Principal's Message

Welcome back to our Mill Park Heights Community

Another busy two weeks have passed us by, and we continue to celebrate the highlights and opportunities for our students at MPHPS.

Our recent curriculum day was a fabulous success, and we look forward to developing our School Wide Positive Behaviours in School’s strategies in our classrooms and school grounds. We listened to two experienced and informative presenters who shared their SWPBS journeys over the past 7 years. This gave us a great insight into factors that will support us as we strengthen the SWPBS framework in our school. Our core focus for the day was determining what constitutes Minor or Major behaviours and what reasonable adjustments should we make in our classrooms and yard for our students. The conversation was rich and diverse. I was incredibly proud of our SWPBS working party who have been leading and driving this implementation over the past 18 months. My sincere thanks go to Hannah Wilson, Zoe Hurrey, Anna Wylie, Nat Becker, Elena Raptis, Mel Lloyd & Kate Stimpson. I am also extremely grateful to Daniel Liang in our IT team who has been invaluable in his updates to Compass.

I would like to celebrate the fabulous feedback we received from our students in Years 4 to 6 after their Attitudes to School survey data was collated. This survey is a requirement for all Victorian students to participate in, and this data is used to support our AIP Wellbeing goals. In many categories, our students ranked MPHPS higher than local schools, the Whittlesea network and the State. Some noticeably high approval ratings were:

Differentiated learning provision in the class – 87%
Effective use of teaching time – 86%
Attitudes towards attendance – 85%
Advocating for our school – 88%
Sense of inclusion and belonging – 88%
Teachers have high expectations for success – 94%

Thank you to all our Dad’s, Carers and Special People for attending our celebration afternoon on Friday. This was a fantastic time for our students to celebrate one of the most important people in their lives. It’s a true highlight for students to share their learning and their classroom spaces and I know they take great pride in the preparation of these events. Thank you for coming and making this such a special afternoon. I truly hope you had a well-deserved Fathers / Carers Day on Sunday.

Finally, a few reminders:

2026 Foundation enrolments are due. Preparation for 2026 Foundation transition will occur early in T4. We do not want your child to miss out, so if you have a sibling and haven’t enrolled yet, please let the office know.
Toilets in the school grounds are for students only. If you have a grandparent or carer who collects your children and does not see the newsletter, please remind them of this requirement.
Swimming continues to be an important program in our school however we have noticed participation rates dropping during the class swimming block. We understand illness occurs, but we hope to give students as much opportunity for water awareness as possible. Thank you for your support in encouraging your children to attend.
We take all Concerns or Complaints seriously and follow the Department of Education guidelines when managing concerns. We attempt to be as positive and supportive as possible. Should you have a concern, the classroom teacher or specialist (if appropriate) is the first person to contact. After this, we have a Wellbeing leader in every team who would be happy to support your discussion with the teacher, or we then have a Learning Specialist or a member of Principal class who may be able to help. We often need 24 hours to gather information and in many cases are unable to make direct comments on the spot until we have time to understand more about your concerns. We encourage you to send an email to the school address or to the teacher via Compass. We will acknowledge and get back to you as soon as possible. We have our policy attached to our school website should you like to read this in more detail.
Respectful Behaviours in our Community – just a quick reminder to everyone that we ask that all our community members show respect to staff, students and families within our school. You may have differing values, beliefs or perspectives, but while on school grounds, we ask that you follow our school values and expectations. Staff will not and cannot intervene between parents who may have differences.

I hope you all have a great fortnight, and I look forward to wrapping up Term 3 in our next newsletter. Enjoy all that you do

Cheers Chris Beare