It is as inconspicuous as they come. Tall brick buildings. A large playground, with black asphalt marked in white paint, is ready for games of boisterous handball. The beige tones of the inner halls are familiar, with the scuffmarks of student’s leather shoes on faded lino.

It is separated by a single characteristic – an unforgiving, black steel fence enclosing its perimeter.

Kingsgrove North High School, a non-descript local government school in Sydney’s southwest, was one the first high schools in New South Wales to have a fence erected. 

It was an unexpected event that led to the addition of the fence in the schools’ aesthetics. In the autumn of 2002, while hundreds of students were preparing for another sweaty sports day, a group of boys were rumoured to be heading toward the school to get ‘revenge’.

They certainly delivered. In the fray of broken bottles, poles, taunts and knives, two Kingsgrove North teenagers were stabbed.

“We really had no idea what had happened,” shrugs Denny Anderson, a graduate of Kingsgrove North High School, who was in year nine when the incident occurred. “It was kind of shocking, but because we didn’t see anything it kind of felt not real.”

“All it meant to us [students] was that we got to go home early that day,” he adds, his mouth curling into a wry smile. 

From the corners of the food technology building, to the recesses of the science labs, rumours was thick. Word was that a schoolmate had been stabbed by a unicorn horn. No, they said, he had been murdered.

“There was lots of hysteria out there, a lot of hysteria amongst kids, a lot of exaggerations about what really happened,” says, Linda Chegwidden, who has taught at Kingsgrove North for 14 years.

“We had to put the lid on it actually, and sort of say look, no, there weren’t 15 people in intensive care and no one died and there wasn’t a gang.”

That night, the news bulletins displayed coifed television reporters under the maroon, gold and blue crest that marks the centerpiece of Kingsgrove North High School. For the staff and students, their five-year battle to rebuild the schools’ standing in the community began here.

Edward Chee, who received a 99.75 UAI and left Kingsgrove North in 2005 with a Premier’s award, also agrees that the media fixation on the perceived violence in public schools leaves the general public with a skewed opinion on the institutions.

 “When [strangers] know it’s a public school, they become very condescending; bombarding me with questions like, ‘How did you survive?’”

“First thing is, it cost us a year 7 class the very next year. We lost our reputation, we got a big fence put up all the way around the school…and we had to do a whole lot of positive things to overturn the negative,” says head history teacher, Peter Dymock.

With schoolyard violence a common feature of current affairs programs, the most recent events attracted controversy after they were posted on popular video sharing site, YouTube. Premier Morris Iemma caved into public demand, promising that 200 more security fences will line playgrounds of local high schools in an attempt to manage just who pays a visit.

However, while the visual intimidation provided by the fence has helped, current principal of Kingsgrove North High School, Helen Wyatt, says that overcoming the problems the school faced after the incident could not be solved simply by investing in large amounts of cold, sterile steel.

“With our enrolments falling, we were getting more kids than were due really that needed a lot of assistance and a lot of help, and a lot of the higher achieving kids were going elsewhere,” she says.

“That was a real issue, and that was a direct result of the media coverage, so we had to turn that around.” 

Sipping a cup of coffee in her office, with tasteful paintings framed against blue walls, and small Asian-themed figurines lining the tables, Wyatt is a figure of calm. But she accepted the position of principal in 2004 knowing there was work to be done.

“I think people, as you would as a parent, you’d be fearful that your child would be safe, safety and security are big issues in parents’ minds.

“The other side is, you want them to be confident that the teaching is being delivered to a high standard,” she says.

While staff-members of Kingsgrove North were confident the school was a safe place to excel, the question of whether parents of current and potential students were aware of this was another matter.

Wyatt’s first point of order was to sell the school to the community. She began by publishing a newsletter focusing on the outstanding achievements of the students.

“I think it’s money well spent. It doesn’t just go out to the community, it goes out to all the staff and the kids so everybody knows what good things are happening in the school…it’s trying to fill that void where the media prints all the bad stories, I’m trying to get the good stories out there,” she says.

Two Director General Awards and a Quality Schooling Award have buoyed the school in the past few years, however this good publicity still has to compete with the negative stereotypes that coincide with being labelled a ‘violent’ public school.

“It was embarrassing to go out in public when it first happened,” says graduate of 2006, Sam Peris. Even his intimidating stature, which now stands at least two heads above everyone on the busy train platform, did nothing to alter perceptions.  

“The community all knew what had happened, and suddenly you’re stared at like this evil kid just because some morons did something bad outside your school.”

Senior Vice President of the Teachers Federation, Bob Lipscombe, says that attitudes such as these are based on media reports that are taken out of context.

“There are 2200 public schools in N.S.W and violence is very low. Bureau of Crime Statistics figures show that schools are some of the safest places in the community.

“That’s not to say that there aren’t incidents that are of concern, but I think that the media reports are blown out of proportion,” he says.

Wyatt agrees, insisting that the 47 different backgrounds in attendance in the classrooms of Kingsgrove North get along as well as humanly possible.

“Given that you’ve got on this side 800 people from different backgrounds who all have to be productive at the one time, in the one place, there is very little conflict,” she says, peering through her small, square glasses.

“The thing is, because you’ve got that concentration of people in the one place it can look like there’s a big issue.”

She smiles brightly when describing her students.

“They’re energetic, they’re positive, they’re polite, they’re fun.”

Just like any other school.

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