Forest Street Primary School principal Jillian Burt believes the children of today are the same as those in her very first class 50 years ago.
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The impacts on children from technology, educational research and the environment might be different, but the children themselves are not.
Ms Burt was this week honoured for her milestone 50 years in education during a Recognition of Service ceremony at the Victorian Department of Education.
Those five decades include 30 years at Forest Street, where she has been principal for 20 years, another eight years at the former Grevillea Park Primary School (now Yuille Park Community College) and time in other schools around Ballarat and Geelong.
"I look at the children I had when I first started and I think children are the same in a lot of ways. They are curious, they want to learn, they want to do their best," she said.
"Maybe all the environmental things with mobile phones and digital communication has an impact on them but children are still curious and fun to be around, and have got their own little quirky ways," she said.
Becoming a principal was never part of Ms Burt's plan, and even after taking on the role she assumed it would just be for a short time.
"I was teaching at Grevillea Park and came to Forest Street on a four-week placement and the rest is history. Someone left and I was here as a teacher, then picked up the principal role 20 years ago," she said.
"I think I would have been really sad to know that last day of my teaching had come about, but I thought I will do this (be principal) for a short period of time and it never happened."
The support from staff at the school, and from the Department of Education's regional office, helped her grow into the role.
"That has enabled me to develop my teaching and leadership over that period," she said.
That support includes assistant principal Lisa Richardson, who has been in her role for 20 years.
"I don't think I would have ever managed in the role without the support of the wonderful staff," she said.
Ms Burt remembers the names of each child in the first grade she taught at Highton Primary School in Geelong when it was a rural school, and delights when she sees former pupils and hears what they are up to now.
In some cases she has seen and taught several generations of the same family come through the school.
"Over the years I worry about some of the children and hope you've done the best for them and hope they are going to achieve in some way in their life," she said.
"I have them come up and say 'you taught me' and they've done so well - some of the ones you worry about are the ones where they've got their job, they've moved on, had a family."
Ms Burt said 50 years in teaching felt like both a long time and a short time.
"Fifty years is a long, long time but it's funny because it seems to have gone so quickly," she laughed.
The children at Forest Street have been quick to remind their principal how long 50 years is though, with more than one commenting "that's much older than my parents".
The amount of planning and research, the science of education and today's crammed curriculums are among the biggest changes she has seen over her time in education, along with the obvious changes in technology and digital skills.
The social and emotional work teachers do to meet the varying needs of their class is also drastically different.
"Previously in some of my grades I had around 30 to 35 students and differentiation was to give them more work if they are able to cope, or less if not. There wasn't the broad range of curriculum planning and I think that's a big change," she said.
"On a Friday afternoon children would watch a movie while we (teachers) planned as a group for the next week," she said.
"I look at the curriculum documents we had and they were very simple books we followed, whether it's teaching maths or English. Now you look at the huge amount of curriculum knowledge, of professional learning staff are expected to do, and sometimes it's overwhelming how much there is and how do you bring it to the level of children in the classroom."
The school is in the midst of a $5.6 million upgrade and hoping to move into their new building within weeks to enjoy the modern spaces, extra rooms, new library and office and planning areas for staff.
Apart from a building constructed through the federal government's Building the Education Revolution initiative, which ran from 2009-2011, there have been no substantial upgrades to the school for many years.
"It's a privilege to be able to work with students every day and try to do the very best for them," she said. "The days are never boring. There's always challenge and excitement."
