Principal's Report

It was wonderful last week to see so many parents engage in Parent Teacher Interviews with over 500 bookings. This opportunity to establish a relationship with your child’s teacher is highly advantageous, as is the chance for them to learn more about your child through your eyes. Meaningful Community Engagement is one of three pillars at our school and I therefore encourage you to maintain this relationship, sharing the wins, the woes and the interesting with the teacher throughout the year! 

Parent PL*

At home, a similar framework can also prove a conversation starter to share openly with your children, role model the importance of challenge and celebrate in success. After a parent session I attended with Dr Arne Rubenstein at my child’s school. We use the terminology a rose (win), thorn (woe) and banana peel (interesting/funny) at our dinner table each night to start us off.

*After sharing two podcasts in the last edition, a number of parents commented that they enjoyed tuning into them, and so I’ll continue to share, where I come across something good, because parenting is hard! 

2026 School Council Elections

School Council provides an important avenue by which to engage in the workings of our school, in a governance role. All government schools in Victoria have a School Council. They are legally constituted bodies that are given powers to set the key directions of a school within state-wide guidelines. Operational responsibilities remain with school staff.  At HPS, we meet monthly on Wednesday evenings via a combination of in-person and online meetings, with all documentation circulated the week before for pre-reading. 

Nomination

Membership on Council requires formal nomination (and a ballot if enough candidates nominate) and members must meet certain prerequisites, including having a valid Working with Children Check and undertake training in this space. 

The nomination for candidates is now open and will close Wednesday 25th February at 4:00pm. If you wish to nominate, please collect a form from the office. If a ballot is required, dates for this will be communicated at the time. 

If you have any questions, please contact me directly at Joshua.sheffield@education.vic.gov.au

Parent Involvement

Parent involvement is welcomed in many ways, and there are less formal ways to be engaged and support school events than a role on Council. If you are interested in finding out more about the Parents’ Association, Mum’s Club or Dad’s Club, please reach out to the primary contacts below. These groups play an incredibly important role in connecting our community, fundraising, ‘fun-raising’ and supporting school priorities, in a very fun and relaxed way. Again, if you have any questions, please be in touch.

Mum’s Club: Linda Corr lindacorr83@gmail.com 

Dad’s Club: Mark Alexander markalex@hotmail.com 

Parent’s Association (PA): Carlo Cajiili ccajili@gmail.com 

It is worth noting that each group have multiple ‘key drivers’ of the groups to share the responsibility, for simplicity I have listed just one.

2026 Priorities

This year’s Annual Implementation Plan (AIP) has been approved by the Senior Education Improvement Leader and reviewed by School Council.

The key priorities for this year build on from last year and are summarised as:

Key Improvement Strategy 1. Build teachers' understanding and consistent application of two of our Instructional Model’s seven Core Practices (Explanation and Adaptive Teaching).

KIS 2. Build staff understanding of, and ability to, frequently and purposefully encourage expected behaviours with effective systems for acknowledging expected behaviours refined and implemented consistently. 

These key priorities are closely linked to our school philosophy and priorities (see graphic) and reflect a focus on further improving the strong academic performance of our students over recent years. They also align with departmental priorities, are heavily underpinned by the strong educational research and are being supported by further resource development across the state. 

We have aligned our Curriculum Days, Professional Learning Schedule, our Learning Specialist's Position Descriptions, an instructional coaching program and budgets to support the successful implementation of these priorities and in turn, stronger outcomes for your children.

Facilities Issues

I have been made aware of concerns circulating in WhatsApp Groups about toilets and the height of the soft fall in the front playground. Thankfully, both of these were brought to my attention, meaning we can take action. We were unaware the toilet soap dispensers were not refilled, this is the responsibility of the cleaners and has been fixed immediately. The height of the softfall we were aware of and it has been booked in to be filled in April holidays (the next available time). 

Please remember that the best way to get something fixed, or answered, is to reach out to one of us; the airing of concerns in chats doesn’t normally result in any change, which is a no-win situation!

Fishing Kit Donation

We have been provided with a large number of fishing kits (rod, reel, basic tackle) as a part of a partnership the DE have. If anyone is aware of a charity that would benefit from a donation of these brand new kits (either in Australia or abroad), please contact the office.

New & Important Dates

• School Photos: 23rd & 24th February (Whole School)
• District Swimming: Tuesday 3rd March (Select Students in Grades 4-6)
• Division Swimming; Tuesday 10th March (Select Students in Grades 4-6)
• NAPLAN Testing Window: 11th – 23rd March (Grades 3 & 5)
• End of Term: Thursday 2nd April at 2:30pm
• Curriculum Day: Monday 20th April
• Start of Term 2: Tuesday 21st April

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