Principal's Report

 Dear Members of the Glen Waverley Primary School Community,

I trust all is well with you and your family and welcome to this fortnight’s newsletter where so much is shared about our wonderful school.

As per usual, if you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me on 9802 9938 or via email at frank.catalano@education.vic.gov.au.

The end of Term One

I find it difficult to believe that we are fast approaching the end of the first term of the 2024 academic year – where has the time gone? Nevertheless, a sincere thank you to all the members of the Glen Waverley Primary School community as it has been an outstanding term of teaching, learning and collaboration.

School Holiday Program 

A reminder that our school implements a school vacation care program every school holidays. A copy of the program is attached for your information and if you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact or see Meththa our school coordinator. 

School Chess Team 

Recently our school chess team participated in their first tournament for the year and once again, the children were outstanding as they represented themselves, their family and our school exceptionally well. The tournament was played at Kangaroo Grounds PS and below is an excerpt for Tim Broomes’ email to families and schools:

A lovely start to our 2024 Primary interschool program today hosted by our wonderful friends at Kangaroo Ground.  Thanks again Laurie!  Thanks equally to our visiting schools and individual families, with a special mention to our long-distance travellers from Candlebark PS, to the big squad from Glen Waverley PS, and to our interschool debutants from Greensborough PS.

This first tournament of the year was set up at fairly short notice, so it was a delight to see a full room, with some of Victoria's very finest primary school players in the field, together of course with some who are just dipping their toes for the first time.  I hope that all had fun and that everyone of all levels of experience feels that they had some thought-provoking games today.

Thanks very much.

Tim Broome

Business Manager, Northern Star Chess

I am very proud to report that our team placed 1st and the following children received individual recognition:

Medal Recipients:

• Amaya (Year 4) – Girls Gold
• Janhavi (Year 3) – Girls Silver
• Saheli (Year 4) and Yehara (Year 5) – Girls Bronze
• Reyashi (Year P – 2) Girls Bronze 
• Naveen (Year 3 and 4) Boys Silver
• Samuel and Aadyha (Year 3 and 4) Boys Bronze
• Akshobhya – (Year 5 and 6) Boys Bronze 

Certificate Recipients:

• High Distinction:           
  • Naveen (Year 3)
• Distinction:                   
  • Samuel (Year 3), Aadyah (Year 4), Ethan (Year 3), Akshobhya (Year 5), Amaya (Year 4), Janhavi (Year 3) and Thehan (Year 3)
• Credit:              
  • Yehara (Year 5), Reyan (Year 5), Saheli (Year 4), Mihin (Year 4), Lesara (Year 4) and Senon (Year 3) 

Well done and congratulations everyone as you should be incredibly proud of yourselves! Also, a sincere thank you to the numerous parents who supported the children by escorting them to the event as your efforts are appreciated immensely! I look forward to sharing additional news next term! 

Royal Children’s Hospital Good Friday Appeal

As an internationally minded school, not only is it important that we support events occurring throughout the world, but also in our local community. Every year our school supports the Royal Children’s Hospital Good Friday Appeal and this year there are 2 aspects to our campaign:

1. Cousins Sahana and Shivane (and some of their friends) – sold chocolate Easter Eggs and handmade Easter cards and
2. The coin races.

Our aim was to raise at least $2,000. Sahana and Shivane raised $697.15 (how wonderful is that!) and the coin races raised $1,788.00 (which is also fantastic!) In total, the children raised $2,485.15 – which is simply outstanding! 

However, Sahana’s parents, Manish and Preeti, decided to match what Sahana raised, and they added an additional $697.15 to our school’s total. Hence our overall total was an amazing $3,185.15.

May I take this opportunity to thank the Chopra families for supporting Sahana and Shivane’s initiative as your spirit of generosity is simply amazing and the entire Glen Waverley Primary School community for supporting this year’s fundraiser! 

Coin Race Information:

The child selected to contact the Royal Children’s Hospital Good Friday Appeal and pledge our school’s donation is Sandaru from Class 3A. 

Once again, well done and thank you everyone as we should be incredibly proud of our efforts!!

International Women’s Day

On Friday 8th March our school recognised this extremely important and world-wide event with a special lunch for our staff. Our guest speaker was Dr. Ranjana Srivastava, who is a former parent of our school, an oncologist and author. Ranjana shared her life journey, how she balances work, family and personal commitments and the importance of providing time to regroup, recharge, reassess and connect. 

The School Captains also had a pivotal role in the celebrations as they were involved in acknowledging the female members of staff for the important work they do for our school community and to introduce and thank Ranjana; below is what each of them said: 

Jonathon:

International Women’s Day is an important global event, commemorating the political, economic and cultural achievements of women and appreciating all the exceptional effort and determination they put into their work to make our everyday life better. Women’s economic empowerment is crucial to a gender, equal world. When women are given equal opportunities to men to earn, learn and lead, entire communities can benefit and thrive. At our school, women have an equal right to teach, learn and grow. Now, I’ll hand over to Vinudi.

Vinudi:

On the behalf of the students thank you to all the women here today in front of us. Today we celebrate the importance of women around the world and their contributions to our society. So, I would like to thank you from the bottom of my heart for truly being an inspiration for many of us to work hard towards our goals and be ourselves. Words cannot describe how grateful we are for the dedication you put into teaching and helping the students at our school to become better people. Your words give us the strength and courage to chase our dreams and keep moving forward. Each and every day you work hard to be here for us, and we are very appreciative that your support helps us be the best versions of ourselves. We are very thankful that there are people like you at our school who make us feel belonged and safe in our community. You’ve helped shape who we are and guided us towards success. Your encouragement has brought us a long way and taught us to believe in ourselves. Without the female staff our school wouldn’t be the school it is today. So, I would like to express great gratitude towards all the women at our school and a very big thank you for your dedication, encouragement, inspiration and all the great things that you do. And now can I please hand over to Ranuga.

Ranuga:

Today we are fortunate to have Dr Ranjana Srivastava here to celebrate International Women’s Day with us.

Dr Ranjana is an oncologist that went to Harvard Kennedy School in the UK. She is also an author for the Guardian magazine. Also, she in an author of many books. They are focused on Cancer and information for families and doctors.

Her best-selling books are A Better Death: Conversations about the Art of Living and Dying, Happy Death, and Tell Me the Truth: Conversations With My patients about life and death. 

Dr Ranjana is also a mum; she has 3 children. 2 of them came to our school we look forward to Dr Ranjana speaking with us. 

Can you please join me in welcoming to Ranjana. 

Swanya 

Thank you for sharing your life experiences, thoughts and knowledge. You are truly an inspiration to all of us. 

You have taught us; the key to happiness is:

• Someone to love
• Something you look forward to and
• Something you love doing. 

Dr. Ranjana, you also mentioned that it is very important to stay connected with family and friends.

We are so grateful for you Dr. Ranjana and without you most of us in this room would not know the importance of International Women’s Day. As a token of appreciation on the behalf of the school we present you with some gifts. 

Now, once again, let’s all take a moment to honour, respect and adore all the amazing women in our lives. Thank you for all the things you do towards society. Let’s all celebrate this special day of international women’s day. 

Curriculum Day

Our second Curriculum Day for the year was held on Tuesday 13th March and what a resounding success it was! As a staff we spent the morning renewing our first aid qualifications and the afternoon was spent developing the staff’s capacity in building team success, our knowledge of The Resilience Project and data literacy. We look forward to providing an overview of forthcoming curriculum days in future newsletters. 

Please refer to Ms. Amanda Seach’s piece for an overview of the day. 

NAPLAN Assessment Tasks 

By the time this newsletter is distributed, the Year 3 and 5 children should have completed the NAPLAN assessment tasks for this year. I wish all the children well and also thank the Year 3 and 5 teachers and the families of the children completing the assessment tasks for all of their work in ensuring the children are prepared. Best wishes to all and we look forward to receiving the children’s results next term.

Virtual Reality Headsets

The speed, change and opportunities that technology brings really excites me and as a school we endeavour to do our utmost to ensure our school remains at the forefront of technological advancement. Recently we took delivery of 12 Meta Guest 3 headsets and wow, entering and working in the virtual world is an amazing experience on many, many levels! 

An example of the learning being completed in this space includes the Year 6 students designing objects such as buildings or shoes and then re-creating these in the virtual world! Once this has been completed, they then replicate the design with the 3D printers – what ground-breaking and exciting learning! I look forward to sharing more VR news next term!

Hair Donation

Congratulations to Mindi (Year 4) for donating her hair to support children with cancer. Mindi mentioned that her hair had to be at least 33cm in length before it could be donated. Well done and thank you Mondi as I cannot express how proud I am of you as your spirit of generosity is something that will make a huge difference to others. Also, well done, congratulations and thank you for being a wonderful ambassador for your family, our school and yourself! 

Facilities Update

The development of our school’s facilities is an important part of our overall school improvement plan. Some of the recently completed projects include:

• The installation of new seating and shade structures on the school oval

• The removal and/or trimming of trees as we commence developing the new Year 6 Area

• Tiling of the gymnasium bathrooms 

• The installation of an additional 44 solar panels 
• Updated the art room flooring and

• The installation of a shade structure over the ramp that leads to the front of our school.

Throughout the forthcoming holidays we plan to:

• Build a shade structure over the portables adjacent to the oval.
• Install operable walls in between classrooms in Block A and Block B.
• Install cooling fans and change the lights in the gymnasium. 
• Paint the inside of the Early Learning Centre.
• Install an additional storage shed behind the ELC and
• Install banner poles at the front of our school which display our school values.

I look forward to sharing photographs of the above works in our first newsletter of Term Two. 

Sport's Achievements

I am delighted to take a moment to celebrate the remarkable achievements of two of our students, Aidan (6C) and Ethan (2A) , at the recent club championship day held last weekend.

Aidan showcased exceptional talent and determination, securing the 2nd position in both the Triple Jump and Long Jump events. Equally impressive is Ethan's performance, as he secured the 2nd place in the Long Jump event. 

Please join me in congratulating Aidan and Ethan on their remarkable achievements. We look forward to witnessing their continued success both on and off the field.

Principal Awards

Congratulations to the following students for receiving a Principal Awards recently: 

Prep A

• Durga, Sohana and Anaisha for making outstanding progress with their learning. 

Prep B

• Anaira for receiving a certificate from her swimming club. She has now completed Level 5. 

Prep C

• Kaniishka, Erina, Hareem and Charlotte for making amazing progress with their learning 

Prep D

• Aveer for being a very responsible member of our school community

2A

• Max for working out how old Mr. Catalano is in months and then transferring this to how old he is. 
• Owen, for completing the most amazing home learning about pandas.
• Arthur, Abisshna, Jithu and Mahi for making excellent progress with their spelling skills.  

2B

• Samiksha also for working out how old Mr. Catalano is in months and then transferring this to how old she 2B

2C

• Eric for his amazing commitment to improve all aspects of his learning. Well done and keep it up Eric! 
• The whole class for working so hard to create their very own “Collaboration” posters. 
  • Melodie, Sithuka and Nikhil 

• Lucas, Satvi, Yasheli, Leah and Aston

• Yashora and Megan

2D

• Vivienne for learning about the 5 W’s when writing a piece, the Bossy E and the High 5 strategies. 
• Ella for being a wonderful friend. 
• Amesh and Ayaan for also learning the importance of the Bossy E sound 
• Dev, Aislyn and Soha for learning all about the importance of Social Responsibility. 

2E

• Max also for working out how old Mr. Catalano is in months and then transferring this to how old he is. 

3B

• Ali, Minadie, Sam, Anay and Kenu for learning all about what to do in an emergency 

3C

• Abbey for growing approx. 25 bean plants in 2 weeks, as part of a class challenge – well done Abbey!

• Reyansh for being a very supportive friend. 

3D

• Sophie for making amazing progress with her writing as featured in the Kids Corner section of this newsletter and also for the fabulous art work she completed at home. 

• Devanshi for being a very supportive friend and for working very hard on her seeds writing book 
• Riaan and Sai for writing very nice cards for my office and for asking lots of great questions about improving our school. 

4A

• Veer for placing 1st in the first round of the Victorian, National All Styles karate championships. Next will be Round 2 and this will be followed by the Australian championship which Veer has won twice. Well done Veer and we look forward to hearing how you go in the second round! 

4B

• Ometh for writing a very creative poem and for drawing a very elaborate Easter card for my office. 

4C

• Saakhi also for being a very responsible member of our school community 

4D

• Sakthi for continuing to make amazing progress with her writing. She recently wrote the narrative, The Magical Unicorn, which is featured in the Kids Corner section of this newsletter 

4E

• Tiana and Ravya for making a beautiful and heartfelt card for my office. 

5A

• Kyra for continuing to ensure her home learning is of a very high quality and standard 

5C

• Emilia, Stuti and Kevon for writing very elaborate reflections about their autism incursion. 
• Meshavi for receiving a bronze medal from the Shotokan Cup karate tournament. Meshavi competed against 16 other children and placed 3rd. Well done and keep it up Meshavi.

• Thinuli for being a very supportive and caring friend. 

6A 

• Thinuli and Seeret also for being a very responsible member of our school community. 

Wishing everyone a safe and happy holiday break. 

Frank Catalano

Principal