PRINCIPAL'S REPORT

Welcome to the new school year and special welcome to our new Prep students and the 20 new families who have joined our school community with children in Years 1 to 6.

Congratulations to all of our students who have settled in so well to school.

A Picture Says A Thousand Words

It was wonderful to see our students back on-site last Monday. They came full of excitement to see their friends and teachers and the joyous sounds of children playing resounded throughout at recess and lunchtime.

Thank you for your understanding with the number of Compass Posts we have been sending throughout the start of term 1. We are extremely hopeful that the barrage of posts will now return to normal.

Thank you Mr Skaftouros & His Team

On the Friday before our students commenced, a huge gum tree fell on our entrance and our cubby houses. Thank you Lee for organising a team of tradespeople to work on the weekend before our students arrived. Our younger students love playing in the cubbies.

Thank You Annie Thomas

Thank you Annie for all of your work last year ensuring that our 2022 students had their new Year 6 bomber jackets on the very first day of Term 1. The students were so excited to receive their jackets and have been insisting on wearing them even in this lovely hot weather.

Privacy Collection Notice

Please see our Privacy collection notice at the end of this newsletter. All school staff must comply with Victorian privacy law and the Schools’ Privacy Policy. This notice explains how the Department, including Victorian government schools, handles personal and health information.

Meet and Greet

One of the highlights of term 1 is when parents have the opportunity to share the special things about their child/children. We call these sessions “Meet and Greet”. We will be holding these sessions online via MS Teams on Wednesday, 16 February commencing at 12 noon and continuing until 5pm.

Bookings opened on Compass this week. Our class teachers look forward to speaking with you face to face, though online, for a 10 minute “Meet The Teacher” chat between the teacher and parent/carer on 16 February. This session is an excellent opportunity for teachers to listen and learn more about your children from the people that know them best – ‘their first teacher’ – which is you!

Conducting these sessions online is also very inclusive of parents who are at work and can spare 10 minutes during their day. Please note that school will continue until the normal 3.30pm dismissal time for the students.

COVID Advice

I will report notifications of COVID positive cases daily on Compass at midday. The absence of this Compass report will mean there are no new cases that day.

We have sent home an additional box of RAT kits with each child this week, for testing during weeks 3 and 4.

Students who have recovered from COVID-19 do not need to participate in surveillance testing for 30 days after their isolation period has ended.

For information on symptoms visit: https://www.coronavirus.vic.gov.au/symptoms-and-risks.

For more information on how to get tested visit: https://www.coronavirus.vic.gov.au/taking-test-covid-19.

If your child returns a positive test result, you must:

quarantine your child for seven days
advise the school about the positive result
Your child must stay home until their symptoms have resolved and they are well
Everyone in your household is a close contact and must isolate for 7 days.

Reporting your child’s positive test

If your child was at school when they were infectious you need to report the positive case through the Student COVID-19 Test Portal or you can notify the school in writing or by phone.

You must also report your child’s positive test to the Department of Health via the COVID-19 Positive Rapid Antigen Test Self-Reporting Form or call centre on 1800 675 398.

Further information for languages other than English:

For school information in languages other than English, call TIS National on 131 450.
For translated written information about COVID-19, please visit: Translated information about COVID-19 | Coronavirus Victoria.
Please ask them to call the DET COVID-19 hotline on 1800 338 663 and they will help interpret.

For health advice in languages other than English: visit www.coronavirus.vic.gov.au/translated-information-about-coronavirus-covid-19.

For general advice and support please call the Department of Education and Training COVID-19 hotline on 1800 338 663.

Advice and further resources about what to do if you test positive to COVID-19, or you have been told you are a contact, are available at:

Your COVID Checklist | Coronavirus Victoria, or call the 24/7 Coronavirus hotline on: 1800 675 398

Privacy Collection Notice

Information for students, Parents and Carers

The Department of Education and Training (the Department) values your privacy and is committed to protecting the personal and health information that schools collect.

All school staff must comply with Victorian privacy law and the Schools’ Privacy Policy. This notice explains how the Department, including Victorian government schools, handles personal and health information. On occasion, specific consent will be sought for the collection and use of information, for example, for a student to receive a health service.

Our school is also required by legislation, such as the Education and Training Reform Act 2006, to collect some of this information.

Throughout this notice, ‘staff’ includes principals, teachers, student support service officers, youth workers, social workers, nurses and any other allied health practitioners, and all other employees, contractors, volunteers and service providers of the school and the Department.

On enrolment, and during the ordinary course of a student’s attendance at a school, schools will collect information about students and their families for the following purposes:

educating students
supporting students’ social and emotional wellbeing, and health
fulfilling legal obligations, including duty of care, anti-discrimination law and occupational health and safety law
communicating and engaging with parents
student administration
school management
supporting policy in relation to student education and wellbeing.

If this information is not collected, schools may be unable to provide optimal education or support to students or fulfil legal obligations.

For example, our school relies on parents to provide health information about any medical condition or disability that their child has, medication their child may take while at school, any known allergies and contact details of their child’s doctor. If parents do not provide all relevant health information, this may put their child’s health at risk.

Our school also requires current, relevant information about all parents and carers so that schools can take account of safety concerns that affect their children. Parents should provide schools with copies of all current parenting plans and court orders about or that affect their children and provide updated copies when they change.

When parents enrol their child in primary school, they will be asked to provide personal and health information in several ways, including via the Enrolment Form, the School Entrance Health Questionnaire (SEHQ) and the Early Childhood Intervention Service (ECIS) Transition Form.

The Enrolment Form is used to collect information that is essential for the purposes listed above, and requests information such as:

Emergency contacts – Individuals parents nominate for a school to contact during an emergency. Parents should ensure that their nominated emergency contact agrees to their contact details being provided to the school and that they understand their details may be disclosed by the Department if lawful, e.g. in the case of emergency communications relating to bush fires or floods.
Student background information – Information about country of birth, Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander origin, language spoken at home and parent occupation. This information enables the Department to allocate appropriate resources to schools. The Department also uses this information to plan for future educational needs in Victoria and shares some information with the Commonwealth government to monitor, plan and allocate resources.
Immunisation status – This assists schools to manage health risks and legal obligations. The Department may also provide this information to the Department of Health and Department of Families, Fairness and Housing to assess immunisation rates in Victoria, but not in a way which identifies students.
Visa status – This is required to process a student’s enrolment.

All schools may use departmental systems and online tools such as apps and other software to effectively collect and manage information about students and families for the purposes listed above.

When schools use these online tools, they take steps to ensure that student information is secure. If parents or carers have any concerns about the use of these online tools, please contact the school.

School staff will only share student and family information with other school staff who need to know to enable them to educate or support the student as described above. Information will only be shared outside the school (and outside the Department) as required or authorised by law, including where sharing is required to meet duty of care, anti-discrimination, occupational health and safety, and child wellbeing and safety obligations. The information collected will not be disclosed beyond the school and Department without parental consent unless such disclosure is lawful.

When a student transfers to another school (including Catholic, independent and interstate), personal and/or health information about that student may be transferred to the next school. Transferring this information is in the best interests of the student and assists the next school to provide the best possible education and support to the student.

For further detail about how and what level of information is provided to the next school, refer to the: Enrolment: Student transfers between schools.

Schools only provide school reports and ordinary school communications to students, parents, carers or others who have a legal right to that information. Requests for access to other student information or by others must be made by lodging a Freedom of Information (FOI) application.

To update student or family information, parents should contact their school.

For more information about how schools and the Department collect and manage personal and health information, or how to access personal and health information held by a school about you or your child, refer to the: Schools’ Privacy Policy

Thank You

Thank you everyone for your support as we transition to 2022 at BNPS. We are hopeful of a better year but of course are still under health and DET restrictions.

Our priority is for our students to be able to access learning and wellbeing at Beaumaris North Primary School so keeping safe and our school open is our number 1!

SHERRIL DUFFY

PRINCIPAL

BNPS Newsletter

Issue 1 · 10 Feb 2022

In this issue