A warm welcome to our community

I hope everyone enjoyed their long weekend last week. It is always great to have a short week at work and school. The weather is all over the place at the moment so I am hoping everyone is well.

School Council

On Monday night, we had our first meeting with the new School Council. The councillors were inducted with the new members through the AGM where office bearers were elected.

I would like to congratulate the following council members who were elected to the following office bearing positions:

President: Gavin Hodgins
Vice- President: Jean Crewe
Treasurer: Daniel Rodger
Minute Secretary: Sarah Mcdonell

The school council also operates with sub committees and their main role is to advise council through their research and investigations. Parents are more than welcome join sub committees and you don’t need to commit to being on school council either.

Please come and speak with Gavin, our president, or a council member if you are interested in being involved in a sub- committee:

Grants and Grounds Development
School Promotions, Fundraising and Community Building
Education

We welcome our parents and the council would greatly appreciate input from the wider community.

School Fees are now due

In our first school council meeting there was considerable discussion around the parent payments as only 40% of families have paid the school fees in comparison to 96% in past years. School Council has always been very generous in giving parents plenty of notice in the year prior to begin to pay contributions. Parents are also given opportunities to make payment plans in conjunction with our business manager and this supports families to make their contributions.

Weeden Heights absolutely relies on parents paying their students fees so we can provide our students with the broad range of activities in the curriculum for all students. The students access the materials in the art room, use the PE equipment and uniforms, create experiments, build in STEAM, access the online programs via the licences etc so the curriculum fees really are essential for everyone to pay.

Regardless of what parents read from the government, students are not funded for everything. The notion of ‘free education’ is correct however the only free part is that the government provide families with a building (school) and teachers. There are extensive costs to learning. Parents need to contribute to the cost of their child(ren) to interact with the curriculum programs and learn in their ‘free classrooms’ and receive ‘free instruction from the teachers’.

Please assist your school in forwarding your fees so we can maintain or amazing programs and facilities. Weeden Heights is ranked in the top 20 government schools in Victoria and our broad ranges of programs on offer. We are one of the first primary schools in Victoria to have virtual reality headsets. We are trying to run a kitchen/garden program along with an art room, STEAM room and PE program.

Your parent contributions (building fund, library fund etc) from the past along with careful planning and budgeting have helped patch the mess we were left with after the capital works. Parents have contributed to:

Sails in the outdoor learning classroom
Artificial turf at the front of the school
Artificial turf with the gameboards near the hall
Replacement sails
Sails over the sandpit and the retaining walls near the sandpit
The storage shed at the back of the school when we lost all the under school storage
Leaf cleaning costs up to $8000 per year which comes from the building fund
New library shelves to house our books
Laptops
Equipment for the TV studio
The pebble mix coating at the front door to hide all the uneven concrete
Electronic sign
Handyman services
Etc etc.

We are fortunate to have our school building and staff provided for our families but schools do need parent fees to be paid to conduct all activities. Please finalise the payment of your 2025 fees or speak with our business manager about a payment plan to suit your family.

Prep 2026 Tours and Enrolments

We have had many calls and visits already for information regarding enrolments at Weeden Heights Primary School for 2026. Tours and enrolment information is available now. Positions are filling fast so if you are an existing family, please complete your enrolment form and hand it in at the office.

If you know anyone who requires assistance with 2026 placements, please direct them to call our office to book a tour date and time. As you will be aware from information sent home through the Kinders, you need to be enrolled in a school by 12 August. Thank you for helping us with this process.

Parent Association/ Parent Group/Parent Association

Thank-you to the wonderful parents who have shown great interest in our PFA. The parents have met to conduct their AGM and have organised all the events for the year.

The PFA warmly welcome anyone who would like to join them to support the school and most importantly our students. They hope to raise a lot of money for the school and are busy organising their Family Movie night where they will screen Paddington 2. They hope to see you and your family there on the night. Stay tuned for the up-coming events across the year.

Student Absences from School

One of our improvement strategies in the strategic plan is to improve student attendance due to the significant absences of our students at Weeden Heights PS. The Department of Education is following our attendances closely and this week I received a report on every student who has had more than five absences. There are thirteen students already on the list which places them in danger in the chronic category for the rest of the year and we have two students who are on attendance plans. Many of these students have had up to 10 days absent.

You should be all aware, a student missing one day a fortnight will miss four weeks in a year, and more than a year of school by the time they reach year 10. Twenty or more days absent in a year is categorised as chronic absence.

We need to improve student attendance across the whole school. ‘It is not okay to be away’ is the focus from the department and their policy states:

In accordance with the Education and Training Reform Act 2006 (Vic), schooling is compulsory for children and young people aged from 6 to 17 years unless an exemption has been granted.

Parents/carers must enrol a child of compulsory school age at a registered school and ensure the child attends school at all times when the school is open for instruction.

Family holidays during school terms are not an approved absence. Please do not organise holidays during school times or delay returns to school as the term dates for school years are well published. I would greatly appreciate your support with this.

There are a few families that have already asked teachers to provide class work while they take a family holiday. The teachers are not obligated to provide work or correct any work when a family has chosen to keep their child out of school. Please take a look at our school Attendance Policy .

Students at Weeden Heights PS are expected at school everyday unless they are ill.

End of Term Assembly

Parents are reminded that this term will conclude on FRIDAY 4 April at 2.30pm. Please note the early closing time. We will conduct our end of term assembly from the basketball courts and parents will be welcome to attend from 2.10pm. There will be quite a few awards to hand out! .

Term two will commence on Tuesday 22 April 2025 after a two-week break. It is a short first week back with Anzac Day on Friday 25 April. School Council also approved a curriculum day on Monday 28 April (week 2) so the staff can continue their work with Dr Jenni Wilson and inquiry learning.

Please take the school holidays to relax with the family as it has been a big term for everyone. I hope that you all have a very Happy Easter and enjoy a wonderful two-week break. Please stay safe and healthy.

Until next time……

Kylie Campbell

Principal

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