Eynesbury College

Eynesbury College was established on 1 October 1989 in the historic Eynesbury House at 69 Belair Road, Kingswood, South Australia. The college was the first senior secondary school in the state to offer Year 11 and 12 courses to full fee paying domestic and international students, with an English Language Centre. The first program of English Language Intensive Courses for Overseas Students (ELICOS) commenced in November 1989. The foundation intake of Year 11 and Year 12 students began studies on 22 January 1990.

Eynesbury offered an innovative and distinctive model of teaching and learning. The model emphasised the importance of teaching with minimal administrative bureaucracy, where teachers exercised a high level of autonomy and input into college decision-making. Students engaged with teachers in student-teacher partnerships, in an adult learning environment, where the emphasis was on study skills and independent learning.

Dimensions of the Eynesbury model have since been adopted by virtually every public, independent, and non-secular school, in South Australia, ensuring an enduring legacy. But this is only part of the bigger picture of Eynesbury. The senior secondary school was integral to the formation of innovative public-private sector relationships between the umbrella company of Eynesbury and the university sector.

In November 2021 (after some 32 years), Eynesbury Senior College (for domestic students) and the senior secondary component of Eynesbury College (for international students) were closed, amidst ongoing financial fall-out from the Covid pandemic. Eynesbury College nevertheless continued, with the Eynesbury College Academy of English (ELICOS) and a university Foundation Studies Program (FSP) for international students. The College also became the provider of Higher Education (HE) diploma programs, previously delivered by the Eynesbury Institute of Business and Technology (EIBT).

The initial vision was for a private, specialist, pre-university, senior high school, with courses only for the final two years of post-compulsory education. The school would be independent, secular, non-denominational and co-educational. There would be an explicit pre-university focus, involving a different approach to teaching and learning, providing transitional steppingstones from school to university. Students would have more flexible timetables and longer lessons than other schools. They would study in a mature, adult learning environment, where the emphasis was on collegiate, teacher-student partnerships. Classes would be small, and pedagogy would focus on independent learning, supported by study and time management skills. Students would receive out-of-class tuition from teachers on a first name basis, with the absence of uniforms and younger students. Distinctively, the school would also have a significant proportion of overseas students.

The Eynesbury story really began in 1983, with the election of the Hawke Labour Government, and by 1985, Australian institutions were able to offer their courses overseas, in the major emerging markets of Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore and Hong Kong.

By the mid 1980’s, Tasmania and the ACT had established senior secondary colleges, suited to the needs of students during the last two years of high school education, but there was no equivalent in South Australia.

In 1986, the founders of Eynesbury, Noel Guerin, Dr Anthony (Tony) Stimson and Malcolm Raedel, were colleagues at Kensington Park College of TAFE (Department of Technical and Further Education), Adult Matriculation School, where they experienced first-hand, the embryonic beginnings of international education in Australia.

Supported by wives, Dianne Guerin, Jan Baker and Deborah Raedel, the founders were also becoming increasingly alive to the potential for applying elements of the TAFE Adult Matriculation operation, to a younger, post compulsory, school-age cohort of students.

They believed that there should be a market for an independent, co-educational, secular, non-denominational school that was a senior college, just for Year 11 and Year 12 students, free from the distractions of younger students, without formal sporting programs and extra-curricular activities.

The College would also be a specialist pre-university college, only offering academic programs, involving Year 11 and publicly examined Year 12 subjects, for students who sought entry to, and success at, university.

The primary role would be to provide a bridge from a conventional school to tertiary studies, offering a learning environment that would encourage young adults to develop their full potential as scholars and as people. It would embrace a staff of specialist teachers, with an emphasis on academic excellence and the development of independent learning and study skills.

The College would be privately owned, self-funded and self-reliant, without support from a founding church, without external backers or investors, would not qualify for government funding and would pay taxes like any other proprietary limited company. Viability would be entirely dependent on tuition fees, which would be set in the low, middle range for Independent schools.

The timetable would be structured into two, two-hour classes per subject (rather than the common 35 or 40-minute periods in schools) and would extend over a longer school day (from 8.45am to 5.45pm), providing greater flexibility in time management and optimal subject choice. Students would only be required to attend classes for 20 hours per week. Outside of formal classes, students would manage their time in private study and receive one-to-one personal tuition from teachers as needed.

The vision was to attract students from a broad range of abilities who were ambitious, committed and prepared to work hard to develop their full academic potential. From the start Eynesbury was open to students who may not have fitted easily into more conventional schools.

The College would also have a significant proportion of international students, if successful in tapping into the emerging export education market being opened in the public and private sectors by the Australian Government.

High Schools at the time, occupied two ends of a spectrum:

At one end, the great majority of Australian schools had almost all domestic students, with a few internationals.
At the other end, a small number of schools, like Taylors College in Melbourne or Beaufort College in Perth, had almost all international students.
No school had a substantial mix of both, but the international goal created significant additional challenges.

The founders would need to establish an English Language (ELICOS) Centre, to raise the level of English proficiency of most overseas students. They would need to develop a dedicated enrolment system that complied with evolving Government regulations for visa processing and fee payment. They would need to establish dedicated student welfare and support systems, including accommodation, such as home-stay. And most fundamentally, they would need to attract students through private agents in overseas markets.

In terms of management of the College, there would not be a single “Principal”, rather a “flat” structure, with three Directors or Co-Principals, each with defined areas of responsibility, to optimise expertise and potential for growth.