🤖 Microsoft Copilot & AI
All staff have Microsoft 365 (including Copilot) through BCE — student access (13+) is being introduced too. See Model of Pedagogy for the full AI policy; the short version:
- Staff may use AI to help plan lesson activities aligned to ACARA/QCAA, and to draft formative feedback on student work
- You must always read student work yourself first, and edit/approve any AI-assisted feedback — it reflects your judgement, not the AI's
- AI must never make summative judgements, allocate grades, or replace moderation
- Only use tools within the Microsoft suite — that's what keeps student data covered under BCE's agreements
💬 Microsoft Teams
Two confirmed uses of Teams at Sophia College:
- Staff Communicare: every Sunday afternoon in term time, a Teams message outlines the week ahead. Read it by close of business Tuesday and give it a thumbs-up to confirm
- Extreme weather: College Leadership alerts staff to changes in break/duty procedures via Teams — stay at your duty area until told otherwise
Add guidance on staff Teams channels and meeting etiquette. Parent-facing comms go through Engage instead, not Teams.
✉️ Outlook & email
Add expectations for professional email use, signature template, and response-time expectations.
🧾 Other BCE systems: Spire, iLearn & Ignite
Three more BCE-wide systems you'll be set up on during induction, alongside Engage, STARS and eMinerva (see Routines):
Spire — BCE's one-stop staff hub
A SharePoint site that's the front door for almost everything BCE: About BCE, Catholic Identity, Education, Employee Centre, News and Events, Policies and Procedures, Support Services, and About Me (your personal details, absentee/sick leave). Files, policies and employee information all live here.
🧍 Open Spire ↗iLearn — professional development
BCE's online PD platform. Complete assigned (web-based) training here — including your mandatory Student Protection, WHS and Code of Conduct modules — and sign up for professional learning. Hours you complete are logged automatically and feed through to your record in Spire.
🎓 Open iLearn ↗iLearn links are often personalised/session-based — bookmark via the Spire/Staff Portal menu rather than a saved URL if the direct link above doesn't work for you.
Ignite — pay & leave
Your pay, leave and long service leave (LSL) balances.
Add the Ignite login URL once confirmed.
📱 Student devices in class
Dell laptops
Every student is issued a college Dell laptop. In your classroom:
- No student is to take out or use their laptop without your permission
- When in use, it must sit flat on a desk — never carried around open, and never carried by the screen
- Students moving around the room while carrying a device must close it first
- Devices are to be confiscated if a student doesn't comply — this is per college policy, not just a suggestion
- All schoolwork should be saved to OneDrive — that's the only thing IT can recover if a device fails
SMART devices (phones, smart watches)
SMART devices are banned school-wide from 8:00am–3:00pm, including in the Learning Common. Devices must be off and in the student's locker — the only exception is with your explicit permission for a specific class, in which case you notify the Pedagogy Companion and other staff teaching that group.
Add where/how a routine phone infringement gets recorded (a shared spreadsheet is used, monitored by House Companions) if staff need to log it themselves.
📊 BCE BI Tool
The Brisbane Catholic Education Business Intelligence tool is used for school data and reporting — e.g. attendance trends, academic results and NCCD data.
📊 Open the BI Tool ↗Add who typically uses this (e.g. leadership/HoDs vs all staff) and any common reports classroom teachers should know about.