From the Principal

Dear Monty South Community,

The last two weeks have absolutely flown!  Congratulations to the Principal’s Advisory Leaders who put on a great assembly last week. Assembly looked slightly different as we presented student of the week certificates as per our 5 Tribes Agreements. Thank you to Trish for working with our students to make the assembly so successful.

One of the things I value in every school, is my school community. Unfortunately, there was very poor timing of some signage that went up in the first week of school which I was not aware of until it was pointed out to me. Unfortunately, in 2022 the school had to deal with several incidents where illegal and inappropriate behaviours were experienced by some. Following advice, it was decided that signage would be placed around the school to curb this behaviour. However, I am a firm believer that our school community are best placed in keeping our school safe and serve as eyes and ears at all other times outside of the school day. I encourage you to continue, using the school as a safe place after hours, use our school oval and courts and report any inappropriate behaviour to us or directly to the Police.

Over this week I met with School council and P&F. It was lovely to hear all the things they love about Monty South, as well as areas that they believe can be improved. There was an overwhelming response to improving our learning spaces and capital work requirements. This is something that we can all work as a community to make sure that our students have excellent teaching and learning spaces.

During the School Council meeting we also discussed having to run an election process as there are five parent and two staff positions available this year. School Council is an integral body in the school decision making process and a great way for you to get involved in the school. I will be sending more information on the process for School Council elections tomorrow.  

The P&F had their AGM last night, and it was very exciting to meet more parents and again hear from them what they love about our school. ‘Community’ is the number one aspect that all participants loved about Monty South. The P&F brings a sense of community to the school, but they can’t do it alone, so if you would like to get involved and maintain the sense of community that we all enjoy, get involved. Congratulations to Bianca Dhollander who was elected president for 2023. It was great to see that the P&F filled all their executive position. I look forward to working with them over 2023.

An additional item on the agenda at the P&F was the ‘Fete’ to be held on the 19 March. Renee has done an amazing job in coordinating the Fete and I would like to thank her for her tremendous effort.  This will be a great event which I hope will bring our community out to participate, so please tell your family and friends. There will be a few communications that will go out soon, so please keep an eye out for these to see how you can be involved. Even our chickens are excited!

This week we introduced a few changes at school that are in the best interest of safety for our students and school community. The first is the requirement that anything with wheels (bikes, scooters, skateboards etc) needs to be walked through the school when students enter or are leaving school grounds at the beginning and at the end of the day.  Please support us in this change as we have a large student population (682) and the pathways are limited. The second is that students in grades 3 to 6 need to have their hair tied back during Kitchen classes. 

When you see me out and about, please say hi! 😊

Keyla Jeffers