Executive Principal's Report

With only a fortnight to go in Term 2, it feels both far too early and entirely necessary to start looking ahead to Term 3. Somehow, we are already planning beyond the halfway mark of 2026, despite the term feeling like it only just found its shoes.

Term 3 Curriculum Planning

Over the first half of this year, staff have been auditing our curriculum at Richmond West Primary School and unpacking what has previously been a very crowded curriculum space. With bilingual and non-bilingual classes, a range of priority areas, and diverse student needs across every classroom, our previous curriculum documentation has at times been quite siloed, with concepts sitting separately and students moving through many different topics across a week.

One of the shifts we are making is towards a more structured approach to some of our Humanities, Health and Social and Emotional Learning content through the use of whole-school overarching themes, entitled 'Discovery'. This is not a new idea in education, or even at Richmond West, but it gives us a clearer way to connect learning across the school and make sure important content is taught in a sequenced, age-appropriate way from Prep through to Year 6.

Next term, the whole school will be united by a Health focus. This theme will support learning across Literacy, Mathematics and Social and Emotional Learning, with each year level approaching the content through an age-appropriate lens. 

Our Prep students will explore “Healthy Heroes”, focusing on how bodies grow and stay healthy, feelings, friendships and what helps us feel safe. Year 1/2 students will explore “Strong Bodies”, looking at growth, healthy habits, change and how we interact with others. Year 3/4 students will focus on “Growing Up”, exploring physical, emotional and social changes, online and in-person safety, respectful relationships, empathy and boundaries. Year 5/6 students will explore “Healthy Futures”, including puberty, influences on choices, friendships and relationships shaped by respect, power and responsibility, and how online choices can affect real-world experiences. 

Behind the scenes, our teams have mapped this work into a two-year cycle, and one of the most impressive parts has been the way our Chinese and English teaching teams have worked together to align parts of this content creatively across both languages.

Boroondara Eisteddfod

Congratulations to our Brass Band students who represented RWPS at the Boroondara Eisteddfod a couple of weeks ago. Not only did they achieve an outstanding result, placing first, but they represented our school with pride, responsibility and plenty of musical polish.

Thank you to Adam for coordinating this opportunity and making it possible for our students to represent our school beyond the school gates. It is always wonderful to see our students take their learning into new spaces, especially when they return with a result that gives the rest of us permission to be quietly smug.

Vere Street Upgrades

The Vere Street works are nearing completion, and anyone who has had a look at the space recently will have noticed how impressive things are starting to look. When Amanda and I toured the site last week, we both had the same thought: the surrounding garden areas now need a little attention, because the upgrade is making everything else around it need to lift its game.

As the project nears completion, we are looking forward to having the Vere Street gate open for pedestrian access before and after school, BUT, we have been able to secure a final quick win out of the projects through some conversations with Homes Victoria and Peter Doumstes, who is overseeing the project. We asked whether the new path, which currently stops at our gate, could be continued into the school grounds to connect with the existing concrete paths near the garden beds.

We are very grateful that this has been incorporated into the overall project. It will create a much more seamless connection between the upgraded external space and our school grounds. These final works are due to be completed over the school holiday break, and we expect to resume full access from the start of Term 3. Thank you also to the parents and carers from our Buildings and Grounds group who were instrumental in building support for this addition to the project.

Divisional Cross Country and Winter Gala Day

Last week, 13 students from Years 4 to 6 represented our school at the Divisional Cross Country. Despite some early gloomy weather, the day turned out positively, both weather-wise and outcome-wise.

While we wait to find out which students are confirmed to progress to the next stage, congratulations to all students who made it through to the divisional level. This is a fantastic achievement and a reflection of their effort, persistence and preparation.

Thank you to Jacqui for once again organising an event with complex logistics and making it look far easier than it actually is. Next week, our Year 5/6 students will head off to Winter Gala Day for interschool sport, representing RWPS in AFL, soccer, T-ball and netball. We know they have been busy training and wish them all the best.

Foundation Royal Flying Doctor Service Incursion

You may have noticed a small plane arrive at school last Friday. While there are no current plans for Richy Dubs International Airport, our Foundation students were very excited to welcome the Royal Flying Doctor Service for a special incursion.

The visit gave students the chance to learn more about the important work of the Royal Flying Doctor Service and see some very memorable props up close. After both an incursion and an excursion within two weeks, our Foundation students are certainly making the most of Term 2.

It has been wonderful to see our youngest students building confidence with experiences beyond the usual classroom routine. For Foundation students, stepping into these opportunities this early in the year is a big achievement, and they handled it beautifully.

Staff Car Park

As part of our ongoing monitoring of the spaces within and around our school, we have made the decision that the staff car park gate will be closed in the afternoons. The gate will be closed from 3:00pm and reopened at 3:40pm, once school traffic has settled.

This decision has not been made to inconvenience families, although we understand it may require some adjustment. The staff car park is a very small space, and in the afternoons there are often limited, or no, spaces available. 

When families do pull in, it can lead to cars blocking others in, blocking access points, or needing to complete tight turns while students and families are also moving through the same area on foot.

We understand that some families use the car park in the mornings when dropping students at TeamKids or Brass Band rehearsal, and we are keen for that morning access to continue where possible. Our concern is mainly the afternoon pick-up period, when the volume of cars and pedestrians at one time is much higher. 

We hope this will ease once the Vere Street gate reopens, but in the meantime, we ask families to walk where possible or park in one of the many side streets around the school. There is ample two-hour parking nearby, and often it is only a short walk to the school gates. Thank you for your support with this change.

Respectful Engagement with School Staff

We recognise that when families engage with school staff, whether teachers, education support staff or members of leadership, they are usually doing so with their child’s best interests at heart. We also understand that conversations about children can sometimes feel emotional, particularly when something has happened that has caused worry, frustration or concern.

It is important that all interactions with school staff remain respectful, courteous and occur at appropriate times. From a school perspective, we also care deeply about student wellbeing, but our role requires us to consider the needs, rights and privacy of all students involved. Behind any one incident or concern, there can be a complex series of events, different perspectives and information we may not be able to share with other families. This can sometimes mean we make decisions that do not give every person the exact outcome they hoped for, but our aim is always to respond in a way that is fair, educative and in the best interests of the students involved.

Where possible, our approach is to educate rather than simply punish. Logical consequences are an important part of helping children learn from their actions. For example, if a student repeatedly excludes others from a game, a punishment might simply be removing them from the game for the rest of lunch. A logical consequence might involve helping the student understand the impact of their actions, supporting them to repair the relationship, and having an adult help them practise including others appropriately the next time they play. 

Primary school students are learning how to manage emotions, friendships, conflict and responsibility. As adults, our job is to help children build these skills, even when the learning is difficult to watch. No one wants to see a child unhappy, but these moments can teach resilience, persistence, problem-solving and repair, and the way we respond as adults can shape how children approach similar situations in the future.

Thank you, as always, for your support across the many moving parts of school life. With two weeks left of term, we are firmly in the “keep going, almost there” phase!

Until next fortnight,

Trevor.