Principal's Report

School Council

Thanks to the people that put in a self nomination for a representative position on School Council. There was a flurry of activity on Thursday, meaning there will have to be elections in all 3 categories. 

Student nominees: Zoe Gray, Emily Macklan, Eoghan French. (2 vacant positions)

Parent nominees: Amanda Bye, Johanna Pihkanen, Leanne Hull, Sarah Shuttleworth. (2 vacant positions)

Staff nominees: Emma Redmond, Ita Rose, Mitch Harris, Chris Greenhalgh. (3 vacant positions)

Ballot papers can be returned to the Office, or emailed to the school by 4pm Monday 18th March.

School Council election process timeline:

Year 7 Camp

The Year Sevens were very welcoming, and I spent an enjoyable evening with them on their last night at Outdoor School – Bogong. The students had a fun evening of activities designed to improve team work and communication skills, run by the Year 12 Wodonga Senior Secondary VET Sport and Rec students. Followed by a short session focusing on gratitude, which is known to help build resilience, before heading to get ready for bed. Stories of their time camping out overnight, enjoying the stars and the sun rise, the good food and spending time with friends were mentioned in the gratitude session, showing a reflective, and grateful group of students. Thanks to the staff that organised and/or attended the camp, to help provide a bonding experience for our Year 7s – Vicky Levesque, Andrew Greenfield, Josh Davies, Shantelle Stimson and Mitch Harris.

Youth Crew

Tuesday saw the first day of this program for the year. Brad Redmond and the 13 Year 10 and 11 students got up early, to make their way to Tallangatta for the first training day. This long running program sees the students learn valuable skills in firefighting, develop leadership and communication skills, develop friends from other schools and earn a VET Certificate II in Public Safety (Firefighting operations). It is only due to the Community Bank Mount Beauty & District Bendigo Bank that this program was able to continue running, after the ADVANCE funding was discontinued at the end of 2022. Without the generous donation from the Community Bank Mount Beauty & District to cover the program costs for 2023 and 2024, we would have had to withdraw from this program and this would have been a terrible loss for all our students.

Staff News

I'm pleased to say we have an interim plan in place to cover Maggie Jowitt's classes. While this is never an easy task, having such a dedicated team of staff has helped make this process easier to manage, so that the disruption to our students’ learning is kept to a minimum. A 0.8 English Humanities position is currently advertised, and we have been able to cover all the classes with our existing teachers, whether that is with people moving sideways or increasing their teaching loads. These changes will be in place until the end of the term but may need to be extended depending on our success in filling the role.

Student Free Days

This year, school has a total of 5 student free days, the fifth being the whole school Professional Practice Day. The remaining student free dates for this year are: 

• Friday June 14th (Report Writing day)
• Thursday 1st August (staff Professional Learning)
• Monday 4th November (Monday before Cup Day, staff Professional Learning).