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Dates!
Tue Feb 18 School Council
Fri Feb 21 Welcome Back Picnic
Fri Feb 21 Interschool Sports
Mon Feb 24-28 School Camp
Fri March 6 Curriculum Day (No school this day - staff will be off campus)
Mon March 9 Labor Day (Public Holiday)
Fri March 13 Interschool Sports
Fri March 13 Ride 2 School Day
Fri March 20 Newlands Latin Fiesta (to be confirmed)
Fri March 20 Interschool Sports
Fri March 20 School Photo Day
Fri March 28 Final Day of Term One! 2.30 Finish
Do you have a Health Care Card? If so, you need to read this for extra $$$$$$
https://www.education.vic.gov.au/about/programs/Pages/csef.aspx
Please click the above link for information regarding an annual payment to help pay for Camps, Sports, and Excursions. $125 per child! The only catch is you need to have the application form into us by Friday, February 28 and present a copy of your Health Care Card.
We are unable to accept any applications after this date!
Please visit the office and pick a form up - the CSEF application form.
Camp Update
Dear Parents of F1E & F1F,
As you are aware, Newlands Primary School will be sending their Grades 3 - 6 to camp next week (Monday the 24th to Friday the 28th February) . As our school continues to grow, the camp team will be taking Brenna with them for the week. This is a notice to make you aware and to let you know that Katey, our Performing Arts teacher will be Brenna's replacement. All students in the classroom have been made aware and we can assure you that the F/1 bilingual program will continue in Week 5 without Brenna’s glorious presence.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact the school on 9354 2928.
Library Update
My name's David and I'm the school librarian. The school library is up and running and it was great to see so many kids using it at lunchtime yesterday.
The library is open Monday, Tuesday and Thursday 11-11.45 am and Tuesday and Thursday 3.30-4 pm. There are lots of books to choose from so please encourage your children to come in and see what we have. If you have books you want to return just bring them in and put them in the tub in the library at any time.
Happy reading!
David
Sustainabilty & Gardens
Newlands PS Sustainability sub-committee met up for the first time in 2020 last Friday to discuss the great projects that we have going on this year. If you would like to get involved please come along to a meeting, or sign up to the email google groups to hear about events and actions when they occur. If you feel like you can't commit to meetings there are one-off working bees and other ways to get involved. We’d love to meet you!
If any new families would like to get involved, you are very welcome to join us at our next meeting: Friday 13th March – 2.30 pm or join the google group by contacting Mike (mjrowell@gmail.com)
Updates for February 2020
What is ResourceSmart?
ResourceSmart Schools is an award-winning Victorian Government program that assists schools to embed sustainability in everything they do. Schools minimise waste, save energy and water, promote biodiversity and take action on climate change to benefit their school and community.
After being part of the program back in 2014, Newlands Primary School has reinvigorated its efforts to provide a strategic plan to work towards becoming a 5-star Sustainable School. We are currently working on the Core module, which sets a foundation in our school to build from. Late last year, we formed a sustainability committee and got together to create our School Environmental Management Plan (SEMP) and have collated billing data to create a baseline to compare against.
The next steps are getting our SEMP document ratified by School Council, creating a School Vision with the help of our José (Sustainability Coordinator) and Environmental Captains, putting together a curriculum planner with our teachers, capturing some learning stories and celebrating our successes.
As we have been successful with a number of grants creating habitat and increasing biodiversity (see below) at our school we will continue to work on the biodiversity module in 2020.
Grants, grants and more grants
1. Our school has been awarded $13,000 by the Federal Government's Community Environment Grant to create the Blue Banded Bee Nature Reserve.
The reserve, which will include an outdoor classroom and indigenous bush food garden, expands on the amazing bee hotel/cubby and peace garden established in 2019. Listen out for opportunities to get involved in the coming weeks and months.
2. At the end of 2019, we were successful in obtaining the Woolworths Junior Landcare Grant. The funds from this grant will be used to purchase raised vegetable beds, to help us establish a kitchen garden for the before and after school care program. This will allow students who attend the before/aftercare program to be involved in planting and nurturing edible seedlings, composting, seed saving and learning about food systems.
3. The Victorian Junior Landcare and Biodiversity Grant ($5000) will be used to strengthen environmental education in the school and is specifically focussed on students ‘tuning in’ to local ecology and the Wurundjeri seasons through observations and story-telling. A whole-school creek excursion in term 2 will be the highlight, and the grant funds will be used for guest educators. Parent volunteers are needed to help with the excursion so please get in touch if you have an interest in this project.
Garden Group
Parents, grandparent and other friends of NPS who love to garden; we hold seasonal working bees to work in the school’s indigenous and food gardens. Some also help out regularly with running a recess garden club with students. If you’d like to help out or even just stay in the loop with what’s happening in the gardens, you can join our google group by emailing Mel (melmate@hotmail.com)
or Nina (Nina.roberts25@gmail.com).
Don't Forget!
I'll be there!
