Dear Families,

'RODE-E-O' or 'RO-DAY-O':

The hot topic of conversation on Monday was how to pronounce the word Rodeo – all due to yet another amazingly successful social event for the families of OGPS. The photos look like everyone had a great night and again, connected with families across the school. As I have stated on many school tours, Primary School is not just for the kids – it is where adults meet and develop new friendships and the stronger these connections are, the better our community is! A huge thanks to Molly Callaghan, Fi Brown and Cat Heil who were the main drivers of this event and no doubt a huge team of terrific volunteers helping the planning, delivering, and cleaning up of the night. Well done and a huge thanks!

BOOK WEEK:

Tomorrow will be another wonderful gathering of our community as we celebrate Book Week! An ongoing strength in the curriculum achievements of OGPS is English – Reading! Much of this success begins at home, with families reading to and with their children. We know that children should have at least 1,000 books read to them before starting school, and it is never too late to keep adding to that number! Every story shared helps build a love of reading and learning. We are looking forward to seeing all the wonderful costumes at our Book Week Parade tomorrow morning!

When: From approximately 9.15am

Where: Bottom Basketball Court

Parents – feel free to dress up too! We’d love to see you join in the fun!

GIANT BOOK SWAP:

Mrs McKeon has again organised this event for Friday and it a great opportunity to refresh your book supplies for home. Please get involved, read with your children, and model the love of reading. As the students' progress through the junior school learning to read, there is a sudden switch from this, to reading to learn! We want ALL students improving their reading ability to enable strong learning. Students are welcome to bring along used books from home to swap with others. Please ensure your child does not bring any new, loved or cherished books.

EMERGENCY DRILLS:

Thanks to all staff and students for their efforts during Practice Emergency Drills. We have several we practice throughout the year and fingers crossed; we never have to enact any of them. If we did, we are well positioned to be safe and responsive. Thanks to those families who have also followed up at home and reinforced the necessity for schools to rehearse these drills.

SCIENCE WEEK:

A huge shout out to the STEM team (Liz & Jessie) for your work in enriching the STEM

program during Science Week with dress ups, experiments, STEM room openings at lunch times etc. There was a real buzz of science in the air last week and we thank you for enabling that to happen.

EV CHARGER:

A few years ago, I approached the Department of Education about the possibility of an EV charger being installed onsite for community use and perhaps the school could make a few dollars out of the solar panels we have had installed. After being politely told it was a great idea but no thanks, a few months ago I was approached to trial an EV charger onsite at school. Of course, I said yes and during the September school holidays, an EV charger will be installed in the staff carpark. I am waiting on a few more details around the specifics (eg: cost, use etc) but it is certainly another feather in the sustainability cap for OGPS. Who knows – if this works well for us and the community, more may be installed in other schools too.

VICTORIAN PRINCIPALS ASSOSIATION (VPA) CONFERENCE:

Mrs H and I will be attending the VPA conference on Thursday (after the book week

parade – can’t miss that!) and Friday this week. Mrs McKeon, Mrs Graham and Mr Roberts will take the reins for the 2 days if you need leadership support. This is another great opportunity for Kristy and I to meet with colleagues from across the State, listen to various presentations and see where we can lead and add more value to OGPS next year and beyond.

MULCH MOVERS NEEDED:

We have a large volume of mulch ready for the gardens, and we are looking for volunteers to help spread it around the school. This can be done at any time – before or after school, during the day or even weekends if you can. We have a few wheelbarrows and shovels/forks available but feel free to bring your own. It would be great to get the mulch in before the weather gets too hot so we can protect the new plants as summer approaches.

WEAR IT PURPLE DAY:

Thanks to Mr Roberts and the Well Being leaders who have put together a little video about the day. Feel free to wear a touch of purple, some purple or full purple! We continue to work together to foster support all young people and families across our community. More information can be found at: https://www.wearitpurple.org/wear-it-purple-day-2026

Have a great week,

Scott McCumber

Principal

OGPS Rodeo