that go on with online abuse.
“The main thing is that we try and instill that kindness.”
After 40 years of teaching at Swan Hill College, Ms Rovere said she “absolutely” believes in public education.
“You shouldn’t be disadvantaged by how much money your parents make or where you go to school,” she said.
“For a lot of our kids it’s about breaking a cycle, and education is the way how.
“It may not be by going through university, but just being able to navigate the world beyond school is so important, and for kids to have the confidence to try different things.
“In country schools especially, careers education matters so much more because students may not know what’s out there.
“I’m a country girl myself, went to a country school, and both my girls went through Swan Hill College.
“Every child deserves a good, quality education.”
