School News

School Based Apprenticeships/Traineeships

Mirboo North Secondary College is pleased to report that we are currently supporting eight students who have commenced their apprenticeship or traineeship whilst they are completing their senior school studies, also known as School Based Apprenticeships/Traineeships. Students are supported by Fiona Hyland who works within the Head Start program which is a program the Department of Education put in place to support students and work with employers, and training providers to ensure the apprenticeships/traineeships are successful. 

Nathan (yr 12) | Cert III Agriculture, Molli (yr 12) | Cert III Business, Matthew (yr 11) | Cert II Warehousing, Jordan (yr 12)  | Cert III Landscape and Construction, Kayla (yr 12) | Cert III Early Childhood Education and Care, Jacob (yr 11) | Cert III Agriculture, Daniel (yr 11) | Cert III Light Auto Mechanic, Tahlee (yr 12) | Cert III Business

If you would like further information about apprenticeships/traineeships and/or School Based Apprenticeships/Traineeships, please contact Nicole in the Careers and Pathways team at school.

Student Attitudes to School Survey (AtoSS)

The Attitudes to School Survey is an annual student survey offered by the Department of Education to assist schools in gaining an understanding of students' perceptions and experiences of school. Students will be asked their thoughts and feelings about their school, their learning, peer relationships, resilience, bullying, health and wellbeing, physical activity and life in general.

The survey only takes 20-30 minutes to complete online and occurs during your child's class time, using a purpose built secure online survey tool.

Participation in this survey is voluntary. If you DO NOT wish for your child to do the survey, please opt out via email to the school at mirboo.north.sc@education.vic.gov.au before the survey commences on 13th May 2024. Personal identification data will not be recorded in the survey response file. This ensures that the confidentiality of your child’s responses is protected at all times.  For further information, please refer to the attached information document from the Department of Education or the school. 

Smoking and Vaping ban

All parents, carers and students are reminded of the legislation that within Victoria, a person must not smoke cigarettes, including e-cigarettes/vapes (regardless of whether they contain nicotine) within school premises and within 4 metres of any pedestrian access to school premises. Smoking or Vaping in these places is a fineable offence. The smoking and vaping ban applies to:

• anyone present on school premises during and outside of school hours including students, teachers, contractors, parents or carers or the wider community, such as sporting groups
• all activities that take place on school premises including pre-schools, kindergartens, outside school hours care, cultural, sporting or recreational activities and school fetes. Parents, carers, schools, and community all play an important role in protecting children and young people from, and educating them about, the harmful effects of smoking and vaping.

Research from the Royal Children’s Hospital shows many parents and carers are not aware of the harmful effects or how their views about smoking and vaping can impact the likelihood of a young person taking up smoking or vaping.

The Department of Education has developed resources to help you learn more about the health risks of smoking and vaping. The resources include advice about how to talk to children and young people about vaping, and where to get support. To access the resources, go to https://www.vic.gov.au/smoking-and-vaping-advice-parents

You can also view this video on smoking and vaping from experts at the Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne for health advice and tips for starting a conversation with young people.

Year 12 Dress Up Day

Great to see the fantastic costumes - choose a costume related to the first letter of your name. Looking forward to the second day later in the term - guess the celebrity!!

Mobile Phones/Devices

A reminder that the Department of Education has in place a mobile phone ban that requires students who bring mobile phones to school to have them switched off and securely put away during school hours.

The Department is requiring all schools to ensure this ban is in place and enforced from the start of the 2024 school year.

The ban applies equally to all government schools right across the state.

This helps ensure that school is a learning environment free from unnecessary distractions and disruptions. 

By ensuring mobile phones are kept away at recess and lunch times, students can interact with each other face-to-face, without the distractions and social pressures that mobile phones can cause.

We ask for the support of all our families, staff and students in continuing to support the implementation of this policy in our school. 

Further information 

Exceptions: For a small number of students with particular health needs, an exception to the policy may be granted. Please contact the Principal if you would like to discuss this.

Emergencies: In the event of an emergency or if you need to immediately contact your child, I ask that families contact the school office who will pass on a message as required. 

Parent support: The Mobile phones in schools webpage provides links to resources for families to help them balance their children’s time using mobile phones.

If you have further questions, please contact the school office.

Exceptions can be granted by your Principal, or by the teacher for your class, in accordance with our school's Mobile Phones policy. This may include health and wellbeing-related exceptions; and exceptions related to ensuring your safety if you’re out of school grounds.

Absences and Attendance

As the cooler weather brings an array of colds and flu’s, we know students may be getting sick and we prefer not to have contagious symptoms at school. If your child is unwell and not at school, please ensure you contact the office or year level coordinator, email keith.kerstjens@education.vic.gov.au, or alternatively, log into compass and complete the attendance note yourself. 

In an ideal world we would have every student at school every day, but if that’s not possible, please inform the school if your child is going to be away for an extended time, so we can support your student with opportunities to catch up on missed work.

Year 9 Woodwork

Some of the current year 9 cohort are currently participating in Mr. Zizz' introduction to furniture making class. During the previous and upcoming weeks, the students have been designing and creating their tables.  The students currently have been finishing their tabletops to their own unique preferences and design, while also constructing their legs for the table. The construction of their very own table is underway with great success imminent

Year 9 Challenge

Yr 9 Landcare Cadets enjoying a recreational walk on the South Gippsland rail trail, learning some of the history, and discussing Landcare in the wetlands.

Women in Trades Excursion

Last Wednesday a group of year 10s and 11s went to the the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre to see The Trade & Tech Fit career expo is 100% hands-on, allowing female and gender diverse students to design video games, lay bricks, weld, fly planes, program a robot, safety test equipment, use power tools, learn to paint and more while understanding more about the range of career options available to women and gender diverse people.  

The expo is a unique opportunity to expand the career options available to female and gender diverse students. The expo allows students to engage with tradies, apprentices and industry professionals, providing insight into the breadth of career pathways where female and gender diverse people are underrepresented.    Exhibitors across numerous industries including building and construction, engineering, automotive, transport and logistics, robotics, mining, transport, agriculture and horticulture, aviation and aerospace will be on display. 

VOS (Voice of Students)

Last week at the General Assembly the VOS leaders and the Middle School Captains were presented with their leadership badges. Congratulations to our Middle School Captains: Montana Samarias and Cooper Webb and the Vice Captains, Isla Haw and Myles Bell.

Congratulations to the VOS leaders: 

Year 7: Tiana Sims. 

Year 9: Montana Samarias, Cooper Webb, Isla Haw, Myles Bell.

Year 10: Anthony Russell, Lateesha Sanders.

Year 11: Eli Anderson.

Year 12: Ruby Marks, Oliver Mahoney, Clancy Mills, Gabrielle Buissink.

We wish the VOS team every success in their endeavour to be the voice of the student body and to make events and changes to benefit all the college.

Thank you

Mrs Benn

VOS /Student Leadership Coordinator

BOYZ N BOOKS

In term 3 I am planning to run a program aimed at improving the reading of boys in years 7 and 8 in terms of quantity and quality of their reading choices. It is common that boys lose interesting reading once they go to high school. This is unfortunate as reading is so essential to success in many subjects. A study in Western Australia interviewed 997 young people between 8 and 12 and found one of the biggest contributing factors in young people enjoying reading is parental encouragement and that “shared reading builds a sense of self as a reader.” 

The term 3 program will involve boys from year 7 and 8 attending a series of fortnightly meetings in the school library with a significant male (dad, older brother, grandpa etc). They will chose a book title that they will both read from a selection of titles chosen to be of high interest to this age group. They will also have the opportunity to listen to a range of guest speakers talk about themselves and their relationship to books. The target group of students  for this program is reluctant readers rather than those who struggle to read. Thursday will be the designated night for the program but the time will be confirmed later to try and work around other commitments of participants.

If you are interested in being involved can you please email me – kerry.bennetto@education.vic.gov.au – including the name of the boy and accompanying male (and contact details for the accompanying male).

Thanks

Kerry Bennetto

Knitting Club

Our happy group of knitters is growing each week. We meet in the Library at lunchtime on Wednesdays. All students and staff are welcome. Bring your own project or use our needles and yarn.

Rose Hill and Caroline Tait

XSEL @ MNSC

The Resilience Project

We are excited to bring The Resilience Project (TRP) into our school community! All students are enrolled in a Social & Emotional Learning program called XSEL. This aims to teach students the skills and knowledge to boost their wellbeing and support their friends and family. In 2024 we have partnered with the Resilience Project to provide curriculum and resources to help support our students.

Middle School Learning Habit Awards

At the recent Middle School Assembly certificates were handed out to some of highest scorers from our Progress Reports from term 1, below is a list of all Middle school students that scored 3.75 or higher in both reports for term 1.   Congratulations to you all, great work.

Do It for Dolly Day 

Year 11 winner Jacob Daly 

Wow! What an awesome turn out of Blue! $183.20 was collected for Do it for Dolly!

The day started with students doing random act of kindness to each other and to teachers. At the start of lunch, the whole school and the Primary school came onto the oval to stand on the blue line in the shape of the butterfly, and a small heart made by the primary school. It looked great! At each year level students were selected for the best blue outfit! The overall best blue winner was James Aveling for his all out there blue dye and costume.

Well done to everyone for their participation today.

In period 5 there was a talk by Constable Tim from Morwell Police who spoke to the students about the criminal aspect of bullying. A big clear message is to not engage in any activity that is disrespectful, to hurt another person, as it all has a ripple effect upon the family and sometimes within the community. Stop things before they get out of control, or tell someone about what is going on.

Thank you all for your contribution to a great day!

VOS