Principal's Report
Principal: Brendan Millar
In this week’s newsletter:
News and Appreciations
- Curriculum Day today
- Easter Chocolate Raffle
- Ride2School Day
Parents’ Association second-hand uniform stall appreciation
Coming Up...This Week
- Emergency Management Drill
Assembly (please be seated by 2:45pm)
Coming Up...Next Week
- Western Region Swim Carnival
- Kids’ Share Open Afternoons
- School Council meeting
- Hoodie Up for Autism Day
- End of Term – early dismissal
Repeated Messages
News and Appreciations
Curriculum Day Today
Today we held a highly productive professional learning day for all teaching and classroom-based education support staff, titled Teaching for Productive Learning in Primary Mathematics. This Curriculum Day was scheduled during Term 4 last year, based on presenter Brendan Lee’s limited availability.
We appreciate for families that this week has been significantly more disruptive than we anticipated prior to the timing of Tuesday’s Stopwork action. Our staff appreciate the support they have received from community members.
Easter Chocolate Raffle
Our annual Parents’ Association Easter Chocolate Drive is well underway. Thank you to the many families who have already donated chocolate over the past few days. The next step is ticket sales for the hampers. Please check Compass for details and purchase your tickets online.
Ride2School Day
Last Friday’s Ride2School Day was a great success. We saw the busiest bike parking area our school has ever had.
The event was organised by Junior School Council co-convenor Lee, a keen cyclist, who worked alongside Community Bike Hub mechanic Warrick. Warrick generously donated his time to check students’ bikes, providing some handy maintenance both before and after the start of the school day.
We also thank the office of our local Member for Footscray, Katie Hall, for donating a fruit box, which proved extremely popular!
We greatly appreciate the support of the Community Bike Hub, our valued local neighbour that provides an excellent service to the community.
Pictured below are students being assisted by Warrick and Lee.
Parents’ Association Second-Hand Uniform Stall Appreciation
The second-hand uniform stall was held before school on Wednesday. We thank our dedicated volunteers for making this opportunity available to families.
Coming Up - Tomorrow
Emergency Management Drill
An Emergency Management Drill will take place tomorrow at 1:30pm. To support the smooth running of the drill, we ask that any early student pick-ups occur before 1:15pm or after 2:00pm.
Emergency drills are conducted each term and cover a range of scenarios to help prepare students and staff should a real emergency occur.
Assembly
The assembly will be held in the Eagle Gymnasium at 2:50pm sharp. We encourage all visitors to be seated beforehand.
This week we will:
- Present our Pupil of the Week Awards
- Feature 5AC with their assembly item, which has been thoughtfully prepared in video format in response to this week’s disruptions
Coming Up – Next Week
Western Region Swim Carnival
The Western Region Swim Carnival will be held next Tuesday for students who qualified through the Maribyrnong Division Carnival.
Unfortunately, we are unable to provide staff supervision at this event due to resourcing constraints. We wish our 3 competitors all the very best of fortune.
Kids’ Share Open Afternoon
Next Tuesday after school it will be our grade 1 to 6 students’ opportunity to share their classroom and learning experiences with parents and carers. Classrooms will be open from 3.30 to 4.15pm. We hope to see many families attending after school.
School Council
Our first onsite meeting for this year will be held next Tuesday evening. We will welcome new members, parent Natalie Cassar and staff member, Caity Gray. I will share a report of our meeting in next week’s newsletter.
Hoodie Up for Autism
The Junior School Council is arranging a Hoodie Up for Autism day next Thursday, the final day of school term. On this day, along with students being welcomed to wear a hoodie in acknowledgement of challenges autistic people encounter, we encourage a voluntary gold coin donation, with money raised being donated to the Amaze Foundation www.amaze.org.au. Coins will be collected in class and conveyed by the JSC reps to the office for counting, with the total amount raised shared at assembly.
End of Term - Early Dismissal
School term concludes next Thursday. At the end of term school will be dismissed at 2:30pm, an hour earlier than the regular time. Dismissal will be preceded by assembly. Due to reduced egress from the gym compared to the outdoor Bilby assembly area, students will return to classes prior to dismissal.
Best regards,
Brendan
Repeated Messages
Family Voluntary Contributions
Thank you to the continued contributions via Compass. We would appreciate this trend continuing to ensure that we can afford the curriculum programs we have in place.
While the principle of a “free education” remains a right, the politicisation of parent contributions has had a significant impact on government schools. FWPS used to receive parent payments from approximately 95% of families. This figure now typically sits between 65% and 70%.
Although we have worked hard to keep contributions low and ensure value for money, receiving approximately 25% less revenue has a very real effect on our ability to provide the quality and range of resources we believe are necessary. In recent years, we have introduced programs such as Spelling Mastery, the Explicit Maths Program, and Inform and Empower. Each of these programs carries a per-student cost. When family contributions are not received, we must find funding elsewhere.
As I write this, I am very conscious that a number of families are experiencing financial hardship. Contributions may be made as a part payment rather than in full. If you are in a position to do so, please support the school by contributing to the best of your capacity.
Inform and Empower Cyber Safety Program
Photographing, Filming and Recording Students
Our annual reminder that if you wish to adjust your current level of permission for photographing, filming or recording of your child to contact the office. Please see the Policy page on our school website for more information:
https://www.fwps.vic.edu.au/page/222/Policies-and-Child-Safe-Standards
Annual Privacy Reminder
Our school collects and uses student and parent personal information for standard school functions or where permitted by law, as stated in the Schools’ privacy policy and the Schools’ privacy collection notice.
Our Photographing, Filming and Recording Students policy, available on the Policies page on our website: https://www.fwps.vic.edu.au/page/222/Policies-and-Child-Safe-Standards, describes how we collect and use photographs, video and recordings of students. The policy also explains when parent consent is required and how it can be provided and withdrawn.
We ask parents to also review the guidance we provide on how we use the Google Suite (G Suite Information for Parents & Guardians) safely at the school and what parents can do to further protect their child’s information. If after reviewing the guidance, you have any questions or concerns regarding your child using Microsoft 365/Google Workspace for Education, please contact the school.
For more information about privacy, refer to: Schools’ privacy policy: information for parents. This information is also available in eleven community languages: Amharic, Arabic, Chinese, Dari, Gujarati, Mandarin, Somali, Sudanese, Turkish, Urdu and Vietnamese.
Camps, Sports and Excursion Fund Applications for Families
Please also make sure you look at the flyer in the newsletter regarding Camps, Sports and Excursions Fund applications for 2026. Applications close in June and are a great help for families.