Albany Senior High School, led by Principal Barbara Cavanagh, is a senior college in New Zealand focused on developing the strengths and talents of every student and ensuring that they have experiences that set them up to succeed in the world once they leave the school environment. ASHS knows that students are no longer passive recipients of knowledge, but should be engaged as individuals in a dynamic, two-way process between teachers and learners because research has shown that students learn best when they feel valued and are actively engaged in their learning. They use three strands within their curriculum to achieve this:

• tutorials - students meet twice a week for 100 minutes to work with tutors to develop their learning power

• specialist subjects - students choose five subjects on which to become experts

• impact projects - students take their learning to the world by developing individual projects from their passions and interests; they have one day aweek dedicated to this work.

The school boasts modern, shared learning spaces where teachers work side-by-side with students. ASHS knows that relationships between teachers and students are the key to success for every student and the school works hard to develop positive learning relationships with each student so they can confidently leave knowing "how they are bright". The teachers operate on the belief that "if you have taught something and the students have not learned it, then you have not taught it". They are involved in personal professional inquiries which supports their own learning about why some students fail to understand what they have taught.