Welcome to week 3.

It has been a wonderful start to the 2026 school year. Today we have the Years 3-6 swimming carnival with clear weather forecast until the afternoon, albeit a little on the warm side – but great for swimming. I’d like to thank those families who volunteer to support. We cannot run these events successfully without your input. An acknowledgement to Nat and the hours she puts in to ensure the event is comprehensively organised and allows all those students who want to participate, to do so at a level that is right for them.

Alphington Primary School Leadership Team

Today I would like to introduce you to the members of the Leadership Team and outline the roles they have in our school. I would imagine that many families would not be aware of the complex structures in place in schools, mostly having contact with their child’s teacher at the coalface.

At APS our Leadership Team leads the direction of the school through the Annual Implementation Plan (AIP). All teaching staff are members of a Curriculum Implementation Group (CIG) which is lead by members of the Leadership Team. These teams drive the whole school priority implementation through strategies and actions.

In addition, we have our School Improvement Team (SIT). This team is made up of each of the year Level Leaders and we meet fortnightly with a focus on making evidence-based decisions about teaching and learning, learner growth and empowerment. Level Leaders lead the learning culture using coaching, modelling and mentoring.

Acting Principal – Shane

While consisting of operational, human resources, organisational and financial responsibility. The priority of my work is the strategic direction for learning and wellbeing, ensuring students continual growth and achievement. My role is ensuring the school has a clear plan for how we enact the vision of ‘Optimising learning and wellbeing for all.’ I work closely with the Leadership Team and the Level Leaders, ensuring they have the resources and capability to implement the priorities documented within the Annual Implementation Plan (AIP) and meet the targets we outline in our School Strategic Plan (SSP). I provide a range of supports and capacity building through leadership mentoring and coaching.

Acting Assistant Principal – Luke

Luke has several operational elements to his role; however, I will focus primarily on outlining the role he undertakes to support student learning and wellbeing. Luke leads the School Improvement Team (SIT). This team is made up of each of the year Level Leaders. Luke attends weekly team planning meetings for all year levels, developing an oversight of the key priorities regarding curriculum implementation. These are the priorities taken from the Annual Implementation Plan (AIP) and those actions being driven by the Curriculum Implementation Groups (CIGs). It ensures we have alignment from leadership through to the classroom.

Luke also supports the Inclusion and Wellbeing CIG teams. He is developing an understanding of our multi-tiered system of supports in these areas and is particularly focussed on supporting teachers and tier 3 supports.

Learning Specialists – Brody and Alan

Brody and Alan’s role as Learning Specialists is multi-faceted. They are both Team Leaders, leading Year 2 and Year 6 respectively. They also play a pivotal role in the mentoring and coaching of teachers across the school, building capacity in the teaching of the curriculum. Furthermore, they will play a key role in the Department of Education and Training’s (DET) implementation of the Victorian Teaching & Learning Model 2.0 (VTLM 2.0). The support the development of the school’s instructional model, supporting the development of expert teachers in Planning, Enabling Learning, Explicit Teaching, and Supported Application.

Brody and Alan also each lead a Curriculum Implementation Group (CIG). Our CIG teams drive the work of the Annual Implementation Plan. Alan leads the English Literacy Team and Brody leads the Mathematics Numeracy Team

Disability Inclusion Leader – Kristen

Kristen’s role also has several layers as she leads the Year 3 team, the Inclusion CIG team and leads the schools’ Disability Inclusion Program. Kristen’s role as DI Leader focusses on ensuring each level of the APS multi-tiered systems of support are understood, implemented and managed. Kristen builds the capacity of all staff in Tier 1 supports, including curriculum adjustments and modifications, as well as providing professional learning around disability. Kristen also supports teachers and education support staff to implement Individual Education Plans (IEPs) for those students identified as requiring Tier 3 supports.

Kristen leads the Inclusion CIG team who implement the strategies and actions associated with our AIP to ensure we are continually striving to meet the needs of every student, regardless of where they are in their learning journey.

Mental Health & Wellbeing Leader – Jessie

Jessie leads the Empowerment and Wellbeing CIG team and is responsible for leading the 2026 roll out of the Mental Health in Primary Schools (MHiPS) initiative. Like the Disability Inclusion model, Jessie supports and builds the capacity of staff within a multi-tiered system of supports for mental health and wellbeing at Alphington Primary School.

Assessment & Data Leader – James

James is responsible for management of assessment and data platforms such as Essential Assessment, PAT Online, and Elastik. James also develops a range of tools relating to student data that support staff to effectively analysis these to provide the best opportunities to further develop student learning and wellbeing.

Road Safety around APS

At the start of the school year, it is important to highlight the importance of safe road use behaviours around the school. I would like to draw families and students’ attention to the following:

Using the pedestrian crossing: It is important that all pedestrians travelling to and from school use the crossings appropriately. We need to encourage this for all pedestrians who may be travelling south or through the laneway to Alphington Park. Currently several people are crossing directly outside the main gate or northern gate, often in between parked cars, this is a very high-risk behaviour. While a slight inconvenience at times please always model positive road user behaviours for our students.
Cyclist awareness: While the obvious benefits of increasing cyclists support traffic management around the school, please be aware of the dangers of travelling on both the road and paths when riding. Several cyclists are demonstrating unsafe behaviours such as riding at speed along paths, not giving way, heading out into traffic without signalling and weaving through traffic. If you and/or you child is a cyclist, please reinforce safe riding behaviours. A reminder also that bikes should be walked through the school grounds.
School Access, Car parking & Adams Street update: A reminder of the various entry and exit gates around the school, parking and drop off options and cyclist options:
Yarralea Street for drop off and pick up – entry and exit points at the main southern gate, and the northern basketball gate. Please be courteous and do not park over neighbours’ driveways.
There is bike storage in the forest with access via the most northern gate on Yarralea Street
Access on Adams Street has two gates, a southern one with bike storage and a Northern gate next to the gymnasium.
Adams Street has short term 5-10 minute drop off/pick up spots on the roadside with timber barricades which allow safe pedestrian travel into the school.
Phillips Street also has a gate which provides access to the Prep classrooms and playground.

Annual privacy reminder for our school community

Our school collects and uses student and parent personal information for standard school functions or where permitted by law, as stated in the Schools’ privacy policy and the Schools’ privacy collection notice.

Our Photographing, Filming and Recording Students policy Photographing-filming-and-recording-students-policy-July-2025.pdf describes how we collect and use photographs, video and recordings of students. The policy also explains when parent consent is required and how it can be provided and withdrawn.

We ask parents to also review the guidance we provide on how we use Google Workspace for Education safely at the school and what parents can do to further protect their child’s information. If after reviewing the guidance, you have any questions or concerns regarding your child using Google Workspace for Education, please contact the school.

For more information about privacy, refer to: Schools’ privacy policy: information for parents. This information is also available in eleven community languages:

Amharic
Arabic
Chinese
Dari
Gujarati
Mandarin
Somali
Sudanese
Turkish
Urdu
Vietnamese

Have a great week everyone!

Shane Wilkie

Acting Principal

CSEF - Financial Assistance for Families