School Council 

School Council membership 2025

Parent members

• Kieran Barns-Jenkins
• Daniel Bevz
• Rick Bottiglieri
• Ben Gibson
• Margaret Hua
• Catherine Luong
• Nerida Rixon
• Tom Rundle

Employee members

• Kristy Bedford
• Elisha Katsonis
• Jarrod Sutton

School Council Secretary

• Sandra Monaghan

Office Bearers

School Council President

Rick Bottiglieri

School Council Vice President

Ben Gibson

School Council Treasurer

Tom Rundle

School Council meeting 25th August 2025

School council met on 25 August 2025. 

Billie and Maddie from Junior School Council presented an update to School Council including:

• Ideas for reducing rubbish and mess in the yard such as reminding students about nude food and taking their rubbish with them. 
• Ideas for reducing the amount of recycling in classrooms 
• Plans for show day 
• Plans to put up posters in Japanese about rights and responsibilities in the yard 
• Update on the activities that were planned for book week 

Jarrod presented on the principal’s report and provided an update on the following:

• Offers have gone out for 2026 Foundation enrolments and acceptances are coming in. It is currently projected that we will have similar enrolment numbers as this year. 
• The school will do its Kinder to Foundation transition program over two weeks in early term 4. This is an opportunity for future students to meet with our Foundation teachers and for parents to attend information sessions. 
• Transition for Year 6-7 student is also underway. Families will have received their offers for secondary school and some families, depending on the secondary school, will have already started receiving communications about transition opportunities. 
• There will be a State-wide Year 6-7 Orientation Day on Tuesday 9 December 2025. 
• The Curriculum Day last week focused on the new Victorian Teaching and Learning Model 2.0.
• We received the comparison for NAPLAN results. In terms of our focus areas for AIP, we are mostly meeting or exceeding our goals. 
• School will be working towards finalising staffing for next year hopefully towards the middle of November. 
• The school is planning for its 2026 School Program; it is likely to remain the same and consideration of additional specialists will be undertaken as capacity to implement is possible. Performing Arts and Science are two areas of interest from students, staff and parents and the school will continue to look into this.
• There are also several events coming up:
  • Grade 2 sleepover – Friday 10 October 
  • F/1 activity night – Thursday 6 November
  • Swimming program for Years 1-6 – this will be held at the Maribyrnong Aquatic Centre on the following dates:
    • Year 1/2s and 5/6s – 20 October to 31 October
    • Year 3/4s – 17 November   
  • Cyber Safety session delivered by Susan McLean. There will be a session for students in Year 3-6 during the day and then a parent’s session. 
• The Department of Education and Training has released two new policies:
  • AI policy – which sets out appropriate use of AI by staff in schools 
  • Suspension and expulsion policy – which gives principals the power to suspend and expel students for behaviour that has occurred outside school but has an impact at school. 
• The Department has just updated its Preventing and Addressing Racism policy, this will be communicated in this week’s newsletter,

Tom reported on the Resources committee meeting. In addition to financial reports being discussed and endorsed, the following was also discussed:

• Camp Australia will now be providing termly reports to School Council which will include data about the program highlights and attendance and any incidents or complaints. 
• The Parent Comedy fundraising event – was endorsed to go ahead at the Essendon Rowing Club 
• The VSBA are currently investigating possible works to be done to the library building due to dampness. There are no current health concerns relating to the dampness. 

Elisha provided an update from the Education Committee

• Elisha and Jarrod attended a conference about the new Victorian Teaching and Learning Module 2.0.
• Work is being done on yard values and rights and responsibilities in the yard. 
• A behaviour matrix is also being developed for the values. Currently working on the value of Respect and then will do Resilience next. 
• The Student Engagement and Wellbeing policy has been reviewed and was tabled at the meeting. This was approved by school council. 
• The next policies that will be reviewed are the Inclusion and Diversity Policy and the Digital Learning policy. 

Jarrod presented on the minutes of the Community Engagement committee. This included discussions regarding the following:

• Upcoming cyber safety session 
• Upcoming events, including considering adding a summer picnic night which will be similar to the basket tea but at the end of the year. 
• Positive feedback on Japanese, Art show and Book fair happening the same week as the 3-way conference. 
• Feedback regarding the possibility of there being a school concert, there is no capacity for this at the moment but something the school will continue to look into when capacity for Performing arts becomes viable.