Principal's Report

Dear EHPS Community,

EHPS Financial Contributions 2024

Our School Council is proud of the quality of the facilities and resources available for our students to enjoy and few schools match the numerous programs that we offer to cater for student’s needs. At Essex Heights, the continuous improvement of student learning and the children’s continued health and wellbeing is central to everything we do. In 2024, we look forward to another great year of teaching and learning. With this in mind, we would like to advise you of the EHPS voluntary financial contributions for 2024.

Schools provide students with free instruction to fulfil the standard Victorian curriculum and we want to assure you that all contributions are voluntary. Nevertheless, the ongoing support of our families ensures that our school can provide classroom bulk supplies, as well as offer rich and extensive programs outside of the traditional teaching and learning structure. These financial contributions assist us with the purchasing of the resources for our exemplary specialist programs of Art/ArtSEL, Music, Science, Indonesian and Health & Physical Education, as well as the maintenance and upgrade of our facilities and grounds e.g. classrooms, playgrounds and school oval.

Other programs that we can offer because of your contributions include the provision and upkeep of our computer devices e.g. purchase of new laptops, maintenance of extensive sets of books for reading, provision of mathematical resources in every classroom, year level choirs and effective first aid for all students.

For 2024, in recognition of the difficult financial landscape, School Council has decided to keep all parental contributions at the same amount as 2023.

We want to thank you for your support, whether that is through fundraising or volunteering your time. This has made a huge difference to our school and the programs we can offer.

All families have received a Compass Notification about this year’s Financial Contributions (email sent on 7 February 2024), and we ask you to please support the school and act upon it, as soon as practicable.

More information can be found on our website by following the link: EHPS Parent Payments.

Parent/Teacher Meet and Greet ’Get to Know You’ Discussions

It was pleasing to hear that so many parents and guardians made the time to have meaningful discussions with their child’s teachers at the recent Meet & Greet discussion. These meetings were an opportunity for teachers to get to know more about your children, and to set the basis for an excellent partnership between home and school. If you were not able to attend a meeting this week, please contact your child’s classroom teacher to arrange a catch up.

Please remember that if there is any issue that impacts upon your child emotionally, physically or academically, it is best to inform your child’s classroom teacher. Teachers will always be pleased to make appointments for a meeting when required.

Student Leaders' Badge Presentation

We were pleased to welcome Mr Matt Fregon MP, State Member for Ashwood, to our special assembly on Monday. Matt has always supported our school and is regularly a part of school events. Matt spoke to the children about leadership and then went on to present badges and a special certificate to all of our Year 6 Student Leaders. We were also delighted to see so many proud parents of our leaders at the assembly.

Instrumental Music

The Essex Heights instrumental music program is the envy of most schools because of its breadth and the quality of the results achieved by the children under the guidance and tuition of our fantastic music staff.

As a result, our program is in very high demand. An important part of the EHPS program is that in addition to their weekly lessons, children have the opportunity to play in ensembles and can sit for AMEB examinations. These combine to give our students a fine start to making and enjoying music.

This year we are very pleased to welcome two new staff members joining our skilled and excellent Instrumental Music staff:

Mark Shiell is our new conductor for Concert Band. He has extensive experience conducting most of the secondary and tertiary symphony orchestras in Melbourne. He has been a guest conductor for many of the major symphony orchestras in Australia. In addition, Mark is the conductor of the MYO Percy Grainger Youth Orchestra. https://markshiell.wixsite.com/conductor
Ben Deane-Johns is our new trumpet and trombone teacher. He has over 20 years’ experience of leading Brass departments in schools around Melbourne. As well as being in many different bands, he is an established composer of symphonic works, and for film and television.

Our Instrumental music program offers a wide range of instruments:

Flute, Clarinet, Saxophone, Trumpet, Trombone, Euphonium – Concert and Contemporary bands
Violin, Viola, Cello, Double Bass – String Ensembles
Guitar, Ukulele – Guitar Ensembles
Drums/Percussion – Percussion Ensembles
Harp – Harp Ensemble
Piano and Keyboard

If your child enjoys listening to music and you are interested in them being a part of our outstanding instrumental music program, detailed information and enrolment forms (last page of each handbook) can be found in School Documentation in Compass (under the Community menu when logged in on a web browser, or select the School Documents button on the app). The handbooks are also accessible on our school website. Alternatively, contact our Instrumental Music Coordinator, Alyssa Kennedy, so that you can secure a place in the program for your child.

Students that are unwell

I would like to remind all families that children who are unwell should not be sent to school. Even though the COVID restrictions have eased, sick children cannot perform well at school and they often pass on their sickness to other children and staff. This only makes managing the learning for all children even more difficult.

Please do not give children medication in the morning to mask symptoms, because those same symptoms will reappear within a few hours. The children are often so unwell that they are miserable at school and are not learning anyway. If this occurs, you will be contacted to collect your child. Schools are charged to maintain a safe and healthy environment for children and staff. Please help us to do this by carefully monitoring our child’s symptoms. If unwell, keep them at home!!!

Grandparents and Special Friends Day

Grandparents and Special Friends Day will be held this year on Thursday 28 March, the last day of Term 1. We invite all families to set the date aside and plan for this special day. On the day, a whole school assembly with all our guests, will be conducted in the Stadium. At that time a series of fun activities will be held, followed by an opportunity to visit classrooms, and concluding with an opportunity for our special visitors to have lunch with their child/children. We hope that we have a Stadium full of special friends and Grandparents. More details will follow in coming weeks.

Welcome

We welcome the following students and their families to the EHPS community:

Weiqi L (1P)
Frank L (34Z)
Xinyi L (34R)

Farewell

We farewell the following students and their families from the EHPS community:

Yan (Alicia) W (1WG)
Aaron D (1EP)

See you at the Welcome Picnic!!

Kindest regards,

George Perini

Principal