Principal's News

It suddenly felt like autumn over the last few days with a few colder mornings to begin the day. I hope all our families enjoyed a great long weekend and I appreciate your support in the delivery of our student free day on Tuesday. 

We've enjoyed a busy fortnight around our school with some wonderful things to celebrate. Thank you for taking a moment to read over some highlights from around the school and some notes to support the coming weeks. 

Leadership Assembly: 

We had the pleasure of formally introducing our 2026 student leaders into their leadership roles with the presentation of our 2026 Leadership Badges last week. My thanks to the state member for Caulfield, Mr David Southwick who took the time to attend our school and present our leaders with their badges and a special certificate recognising their important role in our school. Thank you to our families who took time out of their week to attend this assembly, it was a great chance to celebrate our student leaders and the great way they have begun the year. 

Sports Uniform: 

This year, our Year 5/6 students have the option of wearing the new sports top on PE and Sports days, as well as anytime they represent CPS at sporting events such as district and division. We were delighted to have a group of current Year 6 students, along with Mrs Newman and Ms Molloy, work with local Aboriginal artist Bayley Mifsud (Merindah-Gunya) to create such a unique design. It was terrific to see some of our students wearing these today, they look fantastic and provide a unique opportunity to celebrate and acknowledge the traditional owners of the lands where we work and play at Caulfield PS. 

The story of our sports top...

This design represents the connection between Japan, Australia, and the school community, showing how we are all linked through shared learning and respect. The three meeting places symbolise Japan, Australia, and Caulfield Primary School, with flowing waterways connecting them to show unity across cultures and distance. The central meeting place represents the school - a space where everyone comes together to learn, share stories, and celebrate diversity. The water also represents the Traditional Owners of the land, honouring their deep and ongoing connection to Country and the waterways that give life. The people shown throughout the artwork reflect the diversity and strength of the community - coming together as one, connected by water, culture, and learning.

Merindah-Gunya

Welcome

It gives me great pleasure to welcome Tokunaga sensei to our school as a classroom teacher. Tokunaga sensei began with us on Tuesday working in the Year 1/2 area. He will work with Kato sensei throughout next week before Kato sensei begins her period of family leave. We are excited to send off Kato sensei on her family leave and look forward to sharing her exciting news with our school community over the coming weeks ahead. 

In addition to this, I am delighted to welcome Miss Molloy into the Acting Assistant Principal role, Miss Molloy began this role on Tuesday and will take on this leadership role for the remainder of the term. She has had a great impact on our school this week and it is terrific to see our wonderfully capable staff step into leadership roles and responsibilities in our school. 

Student Free Day - Professional Learning: 

All staff embraced a wonderful opportunity to undertake a day of professional learning on Tuesday, working with Department of Education staff, including speech pathologists and regional disability coordinators. Our day of learning consisted of topics including: 

• Neurodiversity  
• Neurodiversity-Affirming Principles 
• Why we need neurodiverse affirming & inclusive education 
• ADHD and Autism Neurotypes
• Diversity & difference vs behaviours of concern
• Child Behaviour - viewing behaviour as communication (functions of behaviour, student v teacher perspective)
• Tiered supports, linking to CPS MTSS (Tier 1, 2, 3 supports)- proactive adjustments in the classroom / yard- teaching skills- responsive strategies (teaching, rephrasing consequences)

We were so fortunate to secure such an experienced group of colleagues to work with us on the day and I appreciate the efforts of all our staff to engage in such a wonderful professional learning opportunity. 

Industrial Action: 

Official Department of Education information was just shared with me at 5pm today to support industrial action undertaken by members of the Australian Education Union (AEU) for strike action on the 24th March. Over the coming week, I will seek further information that will allow me to understand the implications to our staffing model at our school and then share this back with families. I will aim to keep you informed of how this will impact on our school on that day. I appreciate your patience and understanding on this matter. 

Parent Teacher Interviews: 

Thank you so much to parents and families who took the time to support our Term 1 parent teacher interviews. It was great to see these endorsed as a positive initiative in the school, thank you to families who have provided that feedback to me. We have made this change to ensure that families have 4 opportunities throughout the year to gain feedback on their child's learning. This includes: 

• Term 1 - Parent Teacher Interviews 
• Term 2 - Semester 1 Reports
• Term 3 - Parent Teacher Interviews
• Term 4 - Semester 2 Reports 

We have undertaken this change in conjunction with weekly year level updates on Sentral providing better oversight of what is happening in our classrooms, fortnightly whole school newsletters, twice termly year level newsletters and more frequent communication via the Sentral parent app. I am hopeful that these changes are positively received and providing families with more timely information from around our school. 

Naplan

Well done to our Year 3 and 5 students who began the 2026 Naplan testing period, undertaking tests in Writing and Reading. Despite a nation wide disruption of the testing platform on Wednesday, our teaching staff did a wonderful job eliminating these issues and ensuring all students were able to complete their writing test on Wednesday and their reading test yesterday. The Wednesday writing prompt was a narrative prompt that provided our students with a great opportunity to write a creative story. 

Illegal Car Parking

A number of cars are continuing to make up rules in regard to car parking in the local area at pick up and drop off time. I have a number of parents who will frequently share images with me of vehicles that have illegally parked on Poplar street and when accessing our prep staff car park. The rules are enforced to support all families and ultimately (and most importantly) to protect the safety of our students. On this occasion, I will not share the images taken but they are provided to demonstrate how frequently we are not supporting road rules and parking conditions. To support the safety of all students, please ensure you are respecting parking rules in and around the school. 

School Fete: 

Our school fete committee have begun the planning phase of our 2026 school fete, you can get involved and have a look at our initial plans by navigating over to the School Fete sub-heading. There are plenty of ways to get involved in this project over the weeks and months ahead. 

Enjoy a great weekend, I look forward to seeing you around the school next week. 

Take Care, 

Edward Strain

Principal