From the Principal

Dear Parents and Carers,

It was wonderful news to hear of the restrictions being lifted. Let's hope we can continue to see restrictions being eased and enjoy being reconnected with our families and community.

As we enter into the warmer seasons it is lovely to see children and families taking the opportunity to walk or ride to school. This week we have been impressed by the large number of bikes in the bike racks. This is a great way to start the day, excellent for the students' mental and physical health and wellbeing. Where and when possible I would encourage all families to take up this opportunity.

ICON is coming to COHR

ICON (Integrated Catholic Online Network) is a new and centralised accounting and administration system being rolled out in all Catholic schools across Melbourne. Rachel and Virginia are in the process of a lot of new learning and workshops to prepare us for this new system that will eventually make a lot of processes more streamlined. Please see an important message below from Virginia and Rachel.

From Virginia and Rachel in the Office

Dear Parents and Guardians

We wanted to give you some information around a few changes that may affect you as the school migrates to a new administration and accounting system over the next few weeks.

From tomorrow, 30th October, the school will enter a period of "black out" as we migrate to a new cloud-based accounting and administration system. Essentially what this means is that the office will have no electronic accounting system and for approximately 4 weeks and will be recording all accounting transactions manually until the new system is available .

In this time, the office will not be able to give you an electronic or computerised receipt for any payments or school fees. With this in mind, our preferred method of payment, if possible, is for families to make any fee payments electronically through your internet banking platform (please identify your payments using your account number and last name).

We understand this is not always the preferred method of payment for many families so the office will still be able to take cash and credit card payments but can only provide you with a receipt from our receipt book (with the view to processing the receipt against account balances once ICON is live).

Given we will have no computer system, unfortunately we will not be able to issue any up to date statements, change addresses or telephone numbers, nor accurately provide fee balances at this time. We ask for your patience during this process as there will also be a period of catch up after we are up and running to transfer all transactions from October 16 into the new system. We are confident this will not affect too many of you and we will be up and running as quickly as possible.

Thank you - Virginia and Rachel

Prep 2021 Prep Interviews

Jill Palermo and myself have now completed our Prep 2021 Meet and Greet interviews. These were conducted virtually and were a wonderful opportunity for us to meet with our incoming families and children. It was also an opportunity for our new Prep parents to share with the school any information that may assist us to ensure a smooth transition for their children when they commence at COHR next year.

Class Organisation 2021

Teachers have now commenced the process of organising classes for 2021. Teachers take a broad and balanced view when considering the needs of all students. It is our intention, as always, to provide well-balanced class groupings. To achieve this we take into consideration the academic, social, emotional and behavioural needs of all students. Teachers will draw on their collective knowledge of the students and expertise to arrange the classes.

Individual parent requests compromise this process and inevitably inhibit our capacity to deliver balanced classes. I ask parents to consider how difficult the task of arranging balanced classes would be if we were to act on all parent preferences. Therefore I ask parents to refrain from sending requests about student placement to classroom teachers.

To best support students in their learning and provide optimal social interaction we will be looping some students (students have the same teacher for two years) while others will change classes. Requests by parents to have their child/children placed with certain teachers is certainly not something we consider based on personal preference.

If you still feel there is a need to have an issue discussed, please make a time to see me before Friday 6th November.

Once finalized it will be extremely difficult to make changes to these groupings.

Telephone Issues

We have been having some telephone issues this week. If you need to contact the school, can we please ask you to ring our main line

9569 8966.

Condolences

We keep the Young-Waugh (Alice Prep PS) family in our thoughts and prayers with the passing of Alice's Great-Grandmother recently.

Icy Poles

Icy poles will be on sale tomorrow for $1.

Scholastic Book Club

A Scholastic Book Club catalogue was sent home two weeks ago. If you are interested in purchasing any books, please return your order form and payment to the office by tomorrow 30th October. Alternatively, you can pay via credit card through the Book Club Loop at https://mybookclubs.scholastic.com.au/parent/Login.aspx

School Education Board

Last night we held our second last meeting for the year. Matters raised at our meeting included:

2020 School Review
Enrolment Trends and Promotions
Child Safety
Camp Program given the impact of COVID on our program
Student Leadership

Staff News

Congratulations to Elise and Nick Rimington who are expecting their second child in April next year. We wish them well as they plan for the new addition to their family.

SCHOOL CLOSURE DAY

A reminder that next Monday 2nd November is a school closure day and Tuesday 3rd is a public holiday.

Term 4 Dates

Mon 2nd Nov - School Closure Day

Tuesday 3rd Nov - Melbourne Cup Public Holiday

Tues 10th & Thurs 12th Nov - School Review

Tues 17th Nov - Prep 2021 Parent Information Evening 7:30pm - 8:15pm (via Google Meet)

Wed 18th Nov - Book Week Activity Day

Fri 27th Nov - School Closure Day (Planning 2021)

Tues 15th Dec Term 4 concludes 3:30pm

Please take care and be safe.

Cyber Safety at COHR

CYBER SAFETY AT COHR