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23 June 2025

Join us as Jared Daly, Assistant Principal of Equity and Inclusion at Murray Bridge High School shares how Tailored Learning, formally known as Flexible Learning Options, is making a difference for students facing barriers like anxiety, disengagement or complex home lives. He outlines how his site has transformed its support model by expanding its Independent Learning Centre, creating new programs and redesigning physical spaces to better meet student needs. This episode offers practical examples and leadership reflections for schools exploring or expanding their tailored learning provision.

Show Notes

• For more information, visit
• Contact: education.TailoredLearning@sa.gov.au

Transcript

Dale Atkinson: Hello and welcome to Teach a podcast about teaching and learning in ���ϳԹ�. My name's Dale Atkinson from ���ϳԹ�'s Department for Education, and today we're joined by Jared Daley, who's assistant Principal, Equity and Inclusion at Murray Bridge High School. Jared, welcome to you.

Jared Daly: Howdy, Thanks for having me.

Dale Atkinson: So today we're talking about Tailored Learning, which is replaced Flexible Learning Options, tale of Learning is designed to support young people through a wraparound and support them to address their personal barriers. They may be having some struggles with attendance for all sorts of reasons anxiety, depression, unstable accommodation, family complexities, pregnancy, parenting, a whole variety of things. And so, we're talking to Jared about that today. Jared, tell us a little bit, first of all, about your site. What does it look like?

Jared Daly: Yeah, cool. Okay, so I suppose, moving from FLO over to Tailored Learning we’ve changed what we've got on offer, which has been a real benefit for our students. So previously we had a building called the Independent Learning Centre, which is offsite down the main street in Murray Bridge, and it had around 120 students that were engaging in the centre each year since moving to Tailored Learning the Independent Learning Centre has expanded to about 160 students offsite, and then we've been able to add a reach out program and an ILP program, which are on onsite for students in the middle years.

So yeah, it's really, I suppose, allowed us to capture the students in the middle years, and we probably found that that was a bit of a gap we had before. We were capturing sort of 16, 17, 18-year-olds in years 10, 11, and 12. But there wasn't sort of that program or opportunities for students that are in year 8 and 9 that maybe mainstream schooling wasn't working for them.

Dale Atkinson: And how have the tailored programs changed for that student cohort?

Jared Daly: Previously we actually kind of ran our own reach out program we funded it ourselves. We decided that we had a need for it one of the problems we found was we had students sort of with those anxiety around high school, or coming to schooling backgrounds in the class.

But we also had students with disengagement in the class. And when you put students that are disengaged with maybe ADHD or high levels of energy in the classroom with students with a high level of anxiety that didn't necessarily work out quite as planned. But I suppose the real benefit of tailored learning was we were able to learn from that and saw the need, that there was a need for both classes and then we were able to start up both programs and sort of now we're sort of seeing the benefits of that in students in both spaces having their own space that they can engage in.

Dale Atkinson: What are the mechanics of arranging that structurally for your staff and for your site physically look like?

Jared Daly: So obviously the Independent Learning Centre’s offsite, we rent that building. In terms of at the high school, we did a bit of reshaping of our library, I suppose, as seems to be going the way these days, school libraries and libraries aren't as used. So we shortened the space in our library and built a new wellbeing hub at the back of our library, which it used to have a quite a large conference room in there. So we turned that conference room into a classroom for the reach out space and then in terms of the, the ILP program, we were quite lucky. We had a bit of space in the modular and so we've sort of transformed one of those or two of those classrooms into a learning space for the ILP program. So I suppose fairly fortunate that we had most of the space available where I speak to quite a few other schools and hear what they've got to say and their biggest hurdle is the space where we were fortunate enough to sort of already have existing spaces available.

Dale Atkinson: That's a huge benefit. Now, in terms of, you were selected as a sample school for the Tailored Learning Program and work pretty closely with the program redesign team. What's the support there look like from the redesign team?

Jared Daly: Yeah, so they're a team of ever changing number, but I'll say half a dozen to a dozen, and they've been really supportive, whether that's, you know, from Pam up the top, Pam Kent or Sam McCaffery and then we've also, every school has their own sort of support which works alongside them as well.

So at the moment we've got Angie and Sonya and that's changed a little bit over the years, but they've been really supportive. So, whether that's from a policy and procedures or funding point of view or whatever, Tailored Learning tool or all sorts of different things that they're able to offer that support and I suppose like you said, we're fairly lucky there hasn't been huge changes for us, but I suppose for those schools venturing into the Tailored Learning space for the first time, they're able to support with all of those different, um, perspectives.

Dale Atkinson: So what kind of tailored programs have you been able to create for the students through the program.

Jared Daly: Yeah, so our Independent Learning Centre is a space for year 10 to 12 students. We just focus on SACE down there, one of the really key things that I always bang on about, and I've banged on about this morning at the Tailored Learning Leaders Day was. Each site needs to have and know their why, I suppose, our why’s for learning or re-engaging students in learning.

So the students know they're coming in to do learning. But yeah, so the independent learning centre’s a real big focus on supporting students to complete their safe or whatever their future pathway is. So, there is some young people that school's not for them, SACE isn't for them, maybe an apprenticeship, maybe moving into the workforce or supporting them to have the necessary skills and documentation to move into the workforce or future study or education or whatever it might be. With the ILP program and the reach out program back on the mainstream site I suppose it's putting those wraparounds as you said in place before. So, I suppose sometimes the curriculum takes a backseat to start with because it's about, you know, reengaging the students, making them feel safe to come back to school or onto school grounds and just feeling safe with the staff members as well.

So sometimes, you know, you can all sorts of different programs to support them with that and then when the individual's ready, then we sort of get back into that learning program and hopefully they either reengage with mainstream schooling or worst-case scenario, that sounds bad, not worst case scenario, but at least they've got the option to move on to the ILP and complete their education there.

Dale Atkinson: Now, are there any stories that stick out for you over the last couple of years since the transition in terms of how the kids have been able to interact and, and the outcomes for them?

Jared Daly: I could pick one of a number, but I suppose one really positive story is we've had a young man who was in a metropolitan high school that wasn't going so well, sort of suspension and excluded quite often in the year before he joined us I don't think he really did more than sort of 5 to 10 days at school because he was just constantly excluded. He moved up to Murray Bridge with another family member and since then he's sort of reengaged with school. He's there every day without fail loves to chat, he spent all of last year with us at the Independent Learning Centre. Chipped away at his year 11, you know, there was times during the year where I can remember he'd come up and he'd be banging on my door, and he'd be like “I've got an A” or whatever it might be. And just, yeah, to see him it sort of reengaged successfully in schooling and it's, you know, turned into this year he's moved back, not full-time to the high school, but he has been able to reengage at the high school when he is doing a certificate VET course at the high school and he is also doing a choice subject back at the high school. So it's been really cool to see him going from pretty much, not being able to attend mainstream schooling to return to education and hopefully later this year or early next year he'll achieve his SACE and you know, I can see a positive future for him he'll move into the workforce and find the thing that's right for him and yeah, that's just one of the many, many sort of positive stories.

Dale Atkinson: It's a huge outcome, very personally and professionally rewarding, I would imagine.

Jared Daly: Yeah. Yeah.

Dale Atkinson: In terms of the role of the case managers in the new settings, what does that look like and what's the relationship between you guys and the case management now?

Jared Daly: Yeah, so we're maybe a little bit different from some other schools. We employ all our own youth workers or case managers at Murray Bridge High School. One reason for that is obviously being, whether you want to call us remote or not, obviously we're a little bit further out, so services aren't as readily available in Murray Bridge. So we've always chosen employ our own youth workers where some sites do use externals which is absolutely fine, that's their prerogative. But yeah, so for us I suppose in 2023, we had four case workers at the high school providing wraparound just at the Independent Learning Centre.

Since then, at the moment we've got six at the Independent Learning Centre and four on site at the high school. So we've sort of gone from four youth workers to roughly ten or eleven. So yeah, they've been able to provide those or that wraparound support, but also create really beneficial relationships with the students and normally they're the go-to person for the students. So making the, the student feel comfortable and safe, having that safe person to go to at school, 'cause we all know sometimes the teachers all have great intentions and create really great relationships, but sometimes the students still sees that person as a teacher, where the youth worker, that case manager sort of has that more softly approach and more approachable person. So yeah.

Dale Atkinson: It’s a different relationship.

Jared Daly: Yeah, for sure.

Dale Atkinson: What are your key takeaways? What would you tell other schools about engaging with this program, with the Tailored Learning provision?

Jared Daly: Yeah, it was interesting, earlier today I was at the Tailored Learning Leaders Day and presented there, but interesting first thing this morning, Pam sort of, Pam Kent, who runs Tailored Learning or oversees Tailored Learning. She spoke about some stats of like FLO to Tailored Learning and I think it was something like 74 schools were using FLO and now it's like 113 using Tailored Learning or something like that.

And this year alone in the department, schools have hired 94 youth workers and I think without knowing all the stats, those stats show that there's been this massive need for something else. Whether COVID had a bit of an impact on that, who really knows, but I'm sure it contributed. But yeah, I think it's really benefited a lot of schools that were finding they've got a whole lot of different students with varying needs and their mainstream setting wasn't able to provide or meet the needs of a what was becoming too many young people. And Tailored Learning’s really benefited a lot of schools and been able to reengage young people anywhere from year 8 to year 12 with their learning, which is only, you know, I suppose in terms of us as a, a state and a country, it's only going to benefit us longer term if our young people are staying engaged in their education and having success. So, yeah I couldn't speak highly enough of it.

Dale Atkinson: Thank you very much Jared. The show notes will have some more information about Tailored Learning in them, so if you'd like to check out or find out more, please check out the show notes. Jared Daley, thank you very much for your time.

Jared Daly: Thanks for having me.