From the Principal Class

Dear Viewbank College Community,

We are well into term 2 and have celebrated many wonderful events that have taken place.

We have had many successes in interschool sport and round robin days. 

I want to thank all the staff who have taken out teams and the students for their sportsmanship, participation, and representation of the College.

Year 7 camp was also a great success, with students engaging in a range of activities that both challenged them and brought them together as a group. 

It is one of the really important events on the calendar and builds resilience and independence.

Our Year 7 students have also been attending the Banyule and Nillumbik Tech School to see how technology and design can be effectively incorporated into their learning program.  The excursions support the Wearable Technologies unit students are working on during the year.

The Music Autumn Festival was a huge success and incredibly well attended. 

We have so many talented staff and students to showcase, so the dual stages indoors and outdoors was a great initiative. 

Thanks to our Music team, the Friends of Music parent helpers who organised the barbecue and snacks and the weather for being kind!

Our VCE Theatre Studies students also performed over a few evenings to parents and friends. 

Their performances – Puffs (Year 12’s) and A Midsummer Nights Dream (Year 11’s) were entertaining and well staged. 

The Arts are alive and thriving at Viewbank! 

Thanks to Pasquale Bartalotta and Caitlin Brown for staging this wonderful evening.

The Year 10 Economics and Business classes combined for a Winter Market Day today. It was great to see so many enthusiastic salespeople spruiking their stalls and items for sale. 

Please keep an eye out for more events to come in the remainder of the term, including our Year 9 LEAD City Experience program and Year 10 Work Experience.

Our students in Years 9-11 will be sitting exams in the last three weeks of school.

Exam timetables have been published and Year 10 exams begin on Monday.

These exams are important practice in the lead up to Year 12, as well as an indicator of student progress across first semester. 

Please encourage your student to take these seriously and put in maximum effort.

The Victorian State Schools Spectacular

Congratulations to Kieran H of Year 10 and Alex W of Year 11 who have secured roles in this year's Victorian Schools State School's Spectacular core performing company.

Kieran will be in the Orchestra (Tenor Sax) and Alex will be in the choir.

The Spectacular will be performed twice on Saturday 9th September at John Cain Arena, followed by a television broadcast in December. 

Rehearsals have commenced for this year’s production which will showcase more than 3,000 Victorian government school students in a performance of music, song, dance, skating, circus, puppetry and backstage areas such as audio, lighting, vision and stage management.

Tickets for the event will go on sale on Wednesday 7th June, 2023.

Uniform:

It has been fantastic to see so many students wearing our new uniform item – the Viewbank rugby top.

Both of our uniform suppliers now have these in stock.

A reminder that hoodies and long-sleeved tops worn under our sport top or shirts are not acceptable uniform.

The College has 2 uniform suppliers:

Noone Imageware

283 Lower Heidelberg Road

East Ivanhoe

Phone:  9499 1439

Website

Belgravia (Buxwear) Direct

218 Settlement Road

Thomastown 

Phone: 9464 7555

Website

Illness:

Advice from the Health Department is that we are well into an early flu season, and there are other viruses affecting the health of students. 

If your student is unwell, please keep them home from school to slow the spread of viruses. 

COVID is still circulating, and we encourage testing if your student is showing symptoms. More RAT tests can be collected from the College.

Please contact your student’s House Leader via Compass for work to be completed at home for the duration of the illness.

Lateness:

There are increasing numbers of students who are arriving at school late or are late to classes during the school day. 

We would appreciate your support in encouraging students to be on time.

Whilst we know that there will be occasions when lateness is unavoidable, it can be a disruption to the teaching program and a sign of disrespect to teachers and other students when this is a regular occurrence.

Detentions will be issued for students who are regularly late without a reason.

College Building Fund

The College would like to take this opportunity to sincerely thank those families who have already contributed to the Building Fund this year.

How will your donation assist the College?

The College has a Master Plan for building works with the focus on creating more usable spaces for our students.  Your generous donation will contribute greatly to this. In the past Building Fund donations have supported various improvements throughout the school such as the installation of heating/cooling, external painting and upgrades to learning spaces.

Another exciting opportunity is the development of our VCE Study Centre, to provide our Year 12 students with a purpose-built space to study, gather and collaborate in their final year at the College. 

The end of financial year is fast approaching, if you would like to take the opportunity to make a taxable deduction donation to our Building Fund, please click the Donate Now button below:

All donations big or small are tax-deductible! 

2023 College Production & Friends of the Performing & Visual Arts - Raffle Prize Donations

The 2023 College Production will be "Legally Blonde - The Musical" and tickets are now on sale!   See the 2023 College Production page further on in this newsletter for more details.

Our Friends of the Performing & Visual Arts (FOPAVA) are looking for donations for their major fundraising raffle which is held during production week (26th July - 29th July, 2023). 

Do you OR someone you know have a business or a holiday rental?? 

Could you donate… 

A product? 

A service? 

Accommodation? 

General donations of prizes would also be greatly appreciated (eg. Wine, candles, chocolates, gifts etc) 

Please forward any donations the Admin Office by Wednesday 19th July.  

If you have any questions please contact Karen Howell on 0425 846 626. 

External Exam supervisors

Do you know someone that may be interested?

We have had some of our exam supervisors retire and a new chief exam supervisor for 2023. 

If you know of someone that would be interested and is available either the GAT day (15th June) and during the end of year exams October 24th through November 15th - please pass on my email address anna.crosswhite@education.vic.gov.au or get them to contact the school.

Pay rates are advertised through VCAA.

It may suit a Uni student, or retired person. They need a working with children check but don't need to have been a teacher. Appreciate your help!

Emma Ford, Acting Principal

Rachael Smith, Assistant Principal

Anna Crosswhite, Assistant Principal

Penelope Cleghorn, Assistant Principal