Principal's Update

Community Consultation

As mentioned in the previous newsletter, staff at Dundas Public School are focusing on the development of our new 4-year school plan called our ‘School Excellence Plan’. The 2025-2028 school excellence plan will guide our commitment to continuous school improvement.

An integral component of the new plan development is community consultation. We are very keen to hear from our DPS parents and carers so we have organised 2 platforms where our parents can share their thoughts and insight.

1. Parents and carers can complete an anonymous online survey. The survey has 11 questions and should take 3-5 minutes to complete. The link to the community consultation survey is below. We will also be sharing the link via Audiri, Seesaw and the Sentral for Parents App.

Link to DPS community consultation survey

1. Parents and carers can complete a paper survey. It asks the same questions as the online survey. For the next 2 weeks, our wonderful student leaders will be available every morning from 8:40am-9am with the paper surveys for our parent community to complete. They will be located at our COLA at the bottom of the stairs near the uniform shop. They will be easy to spot as they will be wearing green volunteer tops as seen in the picture below.

We will be collecting your feedback for the next 2 weeks. The survey will close on Friday 6th December at 3pm.

Semester 2 student reports 

ALERT- We still have 77 DPS families who have NOT downloaded and set up the Sentral for Parents App!

This term, ALL student reports will be online which is a very exciting initiative. Having student reports available online means that they can be accessed at home whenever it is convenient. All families MUST have downloaded and set up the free Sentral for Parents App to access the student report.

2024 TERM dates

PLEASE MAKE EVERY EFFORT TO ARRANGE TRAVEL DURING SCHOOL VACATION PERIODS, RATHER THAN DURING THE SCHOOL TERM

Term 4 2024 - Monday 14 October 2024 (for staff AND students) to Wednesday 18 December (for students) and Friday 20 December (for staff) 2024

2025 NSW TERM dates and school holidays

APPLICATIONS ARE NOW OPEN FOR 2026 ENTRY INTO SELECTIVE HIGH SCHOOLS AND OPPORTUNITY CLASSES (O.C.)

Selective high school and opportunity class applications are open from 7 November 2024 to 21 February 2025.

Selective high school Year 7 entry in 2026: Apply when your child is at the end of Year 5 or the beginning of Year 6.

Opportunity class Year 5 entry in 2026: Apply when your child is at the end of Year 3 or the beginning of Year 4.

Selective high schools and opportunity classes are 2 of the ways the NSW Department of Education supports high potential and gifted students.

What are their benefits?

• Students learn alongside, and form friendships with, other high potential and gifted classmates.
• Special teaching methods allow students to learn at a quicker pace and in more detail.
• Research shows that students benefit both academically and socially when learning with classmates who have similar abilities.

Selective high schools and opportunity classes are not zoned so you can apply to ones outside your local enrolment area.

Do you speak another language? Translated resources are available in 13 languages on our website: edu.nsw.link/shsoc_languages

Is a selective high school or opportunity class the right fit for my child?

A selective high school or opportunity class might be a great fit if your child:

• learns quickly
• asks complex questions
• is highly motivated
• has a good memory
• is intensely focused in their area of interest

Where are selective high schools (Year 7-12) located?

There are 4 types of selective high schools:

• fully selective high schools, where all students attending the school have high potential or are gifted
• partially selective high schools, where there is a mix of students who have high potential or are gifted and local area students
• 4 agricultural selective high schools, including 3 boarding schools
• Aurora College, which provides online selective classes for rural and remote students in their local host schools.

Search for a selective high school near you at Find a selective high school.

Where are opportunity classes (Year 5-6) located?

There are 2 types of opportunity classes:

• full-time opportunity classes in selected primary schools
• Aurora College, which provides online opportunity classes for rural and remote students in their local authorised host schools.

Search for an opportunity class near you at Find an opportunity class.

Students successfully placed attend the opportunity class full-time in Years 5 and 6. In most cases, students who have accepted a place in an opportunity class will leave their current school to attend the school with the opportunity class.

Discuss the opportunity with your child and look through the information together on the Selective high schools and opportunity classes website and in the student resource hub:

• Applying for a selective high school: Student resource hub
• Applying for an opportunity class: Student resource hub

Fair and equitable access

The Equity Placement Model helps make access fairer for more high potential students in our community.

We know that some students may be missing out because they experience educational disadvantage.

Under the model, up to 20% of places in each selective high school and opportunity class are held for:

• students from low socio-educational advantage backgrounds
• Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander students
• students from rural and remote locations
• students with disability.

These students still receive offers based on their performance in the placement test.

Learn more at Fair access.

The application process

Complete the online application.

Applications close on 21 February 2025.

Once your application has been submitted and processed, your child will need to sit a computer-based placement test. Learn more at Application process.

Ready to apply?

Apply online at shsoc.education.nsw.gov.au

Further information

Visit Selective high schools and opportunity classes.

Visit: education.nsw.gov.au/shs-oc

School Infrastructure Project Update

School Infrastructure looks forward to sharing this at an information session on Wednesday 4 December 2024, 3 pm to 6:30 pm in the school library.

More information

You can find more information about the project at edu.nsw.link/DundasPS or by scanning the QR code.

Planning for 2025 

The school leadership team has commenced planning for 2025. Currently, we are planning for less enrolments for 2025, with 41 kindergarten enrolments starting but we are losing 57 Year 6 students as they transition to high school. 

At this point in time, we are planning to have 12 classes for 2025. The number of classes is dictated by the staffing formula of the NSW Department of Education. Our current 2025 enrolment numbers equal forming 12 classes. 

We are extremely fortunate at DPS to have highly skilled, professional and passionate teachers. Creating classes is an extremely rigorous process that teachers take very seriously. Our aim is to provide equity for all students based on their academic, social and emotional needs. 

Shortly, students will be completing their friendship sociograms where they are asked to identify 5 students, they are friends with. A reminder of the DPS Class Formation & Teacher Allocation Policy document shared with our community at the beginning of 2024. Below is a link to the policy document on our school website.

Class_formation_and_teacher_allocation_policy_February_2024.pdf

If your child has any social, academic or emotional needs that we are unaware of which may have an impact on their class placement for 2025, please email the school - attention Lee Shipley. This information must be submitted by Friday, 29th November. 

Requests for specific teachers will not be taken into consideration.