Capstone videos completed by all Grade 11 and 12 students in the spring of 2019 provided us with compelling evidence that our senior students, regardless of their passions and pathways, were able to reflect on their learning using common language of competenices and attributes. 

In the 2019-2020 year, we added three questions to the Ministry of Education's Student Learning Survey that all of our Grade 10 and Grade 12 students were invited to complete in late February of 2020. 

A. Are you familiar with the Core Competencies and the RHS Learner Profile?  Yes - Somewhat - No

Of the 183 Grade 10 students who responded to the question, the results included 98 students responding with YES, 74 students replied with SOMEWHAT and 11 students replied NO. This indicates that 94% of Grade 10 students are aware of the Core Competencies and RHS Learner Profile. While only 6% of students responded that they were not familiar, our goal is to work to move the 46% of students who are only 'somewhat' or 'not familiar' into the yes category.

Of the 217 Grade 12 students who responded to the question, the results included 117 students responding YES, 84 students replied with SOMEWHAT and 16 students replied NO. This indicates that 93% of Grade 12 students are aware of the Core Competencies and the RHS Learner Profile. While only 7% of students responded that they were not familiar, our goal is to work to move the 46% of students who are only 'somewhat' or 'not familiar' into the yes category.

B. Please describe what competency or attribute you feel you have grown in the most this school year. Please note that the 6 attributes listed below were not included in the survey question; that is, it was a completely open-ended prompt. Student responses were later categorized, and examples included:

Responsible:

I am more responsible and reflective - I see this in my ability to self-manage and self-regulate. Reflecting has invited me to take more responsibility for who I am and what I want to be.

I feel like I have grown the most in the responsibility competency because I have learned to manage my time and be responsible about all of the work I have to get done. In grade 10 there is a lot more work that needs to be done compared to the previous years, I feel like being able to manage those things have helped me grow in the responsibility competency.

I am more aware of my social responsibility especially in terms of recycling and reducing my footprint. It is frustrating that more students are not, but I try to model this every day.

Caring:

I think I developed my caring skills. I have been aware of being nicer to all my peers lately and I also feel like I've got a lot better at being responsible and taking responsibility toward my actions and my peers. I have noticed that people are friendlier to me when I have been caring towards them.

I have been more mindful of caring about others. Volunteering and helping others is helping me develop important skills for the future. I like myself when I am caring towards others.

Reflective:

Taking the time to reflect on my growth has been very helpful. Knowing my strengths and also being honest enough to recognize areas I am not strong at have helped me. Overall, I am proud of how much I have grown in the past few years.

I enjoy seeing how far I have grown as a learner and a person and how I really have become resilient in many ways. By reflecting on core competencies, it has helped me understand how being a critical thinker and a good communicator will help make me a stronger and more successful person in the future.  

Reflections allow me to think about what I need to work on and what areas I have improved in. it actually gives me joy to discover how much I have grown as a learner in just one year. These attributes have helped me grow into a more well-rounded student and person as I have thought about things I would not normally think much about.

Resilient:

I feel as though over the past year I have learned to become more resilient. I have had to overcome both social and academic challenges. Through sources such as my friends, family, and counselors I have talked about how I can face these problems with ease and 'bounce back'.

Resilient - I think about this attribute a lot and how never giving up is a good thing for me.  I have faced some tough times and I kept moving forward. I have grown to learn from my mistakes rather than allow them to create barriers in my mind; I think the competencies have taught me how to be a resilient learner among other things.

Resilence - I had to deal with great stress and pressure from multiple accelerated courses, contests, AP courses and SAT. However, I have overcome these hardships and improved as a person.

I have been knocked over, but I have gotten back up. I like that I am resilient. I also realized that I was quite afraid to take risks, and challenged myself to step out of my comfort zone. I ended up meeting new friends and have closer relationships with people in my school.

I realize that learning involves mistakes and I do not stress about marks as much - this is resiliency and learning from and bouncing back from all of our experiences. As I attempt more difficult courses and the IB program, I have learned that it is important to embrace the fact that we can make mistakes and recover without breaking down.

Communicators:

I am a better communicator and I realize how important this is to every part of my life. I can understand how to communicate with others in a better way by asking more questions and being able to voice my opinion with more ease.  Understanding others and making myself understood.

Communication skills are increasingly important as we have more and more discussions and presentations in all our classes. I've learnt to communicate with a range of audiences, from younger students to teachers and organizations. I've developed public speaking skills through volunteer experiences such as MC for events and giving a speech for club members. This also improved my leadership skills and ability to work in a a team.

I think I have grown as a communicator the most this year. I joined a lot of clubs last year and this year I have stepped into some executive positions, which requires me to work well with my peers.

As my communication skills have improved, so has my confidence in speaking up in class, with my peers and with teachers. I have enhanced my presentation skills through collaborative work with others.

Thinkers:

I believe I have become a much stronger critical thinker in the past year, I have learned to evaluate the knowledge and information that is presented to me. I started to think more critically about the questions I have been asked, and the ones that I am asking. I am also more thoughful about being creative and how this too, is a form of thinking.

My thinking. I often now stop and think about certain things in more ways than one, from more perspectives than one.

I feel that my critical thinking has grown as I am more aware of what and how I am reading and analzying work. I am able to analyze and understand certain elements more (deeper).

I think I have grown in the critical thinking competency and communications, because I have been learning how to question things, and provide constructive criticism as well as handle criticism better.

Thinking; I've learned to think and view situations from a more objective point of view, which helps me not only in school, but also in the real world with things like politics and the news.

C. Please provide an example of how reflecting on the core competencies or the attributes in the RHS Learner Profile have helped you understand yourself as a learner. Some of the open-ended responses included:

As a Grade 12 student this school year, I have been primarily focused on individual work and studies. As a result, a lot of "alone time" causes me to be more reflective of my actions and my work, and with more time to myself, i have an increased amount of time to stop and think about where I am, and where I want to go. I know my strengths and what I need to improve on.

Taking time to look at the core competencies have helped me and makes me feel aware of things we have done. Being able to think about the ways that I relate to the core competencies have made me more reflective as a learner because I have to rethink my past school year. It helps me remember the things I have done throughout the past year that helped me learn and grow as a student.

These have helped me think more about what I am doing and find more meaning in what I am learning. Reflecting on what is outlined in the Learner Profile has allowed me to understand my shortcomings in critical thinking and what I might do about that.  

These have helped me understand myself.  What I think and what I do. This seems like the point of going to school.  I have come to value regular reflection on who I am, and what I hope to accomplish. It has helped me take responsibility for my life.

Reflecting has made me a better learner because it shows me what works and what doesn't work for me, in terms of studying, working, speaking, etc. It also allows me to recognize my growth and what type of relationships I have with the people and peers around me. I hope y'all make a difference

I feel that I have grown more reflective. Reflection has always been apart of my life but I think that the competencies have really taught me how powerful it really can be. In being aware of how the competencies apply to your education and your life, for example, in how you express and communicate your ideas and comprehension of a subject to other students, it helps one understand themselves as a learner and a person.

Reflecting on the learner profile has helped me understand myself as a learner because it makes me realize which attributes I am strong in and which attributes I need to work on more.

Being able to develop my skills as a caring, reflective, thinker impacts the way I learn by helping me in situations where these attributes are needed. It helps me to reflect on things I could've done better. I think this grows me as a learner because it gives me the chance to think about my actions and be more transparent about myself.

I have also learned to be reflective, to think back honestly on what I have done. Reflecting on how I have grown helps me to understand how much progress I have made on myself throughout the years. Even if it doesn't feel like I have changed much, I look back and reflect on the type of student or person I used to be and feel as if I am much different now, for the better. I also see how these attributes will help me in the future, more than a lot of other stuff I learned.

I believe the core competencies and attributes are a good idea but they are poorly executed in some areas of the school.

I can look back and reflect on what I have done in each class. Sometimes I find parts to improve upon, but there are also times where I feel that the reflections are not always helpful and they discourage me.

I did not really pay much attention to the competencies or attributes. Mostly I was too busy doing homework or procrastinating. However, I am also not as self-aware as I should be too.