Foundation Partner places · three schools · commencing Term 2 2027. See the exchange →

Door one · Discovery

Reduce uncertainty before you commit to anything.

Discovery does two jobs. It tells you what is actually happening in your wellbeing system, and it builds the readiness a partnership needs. Every Discovery Service is Stage One of a partnership, and carries across in full.

Discovery Service

Wellbeing Capacity Review

A structured diagnostic of where your wellbeing system is under pressure: capacity, risk, role clarity and supervision. Five sessions, a written report with domain scoring, a prioritised roadmap, and a facilitated leadership debrief. One flat fee, whatever your size or complexity.

$3,000 ex GST · one flat fee, no levels

What you receive

  • A written diagnostic report, triangulated across leadership, wellbeing staff and teaching staff
  • A ten-domain scorecard, each scored out of five and RAG rated, with evidence, key insight and priority action
  • Cross-system themes
  • A prioritised roadmap of next steps, sequenced and owned
  • A Readiness Index score
  • A pathway recommendation
  • A facilitated leadership debrief

The sessions, and your time

Evidence is gathered across leadership, the wellbeing and inclusion team and staff, then triangulated against documents and system records. Nothing rests on a single voice. Findings are corroborated across sources before they reach the report.

Wellbeing staff and leader session60 to 75 min
Leadership session45 to 60 min
Teacher and staff focus group
Where agreed
40 to 60 min
Document and system review
Desk-based
Desk
Process walkthrough
Where in scope
30 to 45 min
Leadership debrief
Online unless agreed
30 to 60 min

Total school-facing contact time is typically three to four hours, across a three to six week window, scheduled to suit your calendar. Consultations run onsite, hybrid or fully online.

Where a school currently hosts, or has previously hosted, placement students, that is factored into the same review through the workforce readiness domain. It is not a separate service, a separate scope or a separate fee. There are no review levels.

One fee, whatever your school looks like

The review is scoped to what the diagnosis needs, not to what you paid for. Two staff groups or one, a separate process walkthrough or folded into the sessions. That is professional judgement inside a fixed fee, and it means a large complex school and a small one are quoted the same.

It also keeps the recommendation clean. The review sets the level of support STEP would recommend if you go on to build, and lower readiness means a higher investment. That advice is only worth having if STEP earns the same either way.

What gets scored

Ten domains, two questions.

All ten answer what should we fix, and in what order. That becomes your roadmap. Six of them also answer how much help would we need to build this safely, which is what sets the level of support we would recommend. Nothing is set aside.

Leadership
Who owns wellbeing, and whether it shapes planning
Prevention & early support
Whether Tier 1 and Tier 2 hold through a busy term
Team capability
Whether the system survives a key person leaving
Systems & processes
Referral, escalation, documentation and rhythm
Staff capacity
Whether the school can absorb a change this year
Workforce readiness
Whether you could supervise a placement student safely
Whole-school reach
How far wellbeing work extends beyond the team
Student voice
How much students shape the work
Families & services
Referral pathways beyond the school gate
Data & evidence
How you know whether any of it is working

Each is scored out of five with evidence behind the finding, then triangulated across leadership, the wellbeing team and teaching staff. Nothing rests on a single voice.

What we do with the number

Those six give us a readiness profile, and that sets the level of support most likely to result in a build that actually holds. Lower readiness means more support, and a higher investment. We would rather tell you that at the start than watch an implementation fail quietly.

You can choose more support than we recommend. We will not recommend less in order to win the work.

If your score sits on a boundary

Some schools land between two levels. When that happens your report says so, names both, and sets out what would make the difference, so the decision is yours to make with the full picture rather than ours to present as settled.

Payment. 50% on confirmation, 50% on delivery of the final report.

The Follow-Up

A roadmap check-in at around eight to ten weeks: what has moved, what is stuck, and what to do next. It is the right product for a school choosing internal improvement only, and it keeps STEP in relationship with a school that is not building this year.

The Review carries fully into a Build partnership. The Follow-Up does not, because a school heading into implementation needs the implementation rather than a roadmap check-in.

+$950 ex GST

Discovery Service

Supervising Well

A supervision and scope system for hosting placement students well, delivered as one facilitated 2.5-hour session, which fits a staff-meeting double or part of a pupil-free day. Your team leaves able to give real supervision, keep every task safely in scope, know exactly when to step in, and turn hard moments into learning, so no one decides alone.

Your school already offers a placement student the one thing most placements lack: real, meaningful work every day. The risk is not the student. It is weak hosting. Supervising Well gives the staff who host a shared model, practical habits and desk-ready tools, so hosting stays safe, sustainable and genuinely developmental.

$3,000 onsite · $2,000 online · ex GST

What your school has afterwards

  • Every task permissioned, so nothing drifts into work that is not theirs
  • A warm escalation script the room has said aloud
  • A supervision benchmark of 30 to 60 minutes per student per week
  • A four-question debrief habit, rehearsed live
  • Two named commitments per participant
  • Desk tools that stay in use after the session
  • The Evidence Brief that makes the model defensible to a university or a sceptical principal

Built on the HOST model, four moves that turn hosting a placement student from goodwill into practice. It is the difference between a student who is welcomed and a student who is supervised.

What your team leaves able to do

Give every student real supervision
30 to 60 predictable minutes a week, attached to the meetings you already hold
Keep every task safely in scope
A simple C, S, O, X rule so a student never drifts into work that is not theirs
Know exactly when to step in
A warm, ready escalation script for the moment a matter needs a qualified adult
Turn hard moments into learning
A two-minute, four-question debrief that surfaces risk while it is still small

The promise back to you

You never decide alone.

Fit and discontinuation, safety decisions, parent expectations, scope creep and university complexity are shared load, carried with your STEP Lead, your principal and the university liaison.

For STEP Leads, Task Supervisors and wellbeing team staff who host, or are about to host, a placement student. Whether or not you have hosted before.

Configurations

Onsite
Single cohort up to 20, full materials, 48-hour follow-up
$3,000
Online
Capped at 12 participants
$2,000
Follow-In
A three-week follow-in session and supervision cadence check
+$950
Additional cohort
Same visit
+$1,500
Network or cluster
Minimum four schools, single venue
From $1,500

Onsite runs with a minimum of three and a maximum of 20, splitting beyond about 24. Online is capped at 12. Inside a Build partnership it is always onsite. Where a school has no prior hosting experience, STEP recommends adding the Follow-In.

What is included, and what is licensed

Includes a participant workbook, a scope matrix for the wall, and desk tools that stay in use long after the session, so the model carries into everyday practice. Cascade rights, the internal licence for your own STEP Lead to re-run the workshop each year, are included with an Operating Partnership.

Cascade rights let a school re-deliver a workshop carrying STEP’s name, standing behind placement students working with vulnerable children, facilitated by someone who is not a trainer. That warrants an active relationship and an annual check.

The Evidence Brief

Every element of the workshop maps to established research on placement supervision, work-integrated learning and adult professional learning. Kolb, Hattie and Timperley, Kadushin and Harkness, Lave and Wenger, alongside current work-integrated learning literature and the AASW field education standards.

Read the Evidence Brief

Discovery Service

Consultation Session

A focused advisory session scoped to a specific question: role clarity, referral flow, Tier 2 structure or readiness.

From $1,200 ex GST

Not creditable, because advice on a single question is consumed on delivery. Where a school takes three or more within twelve months, STEP recommends a Practice Partnership instead. Repeated consultation is a Practice relationship bought inefficiently, and worse value for the school.

Discovery Service

STEP Re-Entry Review

For schools that have previously completed a Build partnership and lapsed from Operating. Roughly half a Capacity Review, confirming what survived, what drifted, and what is needed to restart.

$1,800 ex GST

GreenResume Operating
AmberRemediation Sprint, then Operating
RedNew Build partnership

Carries fully into the resumed partnership. Open to any school that has completed a Build partnership, regardless of how long ago.

Stage One

Discovery is Stage One of a partnership. 100% of your Discovery investment carries across to a partnership commenced within twelve months. You never pay twice for the same thinking.

How it works in practice

Wellbeing Capacity Review (Stage One)$3,000
Implementation Partnership · Guide, total$24,500
Balance payable on commencement$21,500
  • One service carries. Where more than one has been taken, the highest value single service applies
  • Twelve months, not ninety days. A short cliff manufactures urgency and hands you a reason to negotiate on day 91
  • Build only. Discovery does not carry into Operating, which cannot be entered directly, or into Practice
  • A school holding a Practice Partnership for 12 or more months receives the Review at 50%, because STEP genuinely requires less discovery. The Review then carries fully into Build on top
  • Payment. 50% on engagement confirmation, 50% on delivery of the final report

Delivery mode and travel

Investment is set by scope, not by delivery mode. The one exception is Supervising Well, where onsite and online genuinely deliver different things and are priced differently.

Travel is set by mode and distance. Travel is a flat fee per onsite visit, so there is one number to budget. Zone 1 and Zone 2, up to about ninety minutes from STEP’s base, are included. Zone 3 is $750 a visit and Zone 4 is $1,400, plus accommodation at cost where an overnight is genuinely needed. Wellbeing Capacity Reviews for Zone 3 and Zone 4 schools default to fully online at no travel charge, because the review is identical in every mode and a country school should not pay a quarter more for it. Every figure appears in your proposal before anything begins.

Fully online delivery carries no travel charge at any distance. Online is never cheaper in fee, but it is genuinely cheaper in total for a distant school, because travel drops out.

Already done Supervising Well

Where the workshop has already been delivered standalone, a Build partnership does not re-teach it. That session becomes a supervision practice review instead: confirming the cadence is holding, sampling scope decisions, and testing escalation in live use. The fee is unchanged. You receive the next thing, not the same thing.

Next step

Book a free 15-minute Fit Call.

A short conversation where we map your situation and lock the date. No obligation to go further.

Not included

  • Therapy, counselling, clinical supervision, student case management or crisis response
  • Individual student advice, risk assessment or decisions
  • Staffing or recruitment brokerage
  • Legal, industrial, medical or clinical governance advice

All figures ex GST. Travel per the STEP Travel Policy.

STEP helps schools lift their wellbeing capacity ceiling: safely, sustainably, and without adding load to the people already holding it.
The model
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