Hello everyone and welcome to the latest newsletter.

I hope you and your children are enjoying the term and the opportunities that have presented across recent weeks. Like always, a busy time at MEPS with many learning activities and extra curricular opportunities happening right across the school.

Just to name a few:

Year 3 OzHarvest
Year 3 & 4 Gymnastics
Year 5 & 6 Fire and Flood Excursion
House Athletics Year 4-6
Book Week Illustrator Incursion - Connah Brecon
Book Week Parade Assembly
Cosy into a Book Day
Year 5 Kindergarten Visits
Science Week
Regional Hockey
Nature Play Excursion - Preps
High Ability Maths Incursion - Peter Skelton
Senior School elective workshops
Year 6 City Camp

Thank-you for supporting your children and the school in allowing these wonderful opportunities to extend the learning experience for all students.

Year 6 Camp

Congratulations to the Year 6 students for their efforts at the recent school camp. The students did an amazing job at engaging with the many activities and showing their leadership skills and interpersonal skills in working as a group and also building their independence and confidence.

I extend a HUGE thank-you to the parents that attended the camp to support the experience: Travis Price, Lucky Somasundaram, Stephanie Young and Sheree Farrington.

Also, thank-you to the staff team Mrs Hille, Mr Bell and Mrs Breen for their hard work and the many hours in preparing and coordinating such a rich learning opportunity.

I am grateful to the team for their ‘round the clock’ support of the students and again, I congratulate the students on their engagement with their final school camping experience.

Curriculum Day

During our recent curriculum day, we focused on building staff capacity to use and analyse data in guiding responsive pedagogy to better meet student needs. NAPLAN data was shared with all staff, allowing us to celebrate student learning and achievements, identify areas of focus and better understand trends over time. The staff also had an initial look into attitudes to school survey data (ATOSS) generated by our year 4-6 students. Each data set will be further considered as the year progresses to guide decision making and responses.

On the day our focus on wellbeing continued with staff working collaboratively on the development of school wide expectations connected to the principles of school wide positive behaviour support. We also worked with Kylie Russell, the Department’s Education Improvement Leader, who joined us to present further information on Cognitive Load Theory and the updated VTLM 2.0 (Victorian Teaching and Learning Model) framework. Staff engaged in meaningful discussions around the recent curriculum changes, exploring them in detail and sharing insights collaboratively.

Father’s Day

A big thank-you to the PTA for their organisation and co-ordination of our Father’s Day stall and also the amazing Father’s Day breakfast and community gathering. The team have put a lot of time and effort into planning and co-ordinating this for us all to enjoy. It was great to see everyone at the school and connecting.

I wish all the dads out there a wonderful Father’s Day on Sunday and thank-you for all that you do in supporting your children to be their best. I hope you enjoy the opportunity to be recognised and celebrated.

End of term

Please be aware of our early finishing time on the final day of the term. School will break up for the holidays on Friday 19th September at 2:15pm. Our final school assembly will take place prior to the dismissal and students will be released from their classrooms.

New Principal

I am pleased to share with you that we have a new Principal of MEPS. Welcome to Miss Addison C.

Addi really settled into the role early making a few phone calls (to Mum in particular – about 4 times).

A workshop meeting with some colleagues.

Lunch break in the staff room with some more colleagues.

A few of Addison’s quotes for the day:

“I can boss you around”

“I’m in charge of you”

“I can boss my brother around”

“I can tell people what to do”

“I’m watching you”

Addi did a great job, and it was wonderful to see her enjoying the role and the school. Addison also made some announcements over our PA system, visited many classrooms, shot some hoops in the office, visited the sick bay to make sure everyone was okay, made sure Mr Thresher was working hard and presented our student awards at assembly…..a great job Addison. It was great working under you and thanks for the feedback!

SunSmart

Just a friendly reminder that from 1st September through to the end of April, all students are required to wear a sun-safe school hat whenever they're outside.

This is part of our SunSmart policy to help keep everyone safe in the sun. From Week 9, our "No Hat, No Play" rule will be in place — students without a hat will need to stay in the shaded areas during recess and lunch. This will provide next week as the time to dust off the hats, make sure they’re clearly named and labelled whilst we build our summer habits.

To be sun-safe, hats must be broad-brimmed or legionnaire-style, which protect the face, neck, and ears.

If your child needs a new hat, the school uniform shop is open:

Monday 8:30am - 11:30am
Wednesday 1:30pm - 3:30pm

Thanks for helping us keep our students safe and sun-smart! 😎

https://www.sunsmart.com.au/protect-your-skin/be-a-sunsmart-family

New bell times

As you may have heard around the school, we have installed a new public address system. This has also commenced the music to signal the start of sessions/prepare for learning. Our bells are limited to signalling to the students to come inside. This helps to indicate the learning sessions and also supports our emergency processes if and when students are required to come out of the yard and into our buildings. We have commenced with a generic playlist (thanks for suffering through this) as students help us to generate a more MEPS genre!

You can see the bell times below:

Time
8:45am	School begins
11:15am	Lunch break
12:00pm	Supervised lunch eating
12:15pm	End of lunch
1:55pm	Afternoon break
2:25pm	End of afternoon break
3:15pm	School dismissal

Parent Opinion Survey

A reminder that the Parent / Caregiver / Guardian Opinion Survey is open online until Friday 19 September 2025. All families are invited to participate in the survey.

The survey is conducted online, only takes 20 minutes to complete, and can be accessed at any convenient time on desktop computers, laptops, tablets or smartphones.

Thank-you for taking the time to consider and complete the 2025 survey.

To complete the survey, simply:

Click on the link below or copy and paste the text into your browser. This link will take you directly to the survey.
https://research.orima.com/parent
Select the School and Campus name below
School Name: Mount Eliza Primary School
Campus Name: Mount Eliza Primary School
Enter the School PIN below
PIN: 991671
When complete, please click on the ‘Submit’ button at the end of the survey to submit your answers. Please note that the survey will time out after 60 minutes of inactivity.

PLEASE NOTE: Only one parent / caregiver / guardian from your household is invited to complete the survey on behalf of the student’s family. Please reach out to your child’s teacher, or the school if your child’s family lives in two separate households, so both households can have the opportunity to provide their feedback.

To protect your responses, please DO NOT share the survey link and PIN with others, or on a public website, forum or similar.

Thanks to those who have already taken the time to complete the survey, your feedback is appreciated.

Social media safety

Parents and carers play an important role in supporting their children to be safe online and on social media. You can help your children safely navigate their digital world and educate them to avoid harmful online experiences. You can explore websites, games, apps and social media together and set some rules and boundaries.

Your support and guidance can give your children the knowledge to make sound decisions online and confidence to ask for help when they need it. It is also important to stay informed about online safety.

The Department of Education recognises this important issue and has developed fact sheets about supports to help keep students safe online and what to do if they are involved in an online incident.

The fact sheets contains links to evidence-based information on supporting positive and safe online experiences, signs a child or young person might need support, what to do if something unsafe happens online, and where to reach out to for more support.

To access the fact sheets, refer to the Safe Socials webpage.

If you have any queries about this information, you can contact the Department by email: bullystoppers@education.vic.gov.au

School Crossings

As students travel to and from school it’s important for drivers, pedestrians and cyclists to be aware and take extra care during these busy times. Following the road rules at school crossings doesn’t just keep our community safe, it is also lawful.

To help keep our kids safe, it’s important for drivers to:

Slow down around school crossings at a speed slow enough to stop safely, if necessary.
Stop if a hand held “Stop” sign is displayed and you must give way when school crossings flags are displayed.
Stop and wait until the school crossing is clear of all pedestrians including supervisors.
Stop if a child or adult is about to cross or is crossing, even if there is no crossing supervisor.
Never overtake a vehicle stopping or stopped at the crossing.
Never let children get in or out of your vehicle when stopped waiting at a school crossing.
Respect School Crossing Supervisors, they’re trained to support children’s safety.
Always watch out for children near schools and if you see a school crossing, use it.

At school crossings, all road users need to be alert, including pedestrians. Always look and listen for approaching traffic from each direction before crossing. Pedestrians need to be sure that drivers or riders have seen them and are stopping.

School crossings are active on weekdays during Victorian school terms. Usually between 8.00am to 9.30am and from 2.30pm to 4.00pm.
Red and white posts on each side of the road with orange children’s crossing flags.
Two parallel continuous or broken lines across the road surface. Children’s crossing yellow signs and twin yellow lights flashing.
School crossing supervisor may be present, easily identified by a high visibility yellow safety vest or jacket and a hat with the word ‘Supervisor’ embroidered.
If you’re driving in a school zone, it usually means a school crossing will be nearby. In most cases, the speed limit displayed will be 40km/h or 60km/h (when the original speed limit is 80km/h or higher).

It is time well spent to have a discussion with your child/ren about your schedule and process for entering and leaving school. This also supports the safety measures in building children’s awareness.

https://transport.vic.gov.au/news-and-resources/education-resources/road-safety-education-resources-for-schools/safe-crossings-safe-kids

School Start

I recognise that the ‘morning rush’ can provide some challenges in making life work in getting to school. However, I need to stress the importance of having all students at school and ready for learning in their class at 8:45am. The morning routine and structure of the school day is outlined at 8:45am each day. This time is crucial in preparing students for a successful day. The first session of our day at MEPS provides an outline of the day ahead, sets the learning program and parameters, reduces cognitive load for students, establishes further connections in the class through our welcome circles. These are designed to focus on the social and emotional needs of students prior to setting the learning intentions for the session and the day ahead.

Late arrivals can create a distraction to learning momentum and often doesn’t support students accessing the learning content in a timely and consistent way. Instructions often need to be re-explained and can have an adverse effect of the learning progress.

We do have a number of students who are arriving later to school. I recognise that for some students the 8:45am start can create some concern. In this situation I ask you to please reach out to your child’s teacher as the first port of call with any issues.

In the event that your child arrives late to school, please note that parents/carers/guardians are responsible and required to sign your children in through the office. Students are not to be signing themselves in to school after 8:45am (as per the process prior to 3:15pm).

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me.

Have a wonderful weekend ahead!

Michael Kent

Principal

Respect, Resilience, Responsibility, Connectedness and Challenge

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