Principal's News

in, What a terrific fortnight around the school as we lean into some cooler and shorter days, it is only offset by a great warmth and atmosphere throughout the school grounds, in our classrooms and in the school community.

There is a lot happening around the school and the details below attempt to provide you with an oversight of these and give you a snapshot of what is happening throughout the school as we hit the final two weeks of May. Thanks for taking a moment to engage with this information.

Education Week

We have celebrated Education Week around the school this week with many little highlights around the school. We celebrated our Walk to School day this morning and it was great to see so many students taking the opportunity to ride or walk to school. We threw open our classrooms with our two Open Classroom afternoons and have enjoyed a great STEM incursion for all year levels over the course of the week.

We’ve enjoyed celebrating education and the support we receive as a school allows us the privilege to work with your child and support them. We are appreciative of this opportunity and the chance to work alongside you.

Open Day

Our first Open Day of the year last Saturday was a wonderful success with attendance from a large number of families alongside a great turn out from our CPS families and community members to support our PFC Sausage Sizzle and Cake Stall. A collection of our Year 5/6 student leaders did a great job celebrating our school, providing the audience with an introduction presentation as well as working with families and their children as we ventured over to the prep classrooms at the conclusion of the school tour. A big thanks and congratulations to Aki, Ada, Mae, Naoki, Eleanor, Ayano, Lucy, Aoba, Keira, Alex and Sebastian for their attendance and support on the day. I also extend my sincere thanks to Morioka sensei, Murray sensei and Mrs Curlewis for their attendance and support.

Our very talented school community, parents and friends combined to fundraise over $1500. A huge thanks to all involved who supported the day.

Team Work

Congratulations to our Year 5/6 students who represented our school so well last week at our Winter Playoffs, working together in our team based competition. Our teaching staff were full of praise for the way that our students worked together, supported one another and tried their best. Thank you to our teaching staff for making the day so enjoyable for our students.

Congratulations

Our last whole school assembly saw an assortment of acknowledgements and celebrations from around the school with many students recognised for their work, their leadership and their commitment to our school values. These included:

Team Kids – Making A Difference (MAD) Awards: Yosei K (1/2E) and Yuma A (1/2C)
Specialist Awards: Kiyansh P (STEM), Nanami K (Performing Arts), Yoshita N (Visual Arts), Oliver S (PE), Hinata O (Visual Arts), Tommy H (Performing Arts), Alex O (STEM)

We also recognised our Junior School Council (JSC) leadership team with their badge presentation, presenting JSC Badges to:

Ariuna D (1/2A), Louis L (1/2C), Hinata O (1/2E), Owen B (5/6C), Lilly R (3/4C), Haru M-I (3/4B), Ashley C (1/2B), Nanami K (1/2D), Aiya A (5/6A),

Industrial Action

Whilst an in principle agreement was recently made between the AEU and the Victorian Government, negotiated terms of the agreement include maintaining the current omission of report comments for the Semester One reporting period. Can I encourage families to be please be aware of these changes in the lead up to Semester One reports getting released at the end of Term 2.

Student Attendance - Every Day Counts

The following extract comes from the DET website:

https://www.vic.gov.au/attendance-and-missing-school

Going to school every day is an important part of your child’s education. Children and young people learn new things at school every day, connect with friends, have fun and develop good habits that help them to succeed. Attending and participating in school will help your child:

develop important skills and knowledge to help them learn
develop social and emotional skills such as good communication, resilience and team-work
establish friendships with peers which help develop self-esteem and a sense of belonging.

There is no good number of days for missing school. Being away from school for 1 day a fortnight adds up to missing 4 whole weeks of school a year. Where possible, you should avoid your child missing school, for example, make appointments for your child outside of school hours and keep family holidays to outside term time.

King’s Birthday Public Holiday June 8th

A reminder to all families that the school will be closed due to the King’s Birthday Public Holiday on Monday, 8th June.

National Reconciliation Week

National Reconciliation Week (NRW) is celebrated across Australia each year from 27th May to 3rd June. The dates commemorate two significant milestones in the reconciliation journey - the anniversaries of the successful 1967 referendum and the High Court Mabo decision.

National Reconciliation Week is a time for all Australians to learn about our shared histories, cultures, and achievements, and to explore how each of us can contribute to the national reconciliation effort.

2026 Government Schools Principal Conference

Morioka sensei and I will be attending the Government Schools Principal Conference on Thursday 28th and Friday 29th May. This is a mandated obligation and a strong piece of professional development for leadership teams around the state. We look forward to hearing from Key Note presentations from Lisa Alexander AM, Dr Carl Hendrick, Dr Nathaniel and Dr Simon Breakspear.

This is an excellent opportunity for Victorian government school principals and assistant principals to:

hear from renowned leaders in education
discover new ways of thinking about leadership excellence
learn and reflect from one another.

National Simultaneous Storytime – Wednesday 27th May 12pm

Our school is excited to once again participate in National Simultaneous Storytime (NSS) 2026, a nationwide literacy event coordinated annually by the Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA). National Simultaneous Storytime promotes the value of reading and literacy while connecting children across Australia through the shared enjoyment of a picture book. This year’s featured story is Luna Roo, a wonderful picture book that celebrates imagination, belonging, and storytelling.

The live National Simultaneous Storytime event will take place on Wednesday 27th May at 12pm, with schools and libraries around the country joining together to read the story at the same time. We look forward to celebrating this fantastic literacy initiative and continuing to foster a love of reading across our school community.

Emerging Leaders Program

I have had the chance to work alongside Hugh Greer (principal – Somers PS) and Rachael Stone (principal – Mordialloc College) to support a group of emerging leaders in primary and secondary schools, we kicked off this program last week, working with 38 teachers from around the Bayside Peninsula. The program is an important opportunity to build capacity and leadership in schools, we’ve had three of our staff undertake this program over recent years, all of whom have benefited from the chance to network and learn with others whilst also refining their leadership skills to support their work.

Numeracy At Home

The department has developed a series of videos and these resources offer simple, practical activities families can do at home, at the supermarket, or in the park to help build number sense.

https://www.vic.gov.au/mathematics-and-numeracy-home

As your child’s first teacher, you play an important role in developing their numeracy skills from an early age. The videos show what number sense looks like in the classroom and provide easy tips to support your child’s learning at home. The first video introduces the series, while the following four each focus on a key early maths skill. These are the skills your child will learn in their early years of school, from Foundation to Grade 2. After each video, you’ll find helpful suggestions for practising these skills together at home. There are also pages of information for supporting your child's education at home.

Our Thanks

On Thursday we had a special morning tea to celebrate and acknowledge our wonderful Education Support Team, we also had some special helpers who presented cards and flowers to our staff. My sincere thanks to Aparna, Jess W, Miki, Noa, Payal, Sophie, Theo, Therese, Tomomi who work with such flexibility to support our students each and everyday. Our school wouldn't be the same without them.

Plenty of happy Arsenal, Aston Villa and Carlton supporters this week, I haven’t had much to cheer about this season but it was nice to see a strong performance over the weekend against the Bulldogs. Enjoy a great weekend ahead and I look forward to seeing you around the school over the week ahead.

Take Care,

Edward Strain

Principal