Principal's Page
Kia Ora Friends
We've come to the end of term one already. It's hard to know where the time went, but gone it is. This Friday, our Whānau Time Full School Assembly theme is Thanks For A Term of Awesomeness. Everyone is welcome to attend.
It has been a term of awesome with much to be proud of and celebrate.
We are grateful that more children are attending school regularly. As you have probably seen, our government is focusing a lot of attention on raising attendance levels. We encourage our families to take this message to heart and do as much as possible to ensure their healthy children are at school as often as possible. If achieving this is a challenge, let us know, and we will do everything we possibly can to assist you.
Another celebration within our school community coinciding with the end of term is Eid - the end of Ramadan. So to all our Muslim brothers and sisters, Eid Mubarak.
At our Whānau Time on Friday, a group of our Muslim students will share their thoughts on Ramadan and Eid.
We didn't have any storms or floods or associated damage. This time last year we were faced with huge repair costs to playground shade sails, internal flooding repairs and big external drainage projects to stop mud flooding onto our covered court and astroturf. We are grateful for no repeat this year.
We are grateful to the incredible staff team we have here. They are some of the finest, most patient, most talented, dedicated, and caring people you will ever have the honour to meet. Our school has a wonderful reputation. Every week, we receive applications to join from out-of-zone—and that is all down to the amazing people we have here.
We have an awesome community that supports us, is patient and understanding, and believes in our philosophy and approach. This makes such a difference.
Last year was a tough year for us financially. We had 15 fewer children than usual but lost two and a half teachers as a result. We knew our school was on a growth path and that last year's drop was an aberration, so we funded those teachers ourselves so they could stay on. Our people are our treasure and strength, and we knew a year later we would need them, so there was no way we were going to let them go and lose them to another school.
Sure enough, our roll has increased by 32 children over last year, and we need those two teachers.
There were quite a few other unexpected hits to our budget last year, so we posted our first-ever loss in my time here. For this reason, we have re-introduced the School Fun-Run fundraiser and sausage sizzles. Your support for these fund-raising ventures makes a huge difference, and we are extremely grateful. This week, we had some awesome parent volunteers making sure our first sausage sizzle was a success - big thanks to them - see below.
We'd love to see our children getting out these holidays to gain some Fun-Run sponsorship. Maybe from extended family when you are visiting, maybe Mum and Dad can get a sponsor or two at their place of work. Because the fundraising is online, overseas family members can still sponsor their student relatives.
In the longer term, we are trying to save up funds to build a new school playground. Getting a good result from our School Fun Run would be a big help toward that goal—and there are some great prizes to be won, too.
We hope you get to spend some quality time with family over the school holiday break, and we look forward to seeing all those beautiful smiling faces and happy people - young and old - next term.
Stay safe, warm and well all.
As always - if you have questions or concerns about anything school-related - email me at macash@mac.com, and I will get back to you asap.
My very best regards to you all,
Ash Maindonald
Principal.
