‘We want little boys to go and young men to return’: Scotch College’s bold vision for the next generation

Jason Potoi Andrew can still remember arriving at Scotch College for the first time. It was 1984, and he was touring the school that his father, David, had graduated from two decades earlier.

The pair were soon approached by Ron “Chesty” Bond, a revered classics teacher and vice principal who worked at the school for close to four decades and was a favourite among generations of boys who gave him a nickname that stuck for life.

“He came up to Dad and said, ‘Oh, David Andrew, I remember you. I taught you Latin’,” he says. “It was a nice moment.”

It’s an example of what Scotch alumni, known as Old Boys, like to call the cardinal thread – an intangible link named after the distinctive shade of red in the school’s blazer and tartan that links the past with the present.

While outsiders might see it as a network founded on privilege, entitlement and affluence, for Potoi Andrew, connections aren’t made in boardrooms or clubs, but rather in interactions like the one his dad shared with “Chesty” Bond.

“I wouldn’t say that going to Scotch has smoothed a path because things have changed a lot,” he says. “You’ve got to prove yourself.”

Potoi Andrew’s sons Maximus and Austin had their names put down at birth, and became third-generation “Scotchies” when they ultimately joined the school. Again, the cardinal thread played its part.

“I knew maybe two people when I started,” Maximus says. “But knowing that my dad came here, and my grandpa also came here, it was easy to find friends.”

Austin’s entry was similarly linked to his Scotch heritage, but he credits playing percussion in the school’s military band, an arm of the 142-year-old cadet corps, as his cardinal connection.

“You learn more about the school and its history in cadets,” he says. “Things like what we did during World War I and about key figures like [General Sir John] Monash.”

Having started at the school as an 11-year-old before graduating equal dux in 1881, Monash is a favoured son of Scotch. His bust, left breast laden with military medals, is displayed at reception, while Principal Dr Scott Marsh has a smaller version in his office.

Other references to the school’s history and legacy are scattered across the 27-hectare Hawthorn campus, one of four owned by the college.

The $32 million science centre is named after former student and governor-general Sir Zelman Cowen while a plaque on the Cardinal Pavilion rowing shed on the banks of the Yarra River states it was opened by former school vice captain and later Liberal Party leader, Andrew Peacock.

“The boys are aware they are part of something incredibly special,” Marsh says.