2008 Awards
Teacher Award
Ms Carolyn (Caz) Soeters
Outreach Singing Program Coordinator, ESL and LA Teacher
Jervis Bay Primary School, Jervis Bay Village, ACT
Jervis Bay Primary is located within the HMAS CRESWELL Navy base, within Booderee National Park at Jervis Bay. Students come from a range of backgrounds, but most are from the Wreck Bay Indigenous community and the Navy community. There are many students with special needs, ranging from autism, through behavioural needs, and students dealing with grief due to the loss of close family members.
Caz started her teaching career as a general classroom teacher with no musical background and with great nervousness about engaging in music. Through involvement in the ANU's Music Education Program she overcame her fears, developed her musical instincts and skills and honed them across an entire primary school in the ACT which previously had no music. She is now applying the particular social philosophy of the Music Education Program at Jervis Bay School for the betterment of the entire community, including its large indigenous population.
She is training and supporting both teachers in her school and community members in applying the approach. She not only believes in the musical rights of all but is actively engaged in proving that belief on a daily basis.