Welcome to 2025 at Karoo Primary School!

It has been wonderful to have our Year 1 to year 6 students return this week and to fill our sensational school with excited conversation and joy, as they reconnected with peers and made new connections with teachers and students.

This week, I have had the pleasure of visiting all our classrooms to welcome our students back to the new school year. It has been wonderful to see everyone settling into their new learning environments and to feel the buzz of excitement of new opportunities ahead!

Our priority for the beginning of the year is to re-establish KPS expectations and routines and to explore what it means to be an engaged learner at Karoo PS. We support our students to do this through our Start Up program which operates for the first two weeks back at school. During this time our students explore our school values and what it looks like for them to be role models and strive for their personal growth.

At home you can support your child by re-establishing key school routines of sleeping well and eating healthy for brain development, as well as supporting our child to organise their resources, to build upon their skills they have learnt in previous years.

Welcome to Country and Smoking Ceremony

To start the new year off positively, we welcomed our new school year with a Welcome to Country and Smoking Ceremony lead by Wurundjeri Elder, Perry Wandin. It was an incredible experience for our students, staff and community to learn more about the Wurundjeri – Woi Wurrung culture and to show our respect to them and the land on which Karoo PS stands.

We look forward to welcoming our Foundation students next week on Thursday the 6th of February for their first day of school!

If you would like further information on how to support your child starting school, you can access the Victorian Governments 'A New Year of Learning' webpage for further tips.

Getting to know you Interviews – bookings opening soon!

We have our Getting to Know You Interviews coming up on the Tuesday 25th and Wednesday 26th of February. Please keep these dates in mind, bookings will open at the end of next week for you to book your time. The interviews are a wonderful opportunity to meet you child's teacher and provide them any insights into your child so that the teacher is able to understand them and provide for their needs.

Communication at Karoo Primary School

Karoo Primary School is committed to effective communication and treating everyone in accordance with our school values. It is therefore important that everyone in the school community work together to ensure we are cooperative, honest and respect the protocols below. Our commitment should be to conduct ourselves in a respectful, calm and courteous manner. Teachers will not be able to check or respond to emails during teaching time and will endeavour to reply within 24-48 hours. Please be mindful of the hours that you contact teachers and avoid where able, late at night when people are home. It is important for all people to have some family time and an opportunity to wind down from the day. This enables everyone to recharge and be able to be at their best when they are teaching your children during the day.

If you are ever unsure you can refer to our Communication Pathways overview.

Who should I make contact with?

Ideally your child’s class teacher is the preferred person to contact, however there may be times that it is more appropriate to speak to a Principal Class staff member or school leader.

Leadership Team

Acting Principal – Mrs Courtney Hoffmann

Assistant Principal (Teaching and Learning) –Ms Ashley Kuusela (Mon-Wed) & Mrs Peta Phillips (Wed-Fri)

Assistant Principal (Wellbeing and Inclusion) - Mrs Courtney Hoffmann

Learning Specialist & Year 5&6 Sub School Leader - Mrs Simone Vitas (Mathematics)

Learning Specialist & Year 3&4 Sub School Leader - - Mrs Robyn Harris (Wellbeing)

Learning Specialist & Foundation, Year 1 & 2 Sub School Leader - Mrs Peta Phillips (English)

Learning Specialist - Amy Ellis (English)

Leaders

Foundation – Mrs Amy Ellis

Year 1 – Ms Madeline Diaz

Year 2 – Mr Tim Wilson

Year 3 – Mrs Fiona Marker

Year 4 – Ms Clare McCandlish

Year 5 – Mrs Emma Finnerty

Year 6 – Ms Michelle Davies

Specialists - Ms Jess Cole

What does communication at Karoo look like?

School assemblies every fortnight (even weeks of the school term) on a Friday at 2.50 p.m. These alternate between whole school and sub-school.
School newsletter every fortnight (odd weeks of the school term) uploaded on Compass and available on our website
Weekly Newsfeed information shared on Compass
Phone calls and emails from staff
Getting to Know You interviews – an opportunity to meet your child’s class teacher in February (week 5 – bookings to open next week)
Mid year and end of year student progress reports
Mid year Parent Teacher interviews to discuss student achievements - mid year will be student led interviews
Noticeboards in the school grounds (PE/ Sport near the Gym, Visual Arts - outside Art room, Community Noticeboard - near the Library and Student Council board - in the courtyard
Classroom displays
Karoo emails via Compass
Seesaw student portfolios

Annual privacy reminder for our school community

Our school collects, uses, discloses and stores student and parent personal information for standard school functions or where permitted by law, as stated in the Schools’ Privacy Policy.

Our Photographing, Filming and Recording Students Policy https://karoops.vic.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/Photographing-Filming-and-Recording-Students-Policy-2023-2027.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 us.

For more information about privacy, refer to: Schools’ Privacy Policy — information for parents. This information is also available in ten community languages:

Amharic
Arabic
Dari
Gujarati
Mandarin
Somali
Sudanese
Turkish
Urdu
Vietnamese

Have a wonderful week and I look forward to seeing you around the school!

Courtney Hoffman

Acting Principal

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