Dear families,

Welcome to the 2025 school year! Our staff and students have returned refreshed and excited for the year ahead, bringing a sense of positivity and enthusiasm to the school. The smooth and timely arrival of school supplies has also helped ensure a seamless start to the year. We look forward to a fantastic year of learning and growth together!

WELCOME

We welcome nineteen new students to our school this year. They are Wyatt Ash, Peyton Bailey, Jax Brisbane, Carter Calley, Elsie Clowes, Audrey Creaney, Alexander Fiornza, Charlie Flynn, Jake Garner, Milla Hilton, Quinn Jenkins, James Knee, Cedric Lang, Darcie McCormick, Poppie Monk, Karlie Phillips, Lenny Quirk, Conor Trevaskis and Lucas Zabilowicz. We also extend a warm welcome to their parents and hope they enjoy being part of our Toolamba Community. It was lovely to have so many families join us for morning tea this morning, thank you for making the effort.

PARENTS AND FRIENDS

Sadly at the end of the year we farewelled many of our long-standing members and thanked them for their tireless efforts. As a consequence, we are looking for new member to join our team. The first meeting will be next Tuesday 3rd February at 6:00pm at The Junction Hotel.

SCHOOL WIDE POSITIVE BEHAVIOURS

This year, we are excited to introduce School-Wide Positive Behaviour Support (SWPBS). As part of this initiative, students will engage in lessons focused on expected behaviours and work towards demonstrating them throughout the day. When students consistently model these behaviours, they will earn tokens, which can be saved and exchanged for rewards at our school shop. Every student has had the opportunity to visit the shop, and there is great excitement about the variety of rewards available. For now, the shop will be open on Wednesdays for students who wish to redeem their tokens.

A huge thank you to Mr Argus for all his efforts in this area.

BUS TRAVEL

This year, every student traveling by bus has met with our bus coordinator, Mr. Argus, to review the bus travel expectations for 2025. Each student has also brought home a copy of the Bus Travel Code of Conduct to discuss with their family. Once you have reviewed the code of conduct, please sign and return it to the school.

A friendly reminder that if your child is getting off at a different stop than usual or travelling on the bus when they normally wouldn’t, we are required to notify the bus drivers. Please provide a note, either handwritten and given to your child’s classroom teacher or emailed to the school.

In addition to this, we have refined the behaviour management process. When students make a poor behaviour choice, this will be classified as either a minor or major behaviour and staff will follow a process for determining an appropriate consequence for the students involved.

STAFF

Late last year we advertised a Student Support role, and we are very pleased to have Mel Calleja join us, she is a very welcome addition to our team.

STAFFING

Foundation Jenny Bathman, Stacey Wilkinson & Mel Calleja

Grade 1 & 2 Rachel Farrar & Stacey Hodgkisson

Grade 2 Natalie Price

Grade 3 Mason Argus & Ash Monks

Grade 4 Sam Aitken & Tayhlah Sammut

Grade 5/6 Sarah Maskell & Abby Knight

Grade 5/6 Dani Watt & Filippa Kimmorley

Tutor Learning Robyn Lipshut

PE / Science Tristan Tarrant

Art Carly Tuhan

Business Manager Bree Giles

Technician Dale Pearse

Principal Heather Kennedy (Monday-Thursday )

Assistant Principal Filippa Kimmorley (Friday)

WELCOME BBQ

JOIN US ON WEDNESDAY, 12th FEBRUARY, FOR AN EVENING OF FOOD, FUN, AND COMMUNITY!

📚 CLASSROOM OPEN NIGHT – 5:00 PM

Come along early to explore your child's classroom, meet their teacher for 2025, and see what’s in store for the year ahead.

🌭 BBQ DINNER – 5:30 PM

The school will provide meat and bread, and we kindly ask families to bring along a salad or sweet to share. Don’t forget to BYO chairs and drinks for a relaxed and enjoyable evening.

This is a great opportunity to connect with other families, meet staff, and kick off the year together. To assist with catering, please RSVP via XUNO.

🚲 For safety reasons, we ask that scooters and bikes stay at home.

We look forward to seeing you there!

COMMUNICATION

We have four main forms of communication:

Weekly Newsletter accessed via XUNO or our school website www.toolambaps.vic.edu.au
XUNO
Email
Phone

If you need to contact your child’s teacher, please either.

email toolamba.ps@education.vic.gov.au
phone call to the school 58265212
via XUNO

All emails and phone calls will be directed to the staff member concerned.

SUMMARY

Attached is a summary you may find as a useful reference.

ASSEMBLY

Assembly will be held on a Monday at 2.55pm. At our first assembly on Monday, we will be presenting our school leaders for 2025 with their badges. As a once off, this assembly will commence at 2.45pm.

CURRICULUM DAY

On Friday February 14th staff will be attending a Professional Development Day with Danny Hyndman. There will be no school for students this day.

PARENT STUDENT TEACHER INTERVIEWS

In Week 5 and 6 (24th Feb – 7th March) we will be holding our interviews. Bookings are to be made via XUNO. When these open, we will notify you.

SCHOOL COUNCIL

Our first meeting for the year will be on Monday 24th February commencing at 6.30pm.

School Council elections are upon us again. This year we have two parents who have completed their term of office Simon Robinson and Jade Golightly their term of office and are up for re-election. We do encourage other members of our parent community to join our school council, we are always looking for new members as families leave our school.

Parents are strongly encouraged to nominate for School Council. Further information to come over the next couple of weeks.

Have an enjoyable weekend.

Regards Heather

Consent and Combined Permission Forms 2025