Principal Introduction

Dear Students, Parents and Carers, 

This week saw our Year 7 cohort attend Adventure Resort in Alexandra.  Students built their resilience and increased their self confidence through participating in activities such as the high ropes course, flying fox, rock climbing wall, giant swing, archery, and found relief from the warm weather in the swimming pool.  Our students developed positive relationships with their new peers and also with the teachers that accompanied them on the camp, and a great time was had by all.

As part of our College's large range of High Impact Learning Events, Elisabeth Murdoch College has partnered with One Love Australia with the aim of ending racism within our community.  Our senior students participated in a discovery sessions presented by One Love facilitators and explored topics such as fairness, racism and equality.  Middle school students will participate in these activities later on this term.  Our staff will explore some of the data gathered from the discovery sessions, as well as beginning anti racism professional learning.  More information on the Langwarrin community One Love launch can be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTaVtDSFP4g

A reminder to families that next Wednesday 1st March is a Curriculum Day.  This is a student free day, no formal classes will be running except for senior internal and external VET classes that will be running as per the normal timetable. (EMC VET Sport and Rec 2nd year will not be running.)  Thursday 9th March, Parent/Carer Teacher conferences will be occuring onsite in the Senior Centre.  Conferences will commence at 12.30pm and finish at 7.30pm.  Bookings will be available to Parent/Carers on Compass from 4pm on Thursday 2nd March and will close Tuesday 7th March at 4.30pm.

If parents are unable to attend personally on the day or unable to secure an interview with a particular teacher, Compass allows for ongoing communication via email. I would encourage parents to contact any teacher if they have specific concerns/queries regarding the education of their child. Alternatively, parents may contact Student Achievement Leaders to arrange meetings and discuss overall performance or other issues.

Between Wednesday 15th March - Monday 27th March, Year 7 and 9 students will undertake NAPLAN testing.  The data gathered from NAPLAN helps the College to see whether our students are reaching important literacy and numeracy goals. It can support our College to improve by enabling our teachers to monitor their students’ progress over time against the national measure, to identify strengths and areas to improve in teaching programs. It provides additional information to support teacher judgement about progress in a child’s level of literacy and numeracy attainment.

NAPLAN also allows parents to see how their child is progressing against national standards in literacy and numeracy and over time. As students progress through their school years, it’s important that checks are made along the way to see how well they are learning the essential skills of reading, writing and mathematics – skills that will set them upon the path to success as adults.

NAPLAN offers students an insight into where they are at on their learning journey. By sitting NAPLAN and trying their best, students help to make sure their teachers have the right information to help them get the support they need to reach their full potential.

Literacy and numeracy are core to a well-rounded education and are essential life skills that students develop in every aspect of daily life, no matter what further education or career path they take.  NAPLAN tests are one aspect of each school’s assessment and reporting process, and do not replace the extensive, ongoing assessments made by teachers about each student’s performance.  It is for these reasons we encourage all students in Year 7 and 9 to undertake and do their best at completing these tests.

Thursday 30th March sees our College, along with Langwarrin Primary School, Woodlands Primary School and Langwarrin Park Primary School undertaking the biennial iCAN Challenge.  For those new to the EMC community, participants in this event walk 50km in one day from St Kilda to Frankston.  The walk will be along the beach the entire way and will finish with the last few steps across the finish line celebrated by family, friends and the school community. To participate each individual has the goal of raising $500 for the Royal Children's Hospital Good Friday Appeal.  As a community we are hoping to raise $150,000.

If you would like to donate please go to the link below – you may see a student you know or a staff member and you can donate directly to their page. 

https://fundraise.goodfridayappeal.com.au/event/view/ican-challenge-2023

Kind regards, 

Terry Kiat

Assistant Principal