Principal's Report

Congratulations and Best Wishes to our Year 12s

Our VCE students have now completed their final exams and are ready to join our Year 12 VCAL students for their Valedictory. Whilst VCE and VCAL have brought about challenges for our Year 12s, their resilience and commitment to completing their senior schooling is commendable. We wish all of our students well in their future endeavours and we look forward to celebrating the end of your schooling with you at Valedictory.

If your child is a school leaver, the schoolies celebrations from Saturday, 26th November to Sunday, 4th December, can be an exciting milestone in their lives. However, this shouldn’t mean impacting your child’s health and safety, or causing problems for the communities where they decide to celebrate.

We encourage you to speak to your child about the importance of keeping safe and healthy at schoolies. Information about staying safe at schoolies can be found at Partying safely at schoolies — Better Health Channel.

You can also follow the Good Times Great Breaks Victoria Facebook page, which provides information on what wellbeing support is available in the main schoolies destinations of Rye, Surf Coast, Lorne, Torquay and Phillip Island.

Remembrance Day

Remembrance Day commemorations marked 103 years since the first Armistice Day services were held around the world on 11th November, 1919. We observed one minute’s silence at 11.00am, in memory of those who died or suffered in all wars and armed conflicts. A minute's silence is dedicated to the deceased, especially for soldiers who died fighting to protect the nation. In many countries, people wear a poppy to commemorate those who died in war. Poppies were chosen as a symbol because they often grew in battlefields after combat ceased. Under the flag poles, a wreath was laid to acknowledge the service of armed forces members who have died in the line of duty.

Thank you to our Humanities Team for leading the organisation of our Remembrance Day activities and to our student leaders and staff involved both at school and at our local Epping RSL Service on Friday, 11th November, 2022.

2026 Victorian School Term Dates

The 2026 Victorian government school term dates have been adjusted to give Victorian communities the opportunity to participate more actively in the 2026 Commonwealth Games. School term dates for 2026 to 2030 were announced last year, before Victoria was named host of the 2026 Commonwealth Games. The Games are being held from Tuesday, 17th March to Sunday, 29th March, 2026 across regional Victoria, with Geelong, Bendigo, Ballarat, Gippsland and Shepparton hosting a range of activities and events for 20 different sports and 9 para-sports.

The Minister for Education has approved the 2026 Victorian school term dates:

Term 1: Tuesday, 27th January to Friday, 13th March, 2026
Term 2: Monday, 30th March to Friday, 19th June, 2026
Term 3: Monday, 6th July to Friday, 18th September, 2026
Term 4: Monday, 5th October to Friday, 18th December, 2026.

2023 NAPLAN Update

Students in Years 7 and 9 will take part in the 2023 National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) from Wednesday,15th March to Monday, 27th March 2023.

This is the first year NAPLAN will be held in March, having previously taken place in May. This change was made so school systems would have access to results earlier in the school year, enabling them to appropriately structure teaching and learning plans for the remainder of the year.

NAPLAN is a nationwide measure which helps parents, teachers, schools, education authorities, governments and the broader community determine how well young Australians are developing their literacy and numeracy skills that provide the critical foundation for other learning, and for their productive and rewarding participation in the community.

NAPLAN assesses literacy and numeracy skills that students are already learning at school. On its own, NAPLAN is not a test that can be studied for and students are not expected to do so.

NAPLAN is just one aspect of a school’s assessment and reporting process – it does not replace ongoing assessments made by teachers about student performance; however, students and parents may use individual results to discuss progress with teachers.

Students and parents wishing to familiarise themselves with NAPLAN can visit the public demonstration site on the NAP website. Some past NAPLAN papers are also available.

Brad Moyle

College Principal