Elizabeth South Primary School was the first public school established in Elizabeth (located in Adelaide’s northern suburbs) in 1956. It now serves a community that currently has long-term and compound disadvantage with high levels of transience and unemployment. We are a Category 1 school in the Index of Disadvantage. During 2010 and 2011 there has been an increased student enrolment from New Arrivals programs and school enrolment has increased beyond predicted projections. Our vision, finalised after wide consultation with students, families and staff during 2008, is ‘We are a collaborative learning community in an environment that contributes to learners’ resilience, positive relationships, learning skills and high aspirations’. We have made significant progress towards achieving our vision, reflected in an increased number of families enrolling from outside the community. Our core values are respect, teamwork, diversity and challenge and were identified through a whole-school community consultation process. Parent voice had a strong influence on what they believed was important for the school community. Our vision and values have a strong influence on expectations, class teaching methods and decision making. The Friendly Schools and Families framework is used in conjunction with the Child Protection Curriculum to ensure skills and values for social and emotional development of all children are a strong focus across the school. A recent external validation process confirmed: “A systems approach has been used to account for the many factors and issues impacting on the school’s ability to achieve significant improvement. The deliberate and consistent focus on school improvement has realised a significant cultural shift and considerable improvements in processes and practices of the school, including the development of a pervasive commitment to the achievement of high expectations. The majority of staff were very clear about and committed to learners at Elizabeth South achieving highly. This is..