From the Principal 

Elissa Campbell

Dear Families

The year has flown by as it always does and I am amazed at the amount of learning that has been undertaken and the experiences we have been able to provide to our students this year. None of these things would be possible without the amazing support of our wonderful teaching and support staff. I am proud to be the leader of Woodend Primary School and thank both the staff and our school community for their ongoing support through the ups and downs of each school year.

We have had an eventful week so far with our Year 6 Graduation on Tuesday night, which was a lovely opportunity to celebrate the time our Year 6 students have had at Woodend Primary School. We wish our graduates all the best for their futures and look forward to hearing about how they continue to grow into the adults they will become. Thanks especially to Katie Cashen, Brenda Elliott, Ann Ireland, Joseph Bromley and Vanessa Keckes-Judd for the time and effort they put into preparing the students and the hall for this big event.

Yesterday the whole school gathered in the hall for our annual student carols, it was lovely to see and hear the students getting into the festive spirit and sing-a-long to some old favourites as well as some newer carols.

Unfortunately, the school did suffer some water damage as a result of a plumbing issue late yesterday, the problem has been resolved and the school is functioning mostly as per usual with a few of our classes having to be temporarily relocated. As communicated via Compass last night the Department of Education has supported us by providing Porta-loos and additional bottled water as a precautionary measure. The students have resumed using the toilets and have access to drinking water. I would like to publicly thank the staff who quickly moved into action yesterday and ensured the students were able to continue to be supported during this time. 

Thanks to our wonderful parent community for the many contributions you have made over the year, whether it be as an official representative of our School Council or PFA or via volunteering in the garden, at Carlsruhe, for a camp/excursion, in the canteen, just to name a few. Without our community connections there are many opportunities that would not be able to happen. We look forward to continuing to work in partnership with you all in 2026.

Sadly as we close the year I would like to officially farewell some of our staff including, Mrs Katie Cashen, Mrs Christine Endress, Mrs Pam Lenders and Mrs Debbie Thompson. We thank them for their work, wish them all the best in their future endeavours and encourage them all to remain connected with our Woodend Primary School community. We will be welcoming Ms Sharna Ford to our 5/6 teaching team, Sharna was able to attend yesterday afternoon and was introduced to her class for 2026.

Tomorrow is our final day of school for 2025 and I would like to remind you all that students finish at 1.30pm. We will run a modified timetable and the students will go out for lunch at 12.30pm, return to their classroom at 1pm and be dismissed from there at 1.30pm. As we had to postpone our final assembly yesterday we have rescheduled it for 9.15am Friday morning. 

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and a safe holiday, we look forward to reconnecting with you in 2026, when we return to school on Wednesday 28th January. To those families who will not be returning to Woodend Primary next year, we wish you all the best and hope to see you again at some point in the future.

Principal

Elissa Campbell