Principals` Message

Week 4 news

Over the past few weeks I have been asked by many parents and carers if I know what will be happening with the principal role after this term. I am very happy to let our community know that I will now be staying as acting principal at Fitzroy Primary School until the end of Term 1 next year. This will allow us to have a very stable, positive finish to the 2023 school year and to prepare well for the next year, including the return of the George St building to the school and running of both sites. I look forward to continuing to work with our great community into the new year.

I would like to remind everyone that all children are required to wear a broad brimmed hat, bucket hat or legionnaires cap when outside for PE or playtime. We are starting to experience high UV days and everyone must be wearing a hat outdoors. Hats should also be named to ensure they are easily returned to their owner should they be misplaced. Next week children not wearing a hat will need to stay in the shade during breaktimes.

Don’t forget about our upcoming student free day on Monday 6th November. This is the day before Cup Day which will allow our families to enjoy a long, long weekend, and will provide our teachers with important professional learning time. 

Fete a la Fitzroy

What wonderful day our Fete a la Fitzroy turned out to be! I am extremely happy and proud of our first fete in a long time, which was an absolute outstanding success. It was great to see the large number of people throughout the day enjoying our Fete, with lots of our current families, future families and Fitzroy local community members joining in. We had lots of delicious food, fun activities and excellent entertainment. The entertainment throughout the day was great and it was wonderful to see children and families dancing, singing and celebrating together. The performances by the children from Ecole de Samedi were lots of fun, as were the sets from the Bathroom Choir, the Paper Jellyfish, and Tim Willis. My favourites however were the awesome Fitzroy Primary School mass singing and cultural infusion performances by each year level group. It was incredible to see a huge crowd of parents and carers come together to watch and listen to our children singing together as a whole school. Well done to all our students, Alex and Bree for their support and teaching of the students. A special thanks to the Seben Brothers for the last set of the day and giving us a great finish to an awesome day.

I would like to acknowledge and thank everyone who was involved in supporting our Fete and making it such a success. We had almost 50 businesses and organisations contribute items, experiences and services to our Fete - your support allowed us to provide a great range of experiences, raffle and silent auction items. Thank you to our families who donated second hand items. Huge thank you to those parents/carers who worked tirelessly throughout the day on setup, pack up and stalls throughout the day. Thank you to our all our staff who gave up their time on Saturday to help on stalls and contribute to the organisation throughout the last 6 months. Thank you to everyone who performed and kept us entertained. Thank you to our organising committee (Sally, Marine, Jason, Meg, Jamie, Tania, Elodie, Audrey, Marion, Matthieu, Anna, Jane, Jenny, Lorna) for their dedication and tireless effort over the past 9 months. One last special thank you goes out to Lauren and Evelyn for their extraordinary leadership and energy in bringing this great event to life. Well done everyone we look forward to next years event!

As well as being a great school community day it was also a great fundraiser for our school too. I am very happy to announce that the fete raised $14,931.88 for the school! School council and our junior school council will discuss how the funds can be used to provide improved outdoor spaces for our students.

Voice Referendum Result

The last week has been observed as a period of silence by our indigenous peoples after the referendum result. Out of respect of our first nations students and families we have not raised the referendum result with our community until now. 

This referendum is the first that Australia has had in over two decades and it highlights the importance of referendums to our democratic system of government. We know that in a democracy, it’s important that people can express their opinions on key issues, especially those of great national importance.

For many people, this referendum has been – and will continue to be – a sensitive topic with deep, personal meaning and it is important that we continue to engage with each in a respectful and considerate way.

There will be different responses to this outcome, including disappointment or distress for many students, staff and communities. I encourage students who have been affected by the result to reach out to our wellbeing staff or class teacher, to family, trusted adults, and friends for support. It is important for all members of our community to be respectful and engage in supportive and constructive conversations with those who may have been affected. Additionally there are a range of external mental health supports that can be reached out to for support, such as Headspace, Kids Helpline, Beyond Blue, Yarning SafeNStrong, 13Yarn and the healing foundation.

-Nathan Moore & Andrea Hennessey