At his peak: Year 8 co-ordinator Ben Hawthorne is enjoying the challenges at Lauriston.
SHANNON MORRIS
Hairy moments are common for high-school teachers. But most of Ben Hawthorne’s have happened hundreds of kilometres from the nearest classroom.
Hawthorne is a dedicated alpine climber, and one of his most hair-raising experiences happened while scaling New Zealand’s Aiguilles Rouges alone. Such mountains are entrancing in their scale and beauty but can also be dangerous and unforgiving.
“I got onto this rock ridge that was quite rotten on one side,” Hawthorne recalls, “and I had to cross over to the other side to get onto a decent headwall. The ridge was probably the width of the chair that you’re sitting on.
“I was standing on the ridge and there was a big rock just below that would have been the size of a small fridge and I was about to jump on it, then I thought, ‘No, I’d better not do that, I’ll sit down and do it a bit more securely’.
“I sat down and put my foot on the rock and as soon as my foot touched it, the rock fell nearly 1000 metres down the slope.”
Hawthorne had another close call on the 3754-metre Mount Cook, which he tackled with Gordon Begg, a former teacher. Begg had introduced him to rock climbing in year 11, so Hawthorne was returning the favour on New Zealand’s highest mountain.
“On the descent he stumbled coming down a steep slope on the Empress Glacier,” Hawthorne says. “We were roped up and he slipped past me. Because you are roped up, if he didn’t stop he would have pulled me off.
“He literally slid past me and I remember stepping out of his road so he didn’t knock me over. I thought, ‘He’s not going to stop’, so I threw myself onto the ground and basically dived on top of my ice axe to try and hold him.
“The rope went tight but I think he stopped at about the same time as the rope went tight, so he didn’t pull me over. Afterwards it was like … ‘that was a close one’.”
Thankfully, such close calls are few and far between, and the talented young teacher has enjoyed many satisfying moments attempting to reach summits in New Zealand and Nepal. The determination and discipline he displays while climbing have also helped him succeed in the classroom, where teaching teenagers requires endless patience and stamina.
At just 33 Hawthorne, who is set to finish up as Year 8 Co-ordinator at Lauriston Girls’ School in Armadale at the end of the year, has already scaled great heights in the classroom. He has held several management positions, including a stint at the school’s unique Howqua high country campus.
A natural teacher, Hawthorne combined his enthusiasm for the outdoors with a passion for research and a willingness to try new experiences in and out of the classroom.
Growing up on a farm in South Australia was the perfect start for someone who loved sport, particularly golf, footy and tennis, and generally being outdoors. A solid and supportive family also helped.
Hawthorne and his parents, Dianne and Gary, his brother, Jason, now 31 and a Canberra computer programmer, and sister Christy, now 28 and a Geelong chiropractor, lived on a sheep farm near Orroroo in the southern Flinders Ranges. The children attended Orroroo Area School, which was 17 kilometres away and had fewer than 200 students from prep to year 12.
Each morning they’d either get a lift or ride their bikes to the bus stop in the tiny town of Pekina, leaving the bikes at a local shop. It was an idyllic childhood with plenty of wide open spaces, friendship and sport.
“Our farm was two kilometres out of town. Pekina was a shop, a pub and that’s pretty much it,” Hawthorne says. “Everyone knew each other. It was fun. Your social life was very much to do with school.”
With friends living up to 20 kilometres away, after-school plays were usually weekend sleepovers. Sport was also huge. “Those sorts of communities revolve fairly heavily around sport,” Hawthorne says. “For me it was tennis and in earlier days it was golf, but then that became football. Your weekends were often based around sport.”
Hawthorne’s mother Dianne is also a teacher and still works in local primary schools around Orroroo as an emergency teacher. Gary runs the family’s 1300-hectare sheep and wheat farm, which has 2000 sheep.
When her children were at school Dianne sometimes worked at Orroroo, so several times Hawthorne found himself in his mother’s class. While it wasn’t a problem, as most of his friends knew his mother, there was the odd awkward moment.
“I remember a friend I went to school with got into trouble and went to badmouth her after the lesson and he saw me sitting next to him and he just instantly stopped,” he says, laughing.
Seeing his mother work and have after-hours school involvement gave Hawthorne a taste for teaching from a young age. A seed was quietly sown, and blossomed when he moved to Adelaide’s Westminster School as a boarder from year 10.
Hawthorne loved his time there and met some fine teachers who helped inspire him to pursue a life in the classroom, including Gordon Begg and Andrew Pope.
The climbing bug also took hold, and he managed the best of both worlds by scaling mountains in New Zealand during summer holidays while studying and starting his teaching career.
After completing a degree in exercise and sports science at the University of South Australia, Hawthorne qualified as a teacher in 2001. He immediately headed to Nepal to work for friend and Everest conquerer Duncan Chessell, who had just started a commercial guiding company. While there, Hawthorne guided on Lobuche East, Island Peak, Pokalde and Ama Dablam.
Ama Dablam is 6800 metres, compared with Everest’s 8800, but it’s still huge in anyone’s language. “I didn’t summit … because I couldn’t feel my hands at about 6500 metres,” Hawthorne says.
Mountain climbers no doubt tire of people asking when they are going to tackle Mount Everest. It is the holy grail for many, but as Hawthorne discovered, there is more to mountaineering than sheer height. He did aspire to conquer Everest for a while, but developed an interest in more technical climbing.
“I was quite keen for a while but my interest started to move into steeper more technical climbing in New Zealand,” he explains. “For an Everest trip you need a lot of money, you need a lot of time. The training you could fit in with work, but the issue is the actual time off work; it’s realistically three months, probably even more.”
When he returned from Nepal, Hawthorne secured his first full-time teaching job at Victoria’s Hamilton and Alexandra College as head of outdoor education – a department that consisted of just him. The young graduate was comfortable from the start teaching physical education, outdoor education and geography.
He enjoyed the Hamilton school and would have stayed longer than the four years he had there if he hadn’t met his Melbourne-based wife, Britt.
Britt, 31, a primary school teacher, was visiting a friend and colleague of Hawthorne’s when they were introduced. They have been together since and married in 2008. Initially it was tough; to see each other, she had to drive to Hamilton or he had to drive to Melbourne.
About that time Hawthorne came close to working full-time as a mountain guide, but after meeting Britt in 2004, love ruled. When it became clear things were serious, despite his partner having no interest in climbing – she’d rather read a book – he found a job at Overnewton Anglican Community College in Keilor.
“For a while it was either my weekends were in Melbourne or hers were in Hamilton,” Hawthorne says. “We did that for a year and a half, and then I moved to Melbourne.”
At Overnewton, Hawthorne taught VCE outdoor environmental studies, PE and health and human development, junior PE and year 10 geography. He thrived. “That was great,” he says. “That was where I really got into senior class teaching.”
Less than two years later Hawthorne secured his dream job as director of the outdoor program at Lauriston’s Howqua campus. For six months Britt stayed in Melbourne, teaching and visiting on weekends. She moved up in 2008.
“At the end of that we vowed that we’d always be living in the same place,” Hawthorne says. Soon after came their boys Charlie, 2, and Oscar, nine months.
Howqua is the world’s only year-long extended-stay outdoor education program at an all-girls school. Each year since 1993, Lauriston’s year 9 students have spent a year living at the Victorian high-country facility. They share houses and must keep them clean and get along together. Technology is limited; students can read newspapers but don’t have access to television, the internet or mobile phones.
Howqua’s three pillars are its traditional academic program, pastoral care for girls living away from home for the first time and an extensive outdoor program.
It is an incredible experience during which students mature, develop life skills and enjoy activities such as hiking, mountain biking, rock climbing, cross-country and downhill skiing, white-water canoeing and horse riding.
Hawthorne spent almost three years at Howqua. He ran the outdoor program for the first year, then became director of operations. He also taught science before returning to Lauriston’s Armadale campus at the start of 2010, partly for family reasons.
Although it keeps him indoors more, Hawthorne is relishing his role as year 8 co-ordinator, which helps prepare students for their Howqua experience. It also allows him to teach VCE subjects, which he loves.
“I was very interested in moving into a more pastoral role,” Hawthorne explains. “It does sound very different to teaching at Howqua, but I don’t find that it is.”
Lauriston is a historic school with a modern touch. Founded in 1901 by sisters Margaret and Lilian Irving to educate young women, it has always encouraged them to excel academically and in sport. The school, which now has 950 students ranging from three-year-old kinder to year 12, moved to its current site in 1907.
Historic buildings are complemented by modern facilities and plenty of greenery, including a magnificent old Moreton Bay fig.
The school has constantly updated and moved with the times, purchasing two heritage buildings in the 1970s to house primary grades, and opening Howqua in 1993. It also has a dedicated year 7 and 8 centre where Hawthorne is based.
Not content with simply being an excellent teacher and co-ordinator, he is also studying for a masters degree in student well-being, using a proactive approach in an attempt to prevent potential problems.
“It’s based on positive psychology where, instead of looking at psychology where you’re fixing problems … it’s looking at that proactive side,” he says. “Part of it is prevention, but it’s looking at people who don’t have problems. It’s trying to teach some of those skills and traits of those who succeed.”
Hawthorne also admires aspects of the work of the late German educator Kurt Hahn, a key figure in the development of experiential education.
“It’s really based on the whole idea of character building and learning from experience rather than purely focusing on the academic,” Hawthorne says. “They are learning in a group co-operative environment so that’s quite a powerful working experience.”
The results of this approach are obvious when Lauriston’s year 9 students return from Howqua and start year 10. In an age where parents are criticised for overprotecting and mollycoddling children, these students know how to live independently and co-operate as young adults.
“They get along with everyone in their group,” Hawthorne says. “They’ve gone through this year where it’s socially, emotionally and physically challenging and they become closer, they get to know everyone because they are forced to live with each other and they don’t choose their groups. “They seem more mature here and they seem … like they’ve got more life experience. It’s to do with the community living.”
Bullying is also minimised. “Every now and then you will get a flare-up within the group where there will be some kind of an issue, but because it’s dealt with there and then it’s not a problem,” Hawthorne says.
Life could not get much better for this dynamic young educator, who also appreciates the wealth of experience around him. He has two other PE teachers in year 8 and three others teaching year 7 science with him. Two Armadale campus teachers, Sam Ridley and Andrew Borthwick, hav3e also taught at Howqua.
“You can bounce ideas, you can feed off each other … and I really enjoy that,” says Hawthorne.
Experienced teachers also learn from Hawthorne, who has made a big impact in a relatively short time. His enthusiasm and love of learning is infectious, and he is always looking for ways to improve what he does.
Lauriston’s deputy principal and head of senior school, Nene MacWhirter, says: “Ben is a dynamic and caring young teacher. He provides the perfect link between our Armadale campus and our Howqua campus for his year 8 students.”
While he loves teaching and his family, climbing will always be a big part of this keen outdoorsman’s life. Few experiences beat reaching the summit of a difficult mountain with the wind in your hair; you literally feel on top of the world. But does he take fewer risks now that he’s a father? “Definitely.”
Climbing is “on hold” for now, but Hawthorne wants to return to the mountains when teaching and family commitments allow. “I’m pretty keen to return to alpine climbing at some stage, hopefully in the near future,” he says, insisting the risk of something going wrong can be minimised, just as it can in the classroom.
“The classic example is there’s certain terrain that if you’re climbing together with a partner … you won’t rope up, but if either of you fall you’re probably going to fall a long way and you’re not going to survive,” he says.
“But the real risk is moving so slowly on this terrain that the sun’s going to have time to warm up the slope and the whole slope’s going to give way on you, or it’s going to loosen rocks and you’re going to be killed by rockfall. It’s about minimising the biggest risk and in the process accepting a smaller risk.”
To the rest of us it all sounds pretty scary. But as Hawthorne explains, he feels safer during a well-planned climb than risking life and limb with dangerous drivers on the road – something we all do daily. When you think about it, those rocky mountain peaks don’t look quite so bad.
Success stories \ Lauriston old girls
Kit Willow Podgornik
Attended \ Lauriston Girls’ School, class of 1993
CV \ Fashion designer
At school Willow received colours for drama and athletics, but fashion became her passion. She debuted in 2003 at Australian Fashion Week and premiered at London Fashion Week in 2004. In 2005 Willow was one of 10 brands to have a fully sponsored runway show during New York Fashion Week. As a young girl she loved clothes and worked in fashion shops while studying marketing and psychology at Monash University. The first Willow flagship boutique opened in Sydney in 2008, then a second and third followed in Melbourne in 2009. Willow is now a global business with collections sold worldwide.
Sandie de Wolf
Attended \ Lauriston Girls’ School, class of 1966
CV \ Berry Street CEO
De Wolf was a school prefect, house vice-captain and captain of Lauriston’s netball team. She has worked in the welfare field since the early 1970s, starting as a case worker before moving into management. In 1994 de Wolf became Berry Street CEO when it merged with Sutherland Homes for Children. In 2009 de Wolf, who has won several awards and served on various boards and committees, received an AM for her services to child and family welfare. In 2011 she was inducted into the 2011 Victorian Women’s Honour Roll.
Stephanie Moorhouse
Attended \ Lauriston Girls’ School, class of 2005
CV \ Former Olympic gymnast, sports commentator
Moorhouse loved gymnastics as a child and by grade four trained 25 hours a week. At Lauriston she was a Victorian Institute of Sport gymnast in partnership with Lauriston’s modified education program and scholarship support for elite gymnasts. Moorhouse won gold with the 2002 Commonwealth Games women’s artistic gymnastics team at 15. Moorhouse made the all-round final at the 2004 Athens Olympics, and is now the women’s and men’s program manager for Gymnastics Australia and a gymnastics commentator.
Dr Clare Scott
Attended \ Lauriston Girls’ School, class of 1982
CV \ Medical researcher
Scott won a Lauriston biology prize in 1982. She was also a prefect, won a Duke of Edinburgh gold award and enjoyed musicals, choir and madrigals. She studied medicine at the University of Melbourne, trained at the Royal Melbourne Hospital and the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre as a medical oncologist, and gained her PhD in Professor Glenn Begley’s laboratory at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research with post-doctoral studies at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Long Island, New York. She is now a medical oncologist at the Royal Melbourne and laboratory head at WEHI.