Meet Our Staff 

Joanna Soltys

Science Teacher

Joanna joined Nossal in 2012 after teaching for 9 years at another school. She is passionate about her subject area of Psychology, which she has taught for the entirety of her professional career. Joanna is the current Year 12 Level Leader and is involved in organising events such as camp, formal and Celebration Day. Outside of school, she loves to spend her time with her many animals, gardening and reading. Joanna attends regular training sessions with her Chocolate Labrador X Dogue De Bordeaux, Teddy, with the aim of him becoming one of Nossal's therapy dogs in the not too distant future.

Chantelle Pumphrey

Sports Teacher

Chantelle have worked at Nossal since 2015 when she started as an Inter-school Sport Coordinator. She studied Exercise Science at University and majored in Psychology. At Nossal she had taught Year 11 Psychology, Year 11 Health and Year 11 PE at VCE level. Her favourite subject to teach is Year 9 Dance as she grew up studying Ballet, Tap & Jazz. Netball is her other passion as she grew up playing State League and coaching at Gippsland Storm Netball Club. Her favourite Inter-school sports team to coach is the boys Netball teams and also coaching the Team Vic 12 & Under Netball girls team for School Sport Victoria this year. She enjoys celebrating all of Nossal's students sporting achievements, please go and chat to her if you have any recent achievements or questions about inter-school sport.

Vaani Guruparan

English Teacher

Vaani Guruparan is a new addition to Nossal, who started at the beginning of Term 2. She graduated from Monash University in 2021 and is currently teaching English and Theatre Studies. She is a proud member of Pegasus house and strives to create a positive learning environment to cultivate student critical thinking. In addition to being an enjoyer of diverse novels and manga, Vaani is also passionate about Greek mythology, history and travelling. With extended family dispersed all around the world, she is eager to travel and experience a small part of their lives. Outside of school, she enjoys playing netball, listening to music, and has been a Bharatanatyam dancer (Indian classical dance) for 16 years.  

Joshua Blanchard

Facilities & Operations

Josh commenced his work at Nossal since the beginning of this year as a Facilities Manager. Previously, he studied horticulture at Melbourne University and later worked in facilities roles at Mount Erin College, Somerville Secondary College and Blackburn English Language School.  He was also a ballroom dancing instructor many years ago. Recently, he worked at the Victorian School Building Authority as a trainer for the rollout of a new statewide school asset management system. He trained Facilities Managers from various schools  in the use of the system. Outside of work he enjoys family time with his wife and his son, together with bike riding and watching Marvel movies.  The most interesting thing we know about Josh is that Roger was his year 8 English Teacher and he feels privileged to be Roger's student.  Feel free to contact Josh if you have any facilities issues.

Amanda Polgar

Food Technology Assistant

Amanda has been working at Nossal since 2017 as the Food Technology Assistant. She runs the Food Technology kitchen, assisting staff and students in practical lessons; including ordering, preparing and cleaning up, as well as sharing her expertise with students while they are cooking. She sources recipes and equipment to allow students to get the most out of their time and experience with the program. She also organises various activities and events such as whole-school BBQs, staff morning/afternoon teas, student-led bake sales and co-curricular activities etc. Cooking is her passion and she likes testing new recipes regularly, at the same time using up extra ingredients to cook up a storm for staff wellbeing.

Frank Fu

IT Staff

With more than 5 years’ IT journey in industry and schools, Frank brought his knowledge and experience to Nossal during the lockdowns in 2020. He remotely supported teachers and students to ensure remote learning to be delivered in high quality. Apart from that, he is the main engineer to migrate the school infrastructure from onsite to cloud. After work, Frank coaches  the under 10 basketball team in Berwick Panthers. He helps young people build a love of participating in basketball for life-long involvement in sport to keep them fit, healthy and active. If you have any computer or network issues, you are more than welcome to pop up at the IT window. He will get it resolved.