From the Principal

Welcome back

Welcome back to Term 4, what we like to call the championship term. The students and staff have returned with a focused and purposeful approach to learning.

We have welcomed several new staff over the past few weeks:

• Nicole Donehue – in the library
• Nicole Collier  - to the science faculty, replacing Mark Christopolous
• Rebecca Priest – who starts this week in the Administration team, in Accounts Receivable
• Carly McLelland - School Nurse (joining the Student Services Team).

Fabulous Graduation

We held the Year 12 Graduation at the Grand Hyatt in the city, last Thursday and it was a huge success. It was a wonderful celebration of the culmination of 13 years of education. I extend my thanks, on behalf of the school community, to all of the Year 12 students, for all of their many contributions to our school community, and wish them all the very best of success as they move into the finishing straight of their final year, be it in VCAL or VCE.  See the full report later in this newsletter.

Sincere thanks goes to Allira Scott, Carolyn Richards, Beth Wright, Sarah Williams and Kate Challis for their stellar organisation and orchestration. Thank you also to Jane Lange and Dave Norman, Karen (Booma) Burgess, Jacquie Brogan, Anne Rassool, Alistair Kerr-McGrath, and Cindy Frost, as well as the Assistant Principals for their efforts on the night. There were approximate 40 staff in attendance, sharing the moment. There were also 22 International Students’ families in attendance.

Jacob Erlandson, ex-student from class of 2007 spoke beautifully and provided useful advice and inspiration for the students, as did two of the school captains, Jane Nguyen and Noah Sutherland.

We have received a lot of positive feedback about the evening. Well done, one and all.

Great Mental Health Week

A big congratulations to the Student Services team for last week’s Mental Health Week. The activities for Daily Connect, the special events like Mindfulness Colouring, Journalling, Therapy Animals and Meditation, were all fabulous. If you happened to visit the school on Friday, you would have noticed a significant decline in the sartorial splendour of the staff, who all participated in the Double Denim fundraiser, with funds going to suicide prevention. It was a great team effort, and we all benefited from it. Weeks like this encourage help-seeking and personal behaviour change that supports our own mental health.

Upcoming events

Not only is this week Design Technology week, where we celebrate all things design, but with the Year 12s drawing close to finishing there are numerous significant celebrations to attend to.

This week alone, we have the:

• Senior Concert on Tuesday into the Hall 
• International Student Farewell Dinner

We cap off the big celebrations with the

• Meliora Sequamur Awards on Thursday (not only applicable to Year 12s)

The following week on Monday 21 October, we will have a visit from the Minister for Sport to open the Netball Courts. The Sport Captains and I will be representing the school at this event.

Student Newspaper

In our last issue of the newsletter you will have seen that the first issue of an NHS Student Newspaper, The Spiel, was released. I was very impressed by Hannah Bartley, Evie Cowling, Dominic Harvey, Mila Lawson, Asher Melzak – Parr, Elspeth Pinnuck, Ieva Priedkalns, Lucy Rachman Vascotto, Julia Rossi Hunt, and Edmund Stewardson’s efforts. The paper was of incredibly high quality and shows the diversity and seriousness of student thinking and action. This project was one of our Northcote Thrive Fund - Innovate Grant initiatives.

Congratulations to the students and to Alora Young for their great work.

Outstanding student achievements 

We have recently had a number of students achieve amazing things in co-curricular and beyond-school activities. Featured further in this newsletter are the Year 9s in the Australian Computational and Algorithmic Thinking Competition; Lucy Grage-Perry and Rosie Thyer in the Lions Youth of the Year Awards; and Rosie Thyer (again!) in the State Schools Soccer Team.  

Eva Massey - UNICEF Australia Young Ambassador

Eva was one of eight UNICEF Australia Young Ambassadors who spent five days meeting with 50 politicians across the political spectrum, discussing the concerns of children and young people across the country according to the findings of their A Climate for Change: 2019 Young Ambassador Report www.unicef.org.au/our-work/unicef-in-australia/a-climate-for-change. The Young Ambassador report was compiled after the ambassadors visited schools throughout Australia, conducting workshops and interviews. Eva personally ran workshops at schools all over Melbourne, including one with Northcote High's Year 7s.

Among the findings, which span topics including wellbeing, safety, learning, equality and the environment, they explained one of the issues of greatest concern for children and young people was climate change, and that they view it as the number one threat to their safety – in fact, 86 per cent of 14-17 year olds hold this view.

The school will receive a copy of the report – which will be housed in the library, as it includes the interviews that were completed at Northcote High earlier this year - I'm sure the Year 7 students will love seeing their words in print.

I also received notification that she has just been awarded the Queen’s Guide Award – which is the highest award that can be earned by youth members of Girl Guides Victoria.  She will receive an award at Government House on Feb 8 presented by The Honorable Linda Dessau.

Pokemon Champion

Congratulations to Lewis of Year 9, who recently travelled to Washington DC to compete in the 2019 Pokémon World Championships. This is the second year that Lewis, who has been playing Pokémon competitively for approximately two years (but longer for fun!), has been invited to the Championships. He earned his best result yet: second in his division. That is, the runner-up World Champion!

To get to the Championships, Lewis earned competition points throughout the year. As one of the top eight in the Oceania region, he received a paid invitation and a spot straight into the final rounds of the Championships. He got through 7 or more rounds of general competition and then proceeded to a knock-out final stage, beating players from Italy, Korea, USA and Japan. As part of his prize, Lewis has received an invitation to next year’s World Championships in London. He is looking forward to the travel, and enjoyed taking some extra time to sightsee in the States before the competition this year.  Competing in Pokemon means that Lewis now has friends from around the world who share his passion for the game.

Lewis says he likes the strategy involved in both the gameplay and the event overall. The best way to get better is to practice, and he also makes sure he is well prepared by reading the ‘meta’ (competition and opposition player statistics and information) beforehand, which helps inform his overall strategy.

It’s always great to learn about the efforts, passions and achievements of our students outside of school. Well done, Lewis, and thanks for sharing your experiences.

Staff learning and collaboration

We are delighted that two of our staff will collaborate with one of our local primary schools over the course of the week Tuesday 22 – Friday 25 October.  Hamish Ramsay and Alora Young  will work with staff and students at Clifton Hill Primary School for four days of Professional Learning. We wish them a successful (nearly) week, and trust they will return with good ideas for us to utilise in our Year 7 and 8 context.

2020 Mobile Phone Ban

We have started planning for the Ministerial Ban to Mobile Phones during school hours, which is due to be implemented at the commencement of 2020.

The Leadership team are consulting with staff and students about how to support implemention of the ban from Day 1 next year.  We will also consult with School Council regarding our proposed implementation.

Communication about implementation will begin from mid-Term 4 and will include how parents can support their children to comply with this new Ministerial Order.