Saint Ignatius' College Riverview is an Australian independent single-sex primary and secondary day and boarding school for boys located in Riverview, a small suburb on the Lane Cove River on the Lower North Shore of Sydney.

Established in 1880 by Joseph Dalton SJ, Saint Ignatius' is a Jesuit school in the tradition of Saint Ignatius of Loyola. It is part of the international network of Jesuit schools that began in Messina, Sicily in 1548. Saint Ignatius' College has a non-selective enrolment policy and currently caters for approximately 1,560 students from Years 5 to 12, including 335 boarders in Years 6 to 12.

The College is a member of the Association of Heads of Independent Schools of Australia (AHISA), the Junior School Heads Association of Australia (JSHAA), the Australian Boarding Schools' Association, and is a founding member of the Athletic Association of the Great Public Schools of New South Wales (AAGPS).

Numerous leading contributors to Australian politics, arts, law, religion and sport were educated at Riverview. Notable alumni include former Prime Minister of Australia Tony Abbott; former Deputy Prime Minister of Australia Barnaby Joyce; former Chief Justice of New South Wales, Tom Bathurst; the current Archbishop of Sydney, Anthony Fisher OP; former Premier of New South Wales Nick Greiner; seventeen former Wallabies,Jim Lenehean – Player Profile ; aru.com.au nine Olympians and eight Rhodes Scholars; as well as the first Australian-born astronaut, Paul Scully-Power, and numerous writers including poet Christopher Brennan, art critic Robert Hughes, and playwrights Nick Enright and Justin Fleming.

History

Following Archbishop Roger William Bede Vaughan OSB's invitation to the Jesuits to come to Sydney, on condition that they open a boys' boarding school, and the bequest of Fr John Joseph Therry, who on his death in 1864 left the greater part of his property to the Society of Jesus, Joseph Dalton SJ concluded arrangements for the purchase of the Riverview property on 28 June 1878. Dalton became founding rector of the college.G. Windsor, "Riverview's origins and early style", Journal of the Australian Catholic Historical Society, 1976, pp. 1–18.

The first students were brought to the school as advertised in the Catholic newspaper The Express, whereby boys aged between 8 and 12 would be received at Riverview "as soon as possible after the Christmas holidays". Classes commenced with two students on 11 February 1880, in a small stone cottage on the Riverview estate.

The original cottage became very cramped with greater numbers and, to provide better accommodation, St Michael's House was built. The building was designed by W. W. Wardell and opened on the feast of Saint Michael, 29 September 1880. In 1882 a wooden boatshed was built for rowing and in 1883 the infirmary took shape.

In its early years the college offered classical and modern languages, history, mathematics, the natural sciences and all other branches required for the civil service, the junior, senior and matriculation examinations, along with modern mercantile subjects.

By December 1882, with an enrolment of only 70 boys, the college extended the curriculum to include English composition, writing, music, singing, drawing, painting, Irish history and oral Latin.

Lessons were taught six days a week. Prayers began the day at 6.15 am, followed by Mass and study before breakfast at 8.30 am and concluded with night prayers at 8.30 pm. On Sundays and holidays the boys were allowed to sleep in until 6.30 am.

Within seven years of its founding, keen observers were taking notice. In 1887, James Francis Hogan wrote in The Irish in Australia that: "St. John's College, affiliated to the University of Sydney; St. Ignatius' College, Riverview, conducted by the Jesuit Fathers; and St. Joseph's College, Hunter Hill , under the management of the Marist Fathers [sic, actually the Marist Brothers], are three educational institutions that reflect the highest credit on the Catholic population of the parent colony".Hogan, James Francis, The Irish in Australia , 1887. Reproduced by Project Gutenberg (retrieved 15 June 2006).

The main building of the college was constructed in three stages between 1885 and 1930 and the foundation stone was laid by Cardinal Moran, Archbishop of Sydney, on 15 December 1885.

As originally designed by Gilbert, Dennehy and Tappin, of Ballarat, the building was to be a huge square, representing four identical fronts, but only the South front was completed according to plan due to financial constraints.

The Riverview College Observatory was built in 1909, and was established by the distinguished Jesuit astronomer and seismologist, Edward Francis Pigot (1858–1929), who ordered a complete set of seismographs from Göttingen.

Daniel O'Connell was director of the Observatory from 1938 and was later called to be director of the Vatican Observatory.Nick Lomb; "O'Connell, Daniel Joseph Kelly (1896–1982) "; Australian Dictionary of Biography Another distinguished Jesuit seismologist and astronomer, Thomas Burke-Gaffney, became assistant-director of the Observatory in 1946 and director from 1952. His studies of seismic aspects of nuclear explosions garnered worldwide attention and he served as vice-president of the Royal Society of New South Wales.G. P. Walsh; "Burke-Gaffney, Thomas Noel (1893–1958) "; Australian Dictionary of Biography

The Dalton Memorial Chapel was also built in 1909. The organ in the chapel was built in 1910 at a cost of £460 by Charles Richardson and installed in 1911. By the 1970s the organ was becoming unreliable and the college organist at the time, Peter Meyer, contracted Arthur Jones to rebuild it in 1976."St Ignatius' College Chapel", Sydney Organ, (retrieved 22 October 2006).

Although the first dayboys were not officially admitted until 1923, there was a small group of pupils who were permitted to attend the college as dayboys. In fact, up until the 1960s dayboys remained relatively small in number and Riverview was mainly for boarders.

In the lead up to the 2003 Iraq War, the three school captains wrote a letter to the Prime Minister of Australia, John Howard, calling for a withdrawal of Australian troops from the Persian Gulf and for a non-military solution. They told Howard a poll of 574 students at the college showed 75 per cent were against Australian military participation in Iraq, regardless of the United Nations’ position.

During February 2005, students sang for Pope John Paul II outside his hospital in Rome as part of the 2005 Pilgrimage of Hope. The students had previously met the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, meditated in Assisi and worked the streets and orphanages of Calcutta with Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity.

Motto The school motto, Quantum Potes Tantum Aude ("Dare as much as you can, for God and for Man"), was introduced by the rector-headmaster, Thomas Gartlan SJ, in 1906. Quantum Potes Tantum Aude is now formally translated from Latin as "As much as you can do, so much dare to do", seen to best reflect the Latin, replacing the former "Dare to do your Best". The motto is taken from a song of Saint Thomas Aquinas (1227–1274) entitled Lauda Sion SalvatoremAquinas, Thomas, Lauda Sion Salvatorem , Latin and English translation (retrieved 6 June 2006). ('Praise, O Sion, Praise Thy Saviour'). The next line after Quantum Potes Tantum Aude is Quia Maior Omni Laude, which, together, translates to "As much as you can do, so much dare to do, because He is above all praise".Raper, Mark, 125th Anniversary St Ignatius Day Mass 2005 Homily , St Mary's Cathedral, Sydney, 31 July 2005 (retrieved 6 June 2006).

Traditions It is a longstanding practice for students, particularly in the lower years of the college, to write "A.M.D.G" in the top left-hand corner of any piece of work they do. This stands for "Ad Maiorem Dei Gloriam" which means "To the Greater Glory of God": a central theme of Jesuit spirituality. Traditionally, at the end of a piece of work they wrote "L.D.S." in the center of the page, a practice which is no longer widespread. This stands for "Laus Deo Semper" which means "Praise to God Always", another traditional Jesuit motto. The college song is "Ignatius Teach Us to Know".

Jesuit education

A former Society of Jesus Superior General, Peter Hans Kolvenbach, wrote in The Characteristics of Jesuit Education that the "ideal is the well-rounded person who is intellectually competent, open to growth, religious, loving and committed to doing justice in generosity to the people of God".Kolvenbach, Peter Hans, The Characteristics of Jesuit Education, 1986.

Riverview's Jesuit partner schools include St Aloysius' College in Sydney, Saint Ignatius' College, Adelaide, Xavier College in Melbourne, Loyola College, Mount Druitt, Clongowes Wood College in County Kildare, Ireland, Belvedere College in County Dublin, Ireland and Stonyhurst College in Lancashire, England.

Co-curriculum

St Ignatius' College offers students the opportunity to participate in a number of co-curricular activities including: AT Thomas Advocacy Group, ATTAG ('ay-tag') formed in 2012 to increase the social awareness among students at the school. Named after an Indian Jesuit martyr who gave his life in defending the rights of the 'dalit' untouchables, this group effectively replaced the Amnesty International Club (1980s–2007). Debating and Public speaking: (1881–present) 35 GPS 1sts Premiership Winning Teams (since 1964), and 5 between 1920 and 1963,"Saint Ignatius' College Diary (2011) pp. 197–200" 22 Lawrence Campbell Oratory Winners since its institution in 1935,Lawrence Campbell Oratory Competition#Complete list of previous winners 12 Australian Schools Debating team members (some students for 2 years) (instituted 1972–present) and 31 NSW School Debating team members (instituted 1971–present) (some students for 2 years). St Ignatius' College also offers a range of co-curricular activities including music, drama, and digital media and photography.

Sport Australian rules football: (1880–1892 and 1984–present) Until the start of the 1892 winter, Riverview's football preference had been for Australian rules football. In 2004, Riverview became the first GPS school to field an Australian Rules team in the under-18s division of the Sydney Football League. Since entering the competition in 2004, Riverview has won two premierships, in 2005 and 2011. Since 2016, Riverview has moved to AFL Sydney's Independent Schools Competition (Composed of CAS and AAGPS schools), with the 1st XVIII winning the competition 5 times (2016, 2017, 2018, 2020, 2022) from a possible 6 opportunities (note 2021 was voided due to COVID-19 Pandemic). The First XVIII's 2022 premiership saw them crowned as the first-ever Independent Schools Competition champions, going through the regular season and the inaugural finals series undefeated defeating Newington in the Grand Final at Jubilee Stadium Kogarah 11.7–73 – 2.7–19.