From the Principal

We were delighted to share our school with over 500 visitors at our Open Morning on Tuesday 27 April. Our student tour guides and speakers did an outstanding job of highlighting the great learning community we have here. While our 2020 Virtual Tour, which replaced an Open Day, was a great success, and was praised by many community members, it did not compare with the energy and vibrancy of a live event. Thank you to everyone – staff and students a like - for your contributions.

We are looking forward with great excitement for the Year 8 Camp series that will begin next week. The Year 8s will develop their skills, working towards the theme of Challenge at the 3 day outdoor/adventure camp in the Gembrook forest.

Congratulations to the large contingent of Year 9 City School students who completed their research in the CBD last week. There were great reports of student agency and initiative and a real sense of achievement from all involved.

Preparing for upcoming exams and assessments

As we move towards the middle of Term 2, our values of Achievement and Curiosity are paramount for students and staff. It is always a very important time with many of our students involved in examinations and major assessment tasks that will take place over coming weeks. Many of these onsite events simply did not take place last year due to Remote Learning and COVID-19 restrictions so we are very much planning for the return to more normal arrangements.

This week our Year 7 and Year 9 students will sit the NAPLAN test.
This year our school has been selected to participate in the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) testing, which will take place at the end of May.
Year 11 Unit 1 VCE end of Semester 1 Examinations will be held again this term, giving students valuable experience under exams conditions, so that they can begin refining their skills in preparation for the following final year of school.
Over 450 senior students will undertake the General Achievement Test (GAT) on Wednesday 9 June and all students will be undertaking a series of School Assessed Coursework (SACs) and ongoing Assessment Learning tasks over the course of this term.

We will also hold our annual Subject Expo on the afternoon of GAT Day. Please stay tuned for more information regarding that in coming weeks.

Work experience

Our Year 10 students are looking forward to their week of Work Experience next week. We know it has been a real challenge for students (and families) to gain placements for work experience, with ongoing COVID restrictions really limiting availability. We commend students for their persistence and understand that sometimes even their best efforts have not yielded results. We are very fortunate to have access to virtual work experience that was released and was successful last year during lockdown, so that those students who missed out on a live placement can still gain some of the skills, knowledge and experience.

Co-curricular events to enjoy

There is plenty to read in this edition about the large number of Music, Sporting and other co-curricular events that involve many of our students across all year levels. The volleyballers had wonderful success last week. Congratulations to the Year 8 Girls team, who came away with gold, and the Year 8 boys team who won bronze at the Victorian Volleyball Schools’ Cup.

We are looking forward to our marvellous performing arts students performing live for the very large and appreciative audiences at our mid-year concert series and during the production early next term. We had some fantastic performances during assemblies over the past fortnight, and during Open Day.

We continue to focus on student wellbeing and to promote student (and staff) personal strengths as a priority in our school. We are pleased that students are now settling back into the groove of school on campus – getting involved and re-establishing social bonds.

Our fingers and toes are crossed as we approach the May State budget. We are hoping that the capital works funding for Stage 1 & 2 of the Masterplan are delivered for our school community to address the needs of a growing population. Please see our latest short video clip which outlines what the Stage 1 & 2 upgrades could achieve if the Masterplan was funded.

Until next time, my best wishes to you all.

Sue Harrap

Principal