Peter Botsman Award - 2014

Katie Lipka

Katie Lipka is an outstanding teacher of English whose innovative curriculum design and delivery encourage students to fully engage in a range of traditional and contemporary literacies.  
As a classroom teacher at St Laurence’s College, Katie has shown exemplary dedication to her students, to the school, to her colleagues and to the teaching of English. She is a teacher whose love of English is seen every day in her classroom. She is a passionate, engaging and enthusiastic teacher, who models inclusive education in her classroom practice and has been both very generous in sharing her practice with other teachers and very active in curriculum development.
Katie highly values professional development and has shared her classroom practice at both State and National Conferences, showcasing the work she has done on including Indigenous and Torres Strait Islander perspectives in the English Curriculum, allowing students to develop a stronger appreciation of Indigenous Australian culture, past and present, their nation’s history and the value of hearing the stories of Australia’s “first families”. Katie has made invaluable connections between local elders and our school community in an endeavour to enhance student understanding of the Turrbal and Jagera peoples. Katie also has a keen interest In Native American and Environmental Literature.
Katie is, indeed, a most worthy recipient of a Botsman Award in the school category.