Principal's Report

Dear EHPS Parents and Carers, 

NEVR Youth Concert: Legends & Lore

On Wednesday 13 May, 20 Year 6 students from the Chamber Choir, represented our school in the annual North East Victoria Region (NEVR) Youth Concert held at Hamer Hall. Our children joined with selected children from other primary schools from our region to form an outstanding mass choir. The children performed so well on the night and the mass choir received tumultuous applause. Our students were not only outstanding performers but also wonderful ambassadors for our school. They were true role models for others to admire. It made me very proud to be their Principal. Congratulation to these students on a job so well done. A big thank you must also go to Ms Grace Cordell for preparing the children so well, often in her own time. All parents that attended the concert were amazed at the standard and quality on display. Well done everyone!

Education Week

Our school is celebrating Education Week 2026 next week from Monday 18 May to Friday 22 May.

This year’s theme is ‘Showcase your school’, encouraging school communities to celebrate what’s great about their school.

There are so many great things about Essex Heights, from our people to our school facilities, our learning programs and our supportive school community. It's all here at our school!

To celebrate Education Week, parents/carers are invited to come to school on Monday afternoon from 2:45pm to 3:30pm to visit their child’s classrooms and/or participate in activities with our specialist staff.

There is no School Assembly on Monday due to the Education Week Open Afternoon. 

More information and a copy of the EHPS invitation are on the Education Week page in this newsletter.

Mother's Day Breakfast Treat & Stall

A huge thank you to the Parents and Friends Club for organising the special Mother’s Day events over the past two weeks. The before school breakfast treat on Friday 1 May was very well attended and mums and special carers were able to get together and share breakfast and a coffee with their loved ones. The feedback was outstanding!  Last Friday, the children had a wonderful time selecting gifts from the Mother’s Day Stall. 

These events again show the Essex Heights spirit and our connectedness as a school community. Thank you to all the PFC volunteers. Your work is truly appreciated.

2026 Attitudes to School Survey (Years 4 to 6)

Years 4 to 6 students will participate in the 2026 Attitudes to School Survey.

The following information and consent letter from the Department of Education was distributed to parents and carers of Years 4 to 6 students this week:

2026 Student Attitudes to School Survey

Dear Parent / Caregiver / Guardian

This letter is to inform you about the 2026 Student Attitudes to School Survey (AtoSS), which all government school students in Years 4 to 12 will be invited to complete. 

About the survey

The AtoSS is a voluntary student survey offered by the Department of Education every year to help schools and the department understand students' experiences of school. We will ask your child about their thoughts and feelings about their school, their learning, relationships with other students, resilience, bullying, health and wellbeing, physical activity, and life in general.

ORIMA Research Pty Ltd has been contracted by the department to manage the collection of the online survey and will provide support to schools through a telephone hotline and email.

This year, the survey will be conducted at your school from 25 May to 12 June.

What are the benefits?

Young people enjoy having a say! This survey has been running for nearly 20 years and helps schools plan programs and activities to improve your child's engagement with school, their wellbeing and their learning. The survey data also helps the Department of Education understand how to improve student learning.

What are the risks?

We don’t expect many risks of participation, but some students may find some questions personal or sensitive. If you agree for your child to take part, they can still skip questions or withdraw at any time whilst completing the survey if it makes them upset or uncomfortable. A teacher will be present during the survey to support students.

The questions come from validated survey instruments used in Australia and around the world. They focus on your child’s strengths and are designed for each year level group.

What will my child be asked to do?

Your child will be invited to complete the survey online during class time using a purpose built secure online survey tool. We are not “testing” your child. Please note:

• Students can choose if they want to take part, skip questions if they don’t want to answer, and can stop doing the survey at any time.
• There are different versions of the survey to let all students take part.
• The survey will take around 20-40 minutes to complete.

How is my child’s privacy protected?

A teacher will give your child a unique login to complete the survey. This unique student login is an assigned identifier that will be used by the department to link data for analysis and research only. Some student demographic data such as year level, gender, age, and Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander status are provided to ORIMA research and linked with the unique student login ID to administer the survey. This information helps to support analysis and research, to paint a clearer picture of how Victorian school students are faring.

ORIMA Research will only use student personal information for research purposes to facilitate the administration and data collection of the Attitudes to School Survey. To keep your child’s survey answers private, ORIMA Research won’t include any personally identifiable data in the survey answers file that is provided to the department. 

All data is stored on servers located in Australia, and only staff who are working on the project can access it. 

All information collected about your child will be handled in accordance with the Privacy Data and Protection Act 2014 (Vic), the Health Records Act 2001 (Vic) and the Public Records Act 1973 (Vic), as well as the Department’s Schools’ Privacy Policy.Please note that consistent with the above legislation and our policy, there are instances where we may be required by law to share information provided by your child. For example, where there is a threat to your child’s health and safety. 

How will results be reported?

The department will only use aggregated survey data to report on initiatives and this data may also be used in public discussions of issues about student engagement and wellbeing. An example of how survey data has been previously used includes reporting levels of student engagement in the Performance Summary in the Annual Report to the School Community. The department will not share any identifiable student data with any other party.

Your child’s school will only get reports about groups of students. Information about individual students and the student answers data file will not be shared with schools. If there are low numbers of student answers to a question, the report will not show results for this question to protect the privacy of those students. 

For more information about this survey, including the questions your child will be asked to answer, please visit the department’s survey information page.

If you would like more information or have any concerns about the survey, please speak to your child’s teacher, or contact the department at school.surveys@education.vic.gov.au.

Yours sincerely

Department of Education, Victoria

Parent Contributions 2026

Thank you to the 54% of families that have paid their curriculum contributions for this year. We are grateful to you because with this support we can continue to provide the high-quality facilities and resources for our children.

Our school provides students with free instruction to fulfil the standard Victorian Curriculum, and we know that all contributions are voluntary. Nevertheless, your ongoing support ensures that our school can continue to offer rich and extensive programs beyond the traditional teaching and learning structure e.g. year level choirs, marimba and sport.

Your financial contribution assists us to:

• provide extra and higher quality resources in our specialist areas e.g. art, music, science and Indonesian
• purchase new furniture
• maintain the buildings e.g. painting – internal and external
• upgrade our grounds e.g. new shade sails and synthetic grass 
• improve play areas e.g. School Oval, the stadium, The Heights and the back of Violet and Banksia buildings
• employ a school first aid officer

By making these contributions families are also not required to buy supplies e.g. a booklist or to subscribe to specialist learning programs such as Matific.

I again thank the families that have made a financial contribution to our school this year and encourage others to consider helping our school to maintain our high standards of educational programs and resources that are available for our children.

Parent Contributions are made through your Compass parent portal. Please log in to Compass (a web browser is recommended) and click the blue Click here for more information link in the green Payments Centre box to process your payment. 

Please don’t hesitate to contact our Business Manager, Barbara McCann, if you’d like to discuss your personal situation.

More information can be found on our website by following the link: EHPS Parent Payments.

Smart Watches

I would like to remind all families that smart watches are to be turned off during school hours. Any device that has a similar functionality to a mobile phone cannot be brought to school. The EHPS Mobile Phone Policy clearly categorises a smart watch as such a mobile device

A simple analogue or digital watch may be worn to school to help children tell the time or to learn how to tell the time.

The Essex Heights Mobile Phone Policy can be found on the school website by following this link:   EHPS Mobile Phone Policy 

Students that are unwell

Can all families please remember that children who are unwell should not be sent to school. Sick children cannot perform well at school and they often pass on their sickness to other children and staff. This only makes managing the learning for all children even more difficult.

Please do not give children medication in the morning to mask symptoms, because those same symptoms will reappear within a few hours. The children are often so unwell that they are miserable at school and are not learning anyway. If this occurs, you will be contacted to collect your child. Schools are charged to maintain a safe and healthy environment for children and staff. Please help us to do this by carefully monitoring our child’s symptoms. If unwell, keep them at home!!!

School Times and Communication

Since the start of term, it has been apparent that many children are arriving at school far too early. Children are expected to be in class by 8:50am. Staff are not on yard duty until 8:45am, therefore children in the school grounds before that time are not supervised. It is not a safe practice for children to be dropped off at school too early. I urge families to not bring children to school too early. Similarly, please do not leave children to play unattended after school.

The school has an outstanding Before and After School Care program that is available every day to cater for children that need to be dropped off early or picked up late. Please make use of it so that we can ensure the safety of all our children. Speak to the OSHC Coordinator, Paul Davis, regarding enrolment in the OSHC program. 

At Essex Heights we value the excellent communication that exists between home and school. 

Our Compass portal is the school’s formal communication tool between school and home and can be used to send emails to a teacher, add attendance notes to advise or explain absence, and receive information through the News Feed, and event notification for consent and/or payment. 

Please remember that staff are NOT expected to check their emails outside of work hours. If you send an email to a teacher, please allow at least 24 hours for a reply. Teachers are in class all day and have meetings after school finishes. 

If there is an urgent matter, then please contact the School Office and a message will be passed onto the classroom teacher.

It is advisable that you regularly log into the Compass portal. If you need any assistance, please check the Parent Guides (for web browser or app) on our website or speak to the staff at the School Office. 

Student Absence

If your child will be absent on any day, please enter an attendance note on Compass, preferably by the start of the school day, or contact the school by 9am to report the absence verbally.

Please note that students arriving at school after 9am must be signed in at the Office by a parent or guardian. 

If there are changed plans for the end of the school day, or pick up arrangements for your children are different to those arranged at the start of the day, please advise the school as soon as you know about it. Our Office staff will always pass on messages to students; however, this requires time and lack of interruptions. Please ensure that messages are communicated by phoning the Office; do not email.

Ideally, all arrangements should be made and communicated clearly to your child before the start of the school day.

Thank you for your cooperation and support in all these matters.

Cultural Days

We again celebrate the cultural diversity of our community. We join together to celebrate these important dates together.

World Day for Cultural Diversity for Dialogue and Development    21 May

In 2001, UNESCO adopted the Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity. In December 2002, the UN General Assembly, in its resolution 57/249, declared 21 May to be the World Day for Cultural Diversity for Dialogue and Development.

Shavuot    21 – 24 May

Shavuot is a Jewish celebration of Moses’s descent from Mount Sinai with the Ten Commandments. It is the second of the Jewish pilgrim festivals. Some Jews refrain from working on Shavuot.

Declaration of the Báb    23 – 24 May

This date marks the anniversary of the Báb’s announcement of his mission in 1844. The Báb is a prophet and is considered one of the founders of the Baha’i faith.

Pentecost    24 May

A festival where Christians celebrate the gift of the Holy Spirit. It is celebrated on the Sunday 50 days after Easter. The name comes from the Greek pentekoste, which means ‘fiftieth’.

The Hajj (Pilgrimage) to Mecca, Saudi Arabia    25 – 29 May

On specific days of the Islamic month of Zu Al-Hijja, millions of Muslims from around the world congregate in the Prophet’s birthplace of Mecca in Saudi Arabia. The Hajj is obligatory for all Muslims who have the means to undertake it.

National Sorry Day    26 May

National Sorry Day acknowledges and raises awareness of the history and continued effect of the forced removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people from their families, communities and culture.

Eid al Adha    26 – 30 May

The Eid al Adha means Feast of Sacrifice and commemorates the ordeal of Ibrahim (Abraham) who was asked to sacrifice his only son to prove his faith to Allah (God). The timing of this event is subject to the sighting of the moon) and runs for three to four days.

National Reconciliation Week    27 May – 3 Jun

National Reconciliation Week celebrates and builds on the respectful relationships shared by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and other Australians.

Ascension of Baha’u’lláh    29 May

Ascension of Baha’u’lláh commemorates the anniversary of the death in 1892 of Baha'u'lláh, the founder of the Baha'i faith. This solemn anniversary is a day of rest and is often observed by reading or chanting from the scriptures. Many pilgrims visit the Baha'i shrines and tomb in Israel to pray. The Baha'i day ends and a new one begins at sunset. Consequently, the day on which a Feast or Holy Day is observed starts at sundown of the day before the Gregorian calendar dates listed.

Congratulations

Congratulations to Amber Hardy on her recent engagement.

Welcome 

We welcome the following students and their family to the EHPS community:

• Sayara B (2RO) & Nehan B (4C) 

Farewell

We farewell the following students and their family from the EHPS community:

• Zari N (1M) & Amreen N (5K) – moving out of area

I look forward to seeing you around the school. 

Kindest regards,

George Perini

Principal