Last week, students and staff marked Remembrance Day by assembling outside classrooms and observing a minute's silence following a reading of the Ode of Remembrance by some of our Year 6 leaders. Kinder 2025 transition continued and K-2 students enjoyed their athletics day.

Welcome to Week 6.

Change to 2025 start dates

There has been a recent change to the date on which NSW students resume classes in 2025. All students from Kindergarten to Year 12 will now commence learning on Thursday 6 February.

Creative Arts Showcase

Our Creative Arts Showcase will be held on Thursday 28 November from 6:30 pm. All are welcome to attend and families of students involved in performances have received a School Bytes notification. The P&C will be running a BBQ from 5:30 pm.

School funding and a message from the NSW Teachers Federation and NSW Parents and Citizens Association

This week, schools around NSW will hold meetings seeking support to lobby the federal government to provide our schools with the funding to meet the minimum School Resourcing Standard identified in the 2011 Gonski review.

The NSW Teacher's Federation believes that NSW public schools face a funding gap of $1.9 billion this year alone, with analysis by the NSW Department of Education showing that over the next four years, the Federal government will provide $24.2 billion to the state’s 970 non-government schools, but only $14.3 billion to the 2216 public schools.

Considering the number of students in the public (786,434) and non-government (462,695) systems in 2023, that's an average annual federal contribution of $52,302 for each non-government student, compared with $18,183 per public student.

While we are very proud of the standard of teaching and support offered to students at Ben Venue, a higher level of federal funding would inevitably increase our capacity to reach even higher levels of service to our students and community. For Ben Venue, full funding would support some or all of the following:

Employment of additional teaching staff to further support the learning needs of students requiring additional support, students requiring extension and involvement in an even broader range of sporting and co-curricular opportunities beyond the school
Employment of additional teaching staff to facilitate parallel educational programs for small groups of students whose needs may be better met outside the mainstream classroom
School funding of excursions, co-curricular and extra-curricular activities, thus reducing the need to request contributions from families
More regularly updated technology and increased access to laptops, robotics and coding resources for students
Employment of a part-time administrative staff member to enhance engagement with our community
Reduction in class sizes
Enhanced assets and infrastructure, such as playground improvements and sporting equipment
The ability to purchase Bruce Browning Oval and complete improvement works such as fencing, surface maintenance and installation of soccer goals.

Knowing how busy families are, we felt that communicating this information through the newsletter would be more effective than holding a school hall meeting. Alongside our local Teacher Federation and the Ben Venue P&C, I ask that you watch the video linked in the image above and then consider clicking here to add your voice to the chorus calling for fairer funding for our students.

Sun safety

Australia has the highest rate of skin cancer in the world. The Hunter New England has the third highest rate of melanoma of all NSW Local Health Districts.

Almost all Ben Venue students are very good at wearing hats to protect themselves from the very high to extreme levels of UV rays in Armidale every day. A small number of students also wear sunglasses to protect their eyes from this damaging light. Please be aware that the wearing of sunglasses in the playground is both allowed and encouraged.

Professor Georgina Long AO

Professor Georgina Long AO is a global leader in research and treatment of melanoma, pioneering ground-breaking techniques that have improved survival rates of people with, what she terms, Australia's national cancer. I recently had the privilege of hearing Dr Long speak and thought her story was one that may be of interest. It is a positive tale of perseverance, and a wonderful example of women in science making a life-saving difference on an international scale.

In addition to her plea to be SunSmart, there was one key message shared by Dr Long that guided her to success and that resonated with our work with students: Mistakes are a badge of honour. They mean that you tried.

Collection of students from school within school hours

Student safety is our top priority. Unlike some other schools, the Ben Venue site is very open, with multiple uncontrolled entry points. For this reason, staff may stop and question any adult on site without a visitors badge. If you are on site during school hours, please do not be offended if you are approached by a staff member and directed to the office.

Excepting during open events, all parents and other visitors are required to proceed directly to the office upon arrival on site. To minimise disruption to classes and support student safety, students should be collected from the office. The late delivery of lunches is also managed via the office.

All teachers have been directed to refuse collection of students from classrooms where the adult has not obtained the appropriate pass from the office.

Survey reminder

As part of regular evaluation of school performance, we are collecting information on the perspectives of students, parents/carers and staff over the coming weeks. The information collected will be used to help identify areas of strength and areas for development moving into 2025.

As part of this, I ask you to please find 5 minutes to complete a survey. The survey is very short, containing just 7 multiple choice questions and 3 short responses. Please take the time to help us understand what we are doing well and where we can make improvements.

To ensure only one response per person and to help us understand your responses, your email address will be collected when you complete the survey.

Click here to complete the short survey, before the end of November.

Cam Pryce

Principal

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