Better Buddy Program

The Buddy Program is designed to provide support between junior and senior students by creating friendly and caring school communities.

Better Buddies, an initiative of The Alannah and Madeline Foundation, helps students entering their first year of primary school to feel safe, valued and connected to the school community. The school pairs new primary school students with an older buddy.

This has been taken a step further at St. Carlo where a whole school approach has been adopted to ensure all children Prep- 2 have an older buddy in the school.

They learn the values: caring for others, friendliness, respect, valuing difference, including others and responsibility.

All children in the school learn these values through formal and informal activities. An annual Better Buddies Picnic occurs every year in term one to welcome our prep students and families and for them to meet their grade six buddy and family.

The Better Buddies Framework is a curriculum resource for primary schools, designed to enhance or introduce buddy systems in schools. It is easy to implement and allows teachers to tailor Better Buddies to suit their school, train students to be buddies and source ideas for buddy activities.

Better Buddies is designed to help reduce bullying and create friendly and caring school environments. The Framework builds strong relationships and research shows children benefit immensely - with younger students feeling safe and cared for, and older students feeling valued and respected.

For more information on Better Buddies visit http://www.betterbuddies.org.au/