Castlemaine Secondary College News

Principal News

Farewell to the Year Class of 2019

On Thursday 24 October we acknowledged and celebrated the final day at school for the Year 12 class of 2019. These celebrations included a breakfast prepared by School Council, a highly entertaining “fashion parade” and farewell assembly, and a morning tea with parents, Year 12 students and teachers. Thank you to all involved in this morning of celebrations. The majority of our Year 12 students are now preparing for exams over the next month. Although classes are officially finished, I remind Year 12 students and their families that our teachers still remain available to work with and support our Year 12 students. Other support services, including Careers and Wellbeing supports, also remain fully available our Year 12 students for the remainder of 2019 and into next year. We also continue these supports for our VCAL students and other students not sitting VCE exams. Many of these students are now preparing to enter paid employment and TAFE courses, and we are keen to continue supporting our students on this important journey. The final farewell for our Year 12 students takes place with the Graduation Dinner on Thursday 21 November. I urge all Year 12 students and their parents or caregivers to attend this fantastic event.

VicSRC Student Voice Awards

Last Thursday’s excitement did not end with our Year 12 Farewell celebrations. On Thursday evening I was privileged to travel to Melbourne with three members of our SRC (Cohen Saunders, Niamh O’Connor-Smith and Christian Vejar) and Judith McLean (Leading Teacher for Student Voice and Agency) to the attend the VicSRC annual awards ceremony. We were invited to these awards after being shortlisted for Student Voice Secondary School of the Year Award, and Cohen had been shortlisted for the Youth Leadership of the Year Award. On the night CSC was declared runner-up for the school of the year award and Cohen was also declared runner-up for the individual award. These awards were presented by the Minister for Education and Deputy Premier, James Merlino. These achievements are a fine reflection of the work undertaken by our SRC in recent years as well as Cohen’s impressive individual leadership accomplishments.

Building Update

Our building works are progressing quickly, with construction currently about one week ahead of schedule. Foundation works are well underway, and this week the slab was poured for our new Administration and Library building.

 

 

Paul Frye

Principal

XUNO application and student attendance

As most families would be aware CSC uses the XUNO platform for student management, which includes attendance, storing of reports and ILPs (individual learning plans) and many other teacher functions. During term 3, XUNO released a new parent mobile application, which is very user friendly, particularly with monitoring student attendance. Currently parents / carers receive an SMS when their child / children are absent from school. This process incurs significant cost for the College, which we hope to reduce significantly. During this term we will start conducting trials using the XUNO application for monitoring attendance. If the term 4 trial is successful, in 2020 we hope to replace our current SMS system with all a families using the XUNO application. Families are encouraged to download the application now from the App Store. The login details for each family will remain the same, with the school code being 6dv79a. If you require any assistance please contact the College.

Step-Up Program (Monday 25th November – Friday 6th December)

All students and families are reminded of CSC’s 2020 Step-Up which will be running later term. It is an expectation that all 2020 Year 8-12 students attend for the entire two weeks. During this program students will begin their curriculum for 2020, with each Learning Area conducting one assessment piece during this time. Not attending places individuals at a disadvantage for 2020, which is particularly true for VCE students.

XUNO application and student attendance

As mentioned in the last College Newsletter, families are encouraged to download the XUNO application from the App Store. This application can provide easy to access information to parents in a very convenient way. In 2020 CSC plans to start making more use of ‘app notifications’ to communicate with families. The login details for each family will remain the same, with the school code being 6dv79a. If you require any assistance please contact the College.

Child Safe Standards

All families are kindly reminded that we have copies of the below listed policies on our College’s website.

  • Child Safe Policy
  • Child Safety Responding and Reporting Policy and Procedures
  • Code of Conduct – Child Safety
  • Staff Selection
  • Duty of Care
  • Student Wellbeing and engagement
  • Bullying prevention

Any questions related to above policies should be directed to Paul Frye or myself.

Uniform

A reminder to all students and families that for every 3 uniform infringements a student receives they will be required to complete a lunchtime yard duty detention. We acknowledge that some circumstances may prevent students from being in uniform and therefore they should go to the Administration Office before 9am, where they will be either provided with clean uniform to wear, or if uniform is unavailable they will be provided with a uniform pass. Families are reminded if they require financial assistance for the purchasing of uniform they should contact the College’s Administration or Wellbeing Team.

 

 

Justin Hird

Assistant Principal