Principal’s Report - 5th February 2021

Happy birthday to us,

Happy birthday to us,

Happy birthday dear Lyndhurst,

Happy birthday to us!

On Friday, 28th January 2011, just over 100 of our very first students walked in the front door of our school, marking the beginning of Lyndhurst Primary School. The smiles were broad, the uniforms were new and the nerves were a bit jangly, for students and staff alike. It was, after 7 months of hard work to set the school up, one of the proudest moments of my life. When I was first appointed as Principal of Lyndhurst Primary School in June of 2010, having previously been Principal of Tyabb Primary School for 10 years, the site we now occupy was a mud-pile construction site and the buildings were no more than a concrete slab and a few pieces of steel. Look at us now! It’s been an amazing journey and one that continues as more and more families become part of our school and more and more students move through the classrooms and corridors of this vibrant learning community. We grew quickly in those first few years going from 150 to 300, then 450, 620, 750 and so on. Today we host over 950 students.

Linked to this newsletter are the 4 newsletters that were sent out through the latter part of 2010. They give you a bit of the story of the school as it was built prior to opening and a little bit about my vision for the school. It’s interesting to reflect on how well we have gone in achieving that original vision. There is also a link to our first official school newsletter from February of 2011. Make sure you check out our first staff team, most of whom are still here. My, how youthful we all looked!

Happy birthday Lyndhurst!

COVID stopped us from properly celebrating our 10th year last year. Hopefully, we can organise a celebration this year, now that we have officially turned ten. It’s an amazing milestone and one that is full of wonderful stories, achievements and pride.

Student Leaders 2021

At the last assembly of 2020, our School Leaders conducted a handover ceremony to congratulate our new senior student leaders.

The senior student leaders for 2021 are:

School Captains	SRC Chairs
Tom Watson	Krish Dittakavi
Methuki Bogahapitiya	Hannah Santos

Further student leader announcements will be made as term 1 progresses. Our senior leaders will have their badge presentation at the assembly on 17th February. Local State Member of Parliament, Pauline Richards, will be our guest to make the presentation.

Prep Start

On Thursday of the first week of school, we had almost 150 Prep students begin their first day at school. What an exciting time for families! Everything went more smoothly than we could have imagined and again, the staggered start worked well for everyone. The whole morning was so calm with a gradual trickle of families entering classrooms instead of the usual crowds and noise. I thank all of our prep families for your cooperation. It made day one for our prep students so relaxed. I must congratulate parents and our local pre-school centres for the preparation of the children for school. They are a wonderful group and have so far been very mature, responsible and settled.

A Flying Start

What a Flying Start our students have had to 2021! It’s been a week of activity and conversations, establishing the important relationships, rules and routines that ensure a successful school year. The well culminated on our Flying Start Celebration Day. Although the weather was a little hot and oppressive, it was a fantastic day. Enormous thanks go to our well-being team of Simone Smith and Lisa Howells, who worked closely with a wonderful team of student organisers, to run a great day of activities. I know they were all exhausted by the end of the day but were rewarded of course, by the beaming smiles of our enthusiastic Lyndhurst students.

New Buildings

You may have noticed that two new buildings were erected on site over the holiday break. One building is a double classroom space and the other is a fantastic new music space. The buildings are in response to our growing population and they are terrific learning spaces. There are still a few little bits and pieces to do for final set up of the rooms but all of the students and teachers in them, love their new spaces!

Learning Partnership Evening

This year, as for last year, we are improving our program of connection with parents to try to better communicate to families about what goes on at school and to give parents a much clearer picture of how they can support the learning that happens each and every day. Instead of traditional parent-teacher “get to know you” interviews, we are continuing our Learning Partnership evenings. This year, you will often hear us talk about the Lyndhurst Partnership and, whilst we have referred to the critical role parents play in the learning process, we will be continuing to focus on this as a priority. We see education at Lyndhurst as a three-way partnership between the student, the school and the home, each playing an important role in the learning. As we focus on Student Voice and give students agency over their learning, we will also be giving parents a much clearer pathway to supporting the learning at home. The upcoming Learning Partnership meetings will be our first opportunity to really connect with parents and carers on this topic. I hope everyone is able to attend. I’m sure you’ll get a great deal from it. Much more information will be going out to parents about the learning partnership as the year progresses.

Sub-School Arrangements

I remind parents about the sub-school arrangements in the school directed towards better supporting families in our large school. We have divided the school into 3 sub-schools, placing an Assistant Principal in charge of each sub-school. Mansi Vadera takes responsibility for the years 4, 5 and 6 sub-school, Moira McCann is responsible for the Prep/1 sub-school and Jamie Sharp looks after the Year 2/3 sub-school. This focuses each Assistant Principal on a smaller cohort of students and families, allowing us to build stronger relationships and to support students and their families in a more personalized way, even as our school continues to grow. Each of the sub-schools is supported by a Learning Specialist whose main focus is supporting teachers and students to improving learning. Liam Flanagan is working in the 4/5/6 sub-school, Emma Galvin is working in the Prep/1 classes and our new Learning Specialist, Alicia Stevens, is working in the 2/3 area.

Staffing Update

As we grow, so does our staff team. This year we welcome a number of new members to our staff team. Grace Santoro joins our year 4 team replacing Tania Lavcanski, who transferred during the holidays. Grace worked extensively at our school last year and we are very pleased to have her on board. Grace will also work in the Tutoring learning initiative. Alicia Stevens joins our leadership team as a Learning Specialist as well as a class teacher in year 2. Alicia comes to us from Pakenham Lakeside PS and I look forward to her insights and expertise in our leadership work. Nicole Biuk, although not brand new to our team as she worked with us in term 4 last year, joins us more permanently in a year 2 classroom. Bradley Clinch, Lilli Cooper and Nikki Schute join us as brand new teachers as our student population grows. They are already showing what wonderful additions they are to our teaching team as they take on classes in year 1, year 2 and year 3 respectively.

Years 5 and 5 Beach Program

We are well and truly settled into term 1 now and everything seems to be going along swimmingly, especially for our year 5 and 6 students who will attend the Life Saving Victoria Beach Safety Program next week at Carrum Life Saving Club. I am lucky enough to be able to spend three days on the program and I know how much the students will gain from the experience and how much fun they will have. The beach program has been a wonderful addition to our water safety and swimming program at the school and it is pleasing to see so many of our students attending this year. It’s also great to see that, this year, thanks to State Government funding, the program will be extended later in the term with more opportunities to give children quality beach experiences that will give them, not only increased skill, but a better understanding of the vagaries of the ocean and the need to for care around water.

General points of information for parents

To follow are a few general points of information for parents:

Mobile phones, smart watches and similar devices

New technology keeps challenging us, especially in the education industry and we have recently encountered a new challenge to which we need to respond. We have always had a rule regarding mobile phones and now we find students wearing watches that, unlike previously, work without a phone being present. Essentially, this is a phone and the same rule now applies to these and similar devices. Below are the current rules regarding mobile phones, phone-capable devices, camera-equipped devices, gaming machines, gaming-equipped devices or phone/communication-capable watches.

Children MUST NOT have the above devices or similar at school. If a device is required before or after school, your child will be required to hand the device in to the office when they arrive at school each morning and collect it again as they leave each afternoon. Children must NEVER have one of the above devices or similar in their bag, locker or in their possession during school time. Any children who wish to bring such devices to school must have parent permission and must apply to the Principal on the appropriate form and agree to adhere to the guidelines.

Policy regarding “Private property brought to school”: Private property brought to school by students, staff or visitors is not insured and the Department nor the school, accepts any responsibility for any loss or damage. This can include mobile phones, electronic devices, expensive watches, calculators, toys, sporting equipment and cars parked on school premises. As the Department does not hold insurance for personal property brought to schools and has no capacity to pay for any loss or damage to such property, students are discouraged from bringing any unnecessary or particularly valuable items to school.

We ask for parent support on this issue.

Black Only Footwear at School

In 2017, a proposal for a change to the Student Dress Code to cover footwear which has previously not been covered well in the policy, was presented to the PFA and the School Council. The change has been prompted by a rise in the amount of inappropriate footwear being worn by children and some teasing that has been happening, especially in senior grades, regarding issues like cost and brand names. The proposal has been strongly supported by the PFA and the School Council and the new regulations come into force during term 1 to allow parents some transition time. Essentially, we will be insisting on black only footwear. The new wording in the policy is shown here:

3.13 Footwear:

Safe, comfortable footwear must be worn at all times.
All footwear must be black with no visible logos, colors or decoration.
Footwear may be school shoes or sports shoes as long as they are black.
Footwear must completely enclose the foot, must fit firmly and comfortably and must be appropriate for a range of school activities.
Footwear must be in good and serviceable condition.
Children may wear sports shoes that are not black, only whilst they are participating in school sport activities.
Open toed footwear is not acceptable under playground conditions. Thongs, surf thongs and/or open-toed sandals may only be worn whilst in attendance at swimming programs.

Student accident insurance and ambulance cover: Parents are reminded that the Department of Education does not provide personal accident insurance or ambulance cover for students. Parents and guardians of students who do not have student accident insurance or ambulance cover, are responsible for paying the cost of medical treatment for injured students, including the cost of ambulance attendance or transport as well as any other transport costs. It is the responsibility of parents or guardians to look into their preferred options in regard to accident insurance and ambulance cover. It is highly recommended that families consider ambulance cover, in particular. In the event of a serious accident or illness, we will call an ambulance, regardless of whether you have ambulance membership or not. The costs for ambulance transport can be very high. I suggest all parents investigate Ambulance Victoria membership.

Heat Policy: We have formulated a policy to cater for days of extreme heat. Should the temperature reach 37 deg or over at lunchtime (local temperature), children will be kept inside and supervision arrangements as for a wet day timetable will be implemented. If parents feel that children are better off at home on a very hot afternoon, then you are welcome to call at the office before 12.50 pm to pick them up.

Medication: We CANNOT give medication of any kind, without your written permission. If you need your child medicated during the day, whether on a short term or long term basis, you must fill out a medication form, available from the office. The information that you send should have full information as to dosages, times, indications for use and permission for the medication to be administered. This information should be given to the office along with all medication in original containers. If the medication is for ongoing issues such as ADHD or asthma, a full management plan should be given to the school on the appropriate form.

Entering the school: There are several entry gates to the school grounds. Children, upon arrival at school, should come in one of those gates and remain inside the fences until it is time to enter class. Please DO NOT bring children through the car park gates but ONLY USE PEDESTRIAN GATES. The car park gates are dangerous and this sets a very poor example for children.

Entering the building: With over 700 families in the school now, we must reduce congestion in the main building and around the office. We are asking that no parents enter the main building through the office door before school or at pick-up time unless they have specific business at the office. We are also asking that parents drop off children to the external classrooms doors and pick them up from the same place. There should be no parents waiting inside the main building. We thank you for your understanding and cooperation.

Early morning and after school supervision: Children should not be in the school grounds prior to 8.45am each morning. The school grounds are supervised from 8.45am and we have a well-staffed and closely supervised Before School Care program that opens at 6.45am. Beyond this, we cannot take responsibility for children left in the playground in the morning unsupervised. This applies equally after 3.45pm in the afternoon. Drop off and pick up for children in before or after school care is through the side door of the Cormorant room near the staff car park.

Parking and traffic: Please be patient and considerate when picking up and dropping off at school, especially at this time of the year. We understand that it is a difficult situation, especially after school, as it is at most schools. There is plenty of parking around the school grounds. NO PARENTS are to use the staff car park at any time, unless you are legally accessing the disabled parking space. The risk to children with traffic in that car park is high. There should be NO children in that car park at any time. We will be speaking to the children regarding safe practices when travelling home on foot or on bicycles. There are some simple messages about parking and pickup.

Be patient and courteous
Please consider our school neighbors and park in designated spaces
NEVER double-park to pick up children!
NEVER call children across the road to your car. Ensure they always use a crossing.

Bicycle and scooter use: It is the school’s policy that children may ride bicycles and scooters to school, unaccompanied, ONLY from Year 4 onwards. Children below Year 4 MUST be accompanied by a responsible adult if they ride to school. Even beyond year 4, it is the responsibility of parents to decide whether children are skilled enough, responsible enough and have sufficient road sense to ride safely. It is also the responsibility of parents to ensure that bicycles and scooters are safe and roadworthy. All bicycles and scooters must be stored in the bicycle shed and children MUST dismount and walk prior to entering a school gate.

Using the school crossings: The school has two supervised crossing but many parents put themselves, their children and the children of others’ in danger by not using the crossings properly or not using them at all. You MUST use a crossing if one is provided within a reasonable distance and you MUST follow the instructions of the crossing supervisor. Road safety becomes such a critical issue in such a large community and we rely on EVERY PARENT to consider the safety of our children.

Uniforms: The wearing of school uniform is compulsory at Lyndhurst Primary School. The uniform policy is there for reasons of uniformity of appearance, pride in the school, convenience for parents and security for children. Please ensure that your children are wearing the prescribed uniforms at all times. On those odd occasions when the drier has broken down or the dog has eaten the only clean shirt, please send a note along. There can often be “variations” that appear in children’s uniforms and that is disappointing. The uniform is attractive, comfortable, functional and good value for money. We don’t want a whole lot of variations appearing. Changes to the school uniform are approved by School Council. I ask for all parents to support our efforts to maintain this important part of our school culture. We are proud of our uniform and we hope that the children feel the same.

“Kiss and Drop zone” in Brookwater Pde: Casey Council have placed special signs outside of our school, indicating a “No Parking” area from 8am-9.30am and from 2.30pm – 4pm. The new “No Parking area will be what is commonly known as a “Kiss and Drop” zone. According to the road rules, a motorist is allowed to stop in a No Parking area for a period of up to two minutes to drop off or pick up passengers, so long as they do not leave the vehicle unattended. A vehicle is unattended if the driver is over 3m from the vehicle. This will improve traffic flow and student safety if everyone follows the simple rules.

In the morning, stop, drop off your children and move on.
In the afternoon, stop, pick up your children and move on.
Whenever you can, move to the front of the parking area to leave room for others.

Greg Lacey

Principal

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