From The Principal's Desk

Dear Parents and Carers,

As we are accustomed to these days, there isn’t a week that goes by without special days being celebrated. The last few weeks have seen a number of special days that help us remember some important values to live by.

Last week we acknowledged World Kindness Day and the International Day of Tolerance while this week it was World Hello Day. All of these special days help focus our thinking on the importance of working hard to respect each other, understand and value each other’s differences and the immense power of maintaining positive connections with each other. 

We all play a part in helping to shape these qualities in the young people that attend Delacombe Primary School.

Staffing

We are almost ready to announce our staffing make-up for 2023 and are very close to finalising the class groupings as well. We look forward to sharing this with you in the next edition of the school newsletter. For 2023 we will be proceeding with 25 classrooms with the potential of expanding to 26 should we see a spike in enrolments throughout December and January.

We have recently received confirmation from Scott Phillips that he will be returning to Delacombe Primary School as principal at the beginning of 2023. Scott has spent the last 12 months on leave exploring other job opportunities both in and out of the education field. I am sure everyone will join me in welcoming Scott back. We will be working closely with Scott over the coming months to ensure a smooth transition back into the school.

Advanced Notice - Starting Dates for 2023

In order to give everyone as much notice as possible, below are the starting dates for 2023:

A more detailed explanation of our curriculum days for 2023 and the calendar will be included in the next newsletter.

School Captain Process

Over the last two weeks the current school captains have joined Mrs Lindsay and myself to interview candidates for the 2023 school captain roles. We were very impressed with the quality of the applicants and found it extremely hard to shortlist to the final 15. The final 15 were eventually selected and have presented their speeches to the Grade 3-6 students today. The Grade 3-6 students and teachers will now vote to select the successful students to fill the positions for 2023. 

Next week, we will be selecting our School House Captains.

P-2 Creative Play Space

As part of our school ground development, a creative play space will be installed in the P-2 area of the yard. Justin Staggard has been engaged to design and build the space which should be ready early in the new year. As part of the process we wanted to capture what types of play space the students would like, so Justin has spent the day with our junior students probing and prompting them to think creatively to contribute to the design and layout. We look forward to sharing with you the design that Justin creates for the space.

Victorian Election

This weekend the DPS stadium will be hosting an electoral voting booth. The voting opens at 8am and closes at 6pm. Our Grade 6 parents and staff will be running a BBQ on the day and Greg will have the coffees flowing from the canteen window. Make sure you pop in and buy a snag and a cup of coffee if you are in or around the school on Saturday.

School Council

Our November meeting was held on Monday evening. At the meeting the following was discussed:

• The cash budget for 2023 was discussed and approved. Our thanks to Danielle McCann for all the work that has gone into this over the past few months.
• We discussed the parent payment documents for 2023 and identified strategies to help our parent body understand the new parent payment policy. Parent contributions in 2023 have fallen by almost 70% which means we will be required to think carefully about the programs we run in the future. 
• We discussed the ongoing projects that are currently underway within the school. These include the new fence, walking track, P-2 play space, heating for the stadium, the development of internal office space, tennis court upgrades and the updates to the school security camera system.
• We discussed the return of Scott Phillips as principal in 2023.
• Our child safe focus was on how we keep data safe within our school wide systems and how we are protected through the work of the Department of Education.
• Our NAPLAN data was discussed to identify the progress over the past few years.
• The disability inclusion funding model and how we are progressing with these moving into the new year.
• Our DASH report indicated planning for 2023 and the need to ensure our bus compliance work is kept up to date. 
• We looked at and ratified 3 policies: the Parent Payment policy, Sunsmart policy and Professional Practice Day policy.

Our final School Council for 2023 is a dinner on December 4 where we have the chance to say thankyou to our wonderful school council members.

Book Fair

It has been great seeing the number of students and their parents/carers attending the Book Fair so far this week. It is being held in the new portable which is great seeing this space being used. All funds raised goes back into the literacy resources for the school.

Energy Breakthrough

After spending time at the Energy Breakthrough last week, it has confirmed why this event is such a wonderful experience to be involved in. It is authentic, challenging and builds connections. It is these events that students, staff and parents will remember long into the future. It is just unfortunate, we cannot have more students involved. It was wonderful to see how the students engaged in the experience, representing the school to the highest of levels. A few highlights included:

• The way in which the program brings together students, parents and staff to work toward a common goal. It really was a team effort with everyone playing their part.
• The way in which schools adapted to the last minute change to camping arrangements. Some schools pulled out, but those who remained found a way (some very creative) to overcome the challenges.
• The way in which Delacombe, Buninyong and Maroona combined together to assist each other. This was even highlighted with an interview on stage with students from the schools sharing the stories of how they are helping each other to survive in the race.
• The way in which students forged strong friendships from DPS but also across other schools.
• Then there was the racing that saw all students showing patience, persistence and fabulous sporting behaviours.

A huge thank you to Phil, Miss Gerrard and Mr Toan who led the charge to get this event together. Thanks to the many parents and staff who came up to Maryborough over throughout the event to support the teams and thanks to everyone back at school who baked goodies, covered classes and generally supported the team. We look forward to 2023.

Junior Swimming

Our Prep students started their swimming program this week at Shayne Reece Swimming Centre. The students have been attending daily to develop their water awareness, water safety and some stroke development. Over the coming weeks, the Grade 1 and 2 students will also participate in their programs. Thanks to the staff and parents who are supporting this program.

Grade 3 Camp

This coming Monday the Grade 3 students and teachers are off to Log Cabin Lodge as the final camp for 2022. We were lucky enough to secure state funding for this camp through the Positive Starts Program. The students will spend Monday and Tuesday working on team building skills as part of their first school camping experience.