Principal's Report 

Dear families and friends of MPW,

It was great to see off the first group of 3/4 campers on Monday morning, the opportunity to attend camp provides a great experience for students to engage with their peers and teachers in a different environment and have a fun time as well.

The second group head off on Wednesday and I hope the weather allows for maximum participation throughout the week. There will be Compass notifications to our 3/4 families updating what is happening at camp.

Thank you to our Fundraising group who ran a successful Election Day sausage sizzle and cake stall. It was a beautiful day and great to see the community come together on the day. Thank you to all the parent helpers who were able to volunteer time to support the fundraising efforts. We ran out of sausages twice, so we consider that a successful effort.

Congratulations to our Year 3 and 5 students for completing the NAPLAN testing. We are very proud of the efforts of all students over the 10-day testing period. All students had a go and tried their best for each test, which is all we ask. Student felt confident that they had given their best effort, which is encouraging. Being our first online attempt to complete NAPLAN, I am pleased to say we did not have any technical disruptions or issues which is reassuring that our IT infrastructures are working well.

Yesterday, we provided the school community with the opportunity to contribute feedback regarding the Capital Works funding that was recently announced. The scope of the funding is for the school to upgrade and modernise the infant school, library and playground. School Council has been briefed on the Victorian School Building Authority’s (VSBA) processes. The first part is submitting an educational design brief, that outlines our learning aspirations and opportunities for the design phase. The survey sent out yesterday seeks to capture what these opportunities could look like for our school moving into the future for those areas within the scope of the funding works. We do ask that you include your child(ren) in the discussion when providing the feedback from your family. The survey closes 12pm on Thursday and can be accessed using the following link for families. Click here to complete the survey.

As communicated yesterday, the planned visit from the Minister for Education and Local Member for Essendon has been postponed to early next term. We look forward to the minister's formally celebrating and announcing the funding with our students.

Annual Report to the Community and Annual General Meeting

Each year all government schools report to the community an Annual Report.  The report is generated by the Department of Education and outlines the school’s performance in the areas of Student Learning, Student Wellbeing and Engagement, Parent and Staff Opinion survey results and our Financial situation.  

Last Monday, we held the Annual General Meeting via WebEx to present and speak to the report. Thank you to those who were able to join this meeting, and to our Learning Specialists Kim and Jess who were able to speak to the work in Literacy and Numeracy throughout 2021, and to Sandra who spoke to the school’s finances.

The Department generated Annual Report document has been uploaded to the school’s website.

Drop off and Pick ups

It has been great to see more and more parents coming on site for drop off and collection. As gates open around 8.45am and 3.20pm, you are able to arrive and depart through any school gate for your convenience. We do encourage F-1 to continue using the Lennox Street gate for collection of our junior students.

A reminder to please be considerate of private driveways before and after school, we have been contacted by our neighbours that in some instances their driveways are being blocked in the mornings and afternoons for drop offs and pick-ups.

Also, we have many students who walk and ride to school. Please be mindful of double parking to drop students off and stopping in the disabled parking near entries, as we want to ensure those travelling to and from school are doing so in a safe manner. We do have designated drop off and pick up spaces marked around the school for this purpose.

Recording Absences on Compass

A reminder to families that entering student absences onto Compass through either the school app or Compass website portal is the preferred method of reporting and explaining your child’s absence.

Recording an absence and reason for the absence can be done prior to, during or after the absence. The earlier the absence information is entered the better.

The school has a process to SMS unknown absences each morning to families, we do follow up unexplained absences with phone calls and/or a form sent home.

Reporting COVID related absences 

When communicating a positive case to COVID to the school, please contact Sandra (COVID Safe Manager) in the office to confirm the positive result and isolation period.

If you are reporting a COVID related absence in Compass, please use the comment section to indicate additional information in the Compass notes. 

For household contacts, students are able to return to school if they are non-symptomatic and are returning a negative RAT result each day over the 7-day period. Students 8 years or older are required to wear a face mask while indoors at school. Please notify the school if you child(ren) are identified as a household contact, again contacting Sandra in the office.

Letting the school know of any positive cases within the family, either your child(ren) directly or any adults where the children become a household contact, is an important step to ensure we are able to follow our COVID safe processes.

Enrolments for 2023 are open

Enrolments are open for the 2023 school year.  If you have a younger sibling that is ready to join us 2023 please come to the General Office to arrange a tour or to collect an enrolment package. We have been conducting school tours throughout Term 1 and 2 for prospective parents and it seems that there is steady interest from new families to join the MPW community. 

Divisional Cross Country Coming Up

We have 11 students who are representing Moonee Ponds West at the Divisional Cross Country on 8th June.  To those competing we wish you good luck and hope that you are able to to give your best and enjoy the opportunity.

Dress Code Update - Compulsory Outcome

On Friday you will have received a letter home and a Compass push indicating the outcome of School Council’s decision to move to a compulsory uniform. The Dress Code review process has been going for 18 months, with opportunities for school community feedback around many aspects of the school’s Dress Code. As we near the finalisation of the development of the updated Dress Code Policy based on the feedback provided, I would like to acknowledge the Working Party’s contribution to the process last year. The Working Party, made up of parents and staff, designed the feedback survey, analysed the feedback and pulled together the summary of finding document that has been used throughout the past 12 months to generate discussion at the Education Committee and School Council meetings. I would also like to thank those on the Education Committee and School Council for the thorough discussions that have taken place and work leading the development of the Dress Code policy.

The final steps are now to finalise the Dress Code Policy to include aspects of a compulsory uniform and establish an implementation timetable. This will all hopefully be ready to share early in Term 3.

Student Attitude to School Survey

The Attitude to School Survey (AToSS) is an annual student survey offered by the Department of Education to those in year 4-6. The purpose is to gain an understanding of students’ perceptions and experience at school. The questions focus on their thought and feelings in relation to the school, their learning, peer and social relations, resilience, bullying, wellbeing and life in general.

As we value the importance of our students’ voice, their feedback leads us to be able to reflect and improve student engagement and wellbeing.

We will be aiming to complete the AToSS between Monday 6th June and Friday 17th June for our year 4-6 students. There will be a formal letter coming home to families this week with additional information and your child’s options for participation.

Pupil Free Day – 8th June

A reminder we have our Common Professional Practice Day on Wednesday 8th June. This is a pupil free day. Camp Australia will be offering care for those who need the service.

Kind regards,

Jarrod Sutton

Acting Principal