Acting Principal's Update

Dear families and community members,

Thank you for supporting our Swimming Carnival on Friday 16 February where we once again expanded the number of year levels that participated on the day. 

This year, we saw ours Years 3-12 students walk to the pool in their house colours.  

Aside from have additional year levels attend, we also saw an increase in attendance on the day. 

As a result, we were able to send twenty-one students to the Years 7-12 Campaspe Division Swim Tournament on Tuesday 27 February with three of our staff. It was held at the Echuca War Memorial Aquatic Centre.  Our students did us proud and were well rewarded with many bringing ribbons home, but also their representation out of the pool is to be commended. Such as encouraging one another, supporting participation of their peers and proud to be the loudest cheerers poolside. 

Thank you also to our parents and carers for attending our Parent/ Student/ Teacher Interviews on Thursday 29 February.  It was marvellous to see our students and families working with our staff, discussing how the students have settled into their new classes, how they are progressing with their learning and plans for the term ahead.  Overall, our students have made a terrific start to the year.

A great foundation

Victorian schools are striving to be the best in the country.  We had a successful year in 2023. 

Connections

It has been wonderful to implement Connections into our daily schedule this year. We now have significant teachers for our form groups at Years 7-12, meaning our students overall are greeted by the same teacher each morning to check in on them.  Like Years P-6 where classroom teachers see their students every day, our Check-ins and Connections Teacher see their students every day for the first ten minutes from 9:00 am and then again for fifteen minutes prior to the lunch break. 

The purpose of Check-ins:

• Allows for a routine and predictable start to the day.
• Up to date information can be shared via the bulletin.
• Enables the teacher to inform students of any updates to their daily schedule including rooms, teachers, subjects. 
• Enables the teacher to check student uniform and ask for notes from parents/ carers which can be recorded on Compass.
• Gives students the opportunity to bring in notes for absences.  Students that have been away can speak with their teacher and support can be offered when needed.
• For students that need support with equipment can ask for support.  (If a student needs support with getting the correct equipment, liaise with the Year Level Coordinator and contact the parents/ carers.)
• Remind students that they are to have all equipment for periods 1 and 2 at their check-in session. 
• Speak with students about being ‘ready to learn’, making the most of opportunities presented each day.

The purpose of Connections:

This is where we will further enable students to build relationships with each other and with staff.  We are delivering our School-Wide Positive Behaviours Support framework sessions:

• The teaching of our college values and systems
• Working through each expectation listed on our behaviour matrix
• Constant reminders of desired behaviours and acknowledging students when they demonstrate these expectations

We will also delivery our Respectful Relationships sessions:

• Promote and model respect and equality
• Teach how to build healthy relationships, resilience and confidence

I am optimistic of our parents and carers supporting us this year with the implementation of Check-ins and Connections.  If anyone has any questions, please see the Check-ins and Connections teacher as the initial contact in relaying information relating to absences, uniform and/ or resources.

What’s ahead

Amazingly, this first term is already flying by we are quickly approach the end of term holidays.  To assist with planning ahead, we have the following events and activities:

• Various interschool sports across the year levels for students to participate including Badminton, Lawn Bowls, Regional Swimming, and Tennis, just to name a few.
• NAPLAN testing will be between Wednesday 13 March to Monday 25 March.  Our Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 students will participate.  A schedule to complete each NAPLAN test has been created and will be shared with families via Compass. 
• Our Photos Days are locked in with Years 7-12 photos happening on Friday 15 March and Years P-6 on Monday 25 March.  Further information regarding photos will be provided closer to the date.
• With Good Friday landing at the end of this term, we are scheduled to have our last day of term on Thursday 28 March. On this day, we will finish early at 2:15 pm.  Our buses will depart by 2:30 pm on this day so that our students can get home in a timely manner.

Setting up for Success

We are continuously reviewing our operations and procedures to ensure we set our students up for success.  With the implementation of overall S and N (Satisfactory and Not Satisfactory) results added to our semester reports across Years P-12, we have also reviewed our procedures for students wanting to fast-track a subject in the senior year levels as well as Year 12 students wanting to complete their final year of schooling without getting an ATAR score. 

Please see these two new policies for Fast-Tracking and Unscored VCE.

College Council

We will be holding our first council meeting for this year on Wednesday 20 March. By now, everyone will have submitted their nominations to become a member of Council.  This will be shared in our next issue of Channels.  Thank you in advance to those that submitted their nominations.  I’m sure it will be a positive experience for all involved this year.

Marina Walsh

Acting College Principal