Principal's Message 

We began the year refreshed and with a renewed sense of optimism and vigour: our first start of year in a while that has been a return to 'business as usual'. We delighted in welcoming our new Year 7s, who have all now completed a full term at high school and and developing confidence each day. That energy has continued throughout school. As you will see in this newsletter, we've enjoyed a wide variety of school activities. This term we have run four Year 7 camps, 2 Outdoor Education camps and 1 Galileo camp, as well as our whole-school Swimming and Athletics Carnivals, inter-school sport competitions at the Division and Area level for all year levels, Clubs Expo, Cultural Day and a range of other co-curricular activities, excursions and incursions. In addition, NAPLAN testing was held this term (moved from the traditional May dates), and we have run our first round of Parent Student Teacher Conferences. A strong start! We are now, of course, in a significant spiritual time for many of our community: Ramadan Mubarak to our families in Ramadan; and Happy Easter to those who celebrate that holiday. 

School Council elections

We had a strong response from both candidates and voters in the recent School Council elections. Congratulations to the following members who have been elected to our Council:

Parent members: Tim Richter, Jeff Naqvi, Angela Buckingham, Meredith Pearce, Nina Altis (co-opted to casual vacancy)

Student member: Max Kelaher

School Employee members: Bruce Henry, Melissa Goodger

We are now seeking volunteers for our School Council Sub-Committees: Buildings and Grounds; Finance; Policy and Governance; Community Making and Engagement; and our Climate Action and Sustainability Working Group.  All are welcome in these groups - it's a great way of contributing your skills, knowledge and insights and of getting involved with our school. You can find more information and the sign-up form here 

Student achievement

UHS had two Class of 2022 students featured in the VCE Season of Excellence, which celebrates outstanding achievement in particular VCE studies. A warm congratulations Emile Feik  (Media Studies) and Daniel Wang (Extended Investigation). Daniel's investigation topic  What are the risks and returns of Memecoins?  was received with great interest by the audience at the Top Talks celebration. Meanwhile, Emile's film Earl Dreams of Apples can currently be seen both at ACMI cinema and at the VCE Top Designs exhibition at the Melbourne Museum. 

Connect - Self and Others 

This year we are piloting a significant initiative for University High School with the Connect - Self and Others program for all students in Years 7-12. Connect is a social and emotional learning program aimed at enhancing connection to school, peers, teachers and learning. This is an important step towards our Strategic Plan goals. The program includes lessons based on the Berry Street Education Model principles, the Rights, Resilience and Respectful Relationships curriculum, Wellbeing and Mindfulness, Careers Education and study skills and goal-setting activities. In 2023, Connect runs for all students for half an hour on a Monday, and we are actively seeking feedback from students and staff to ensure that we are best meeting students' needs in these sessions.

NAPLAN 2023

This year there was a change to the timing of the NAPLAN tests, being run in March (Term 1) rather than May (Term 2). This is a positive change for schools, as it means that we should receive the results by the second half of the year, in time to do some analysis and make any necessary interventions or adjustments with our existing Year 7 and 9 cohorts. 

We conducted 8 (4 per year level) cohort-wide test sessions and numerous catch-up sessions. Students completed 2310 tests in total covering Reading, Numeracy, Writing and Conventions of Language, which was a 96% completion rate over Years 7 & 9. 

NAPLAN has now transitioned to online testing. UHS ran the tests online for the first year last year, which operated quite smoothly. Unfortunately, this year we encountered many more technical difficulties, which was surprising as we were more prepared having learnt from last year. The challenges led us to cancelling and rescheduling one day of testing all together, and required intervention from the Department’s technician team to resolve. Our IT and organisational team worked very hard to sort out the issues and keep the tests running, and we have identified some actions for the future which we think should resolve the issues we experienced.  A big thank you to the students and staff who were patient, adaptable and persisted even through the difficulties.

Engaging with your child's learning

At the end of term we conducted the Parent Student Teacher Conferences, with a high demand for interviews across all year levels. I hope that you were able to have some positive and productive conversations with your child's teachers, and that your child was able to identify some goals for their learning in Term 2. 

This year we have also been working on an update to our Progress Reports. You may have noticed that this term, we published the 'Attitude and Effort' feedback and Student Goals (set by students themselves) prior to the 'Achievement' indicator. The purpose of this is to encourage reflection and discussions both at home and in the classroom around positive and productive learning behaviours, and how students might take steps towards their goals and progressing their learning. I encourage you to unpack this with your child, helping them to pinpoint specific things in each subject that are going well and that they would like to work on 

Later this year, we will also be piloting a revised 'Attitude and Effort'  rubric which will give more detailed and specific feedback around students' strengths and areas for improvement. 

If you have any questions or concerns about your child's learning progress, their sub-school coordinator is your first point of call. 

Facilities update

Works to refurbish the damaged Level 2 of the South Building commenced in January, and have been progressing well with the program on schedule at this stage. The refurbished space will replace the three lost Science Labs and three general-purpose classrooms. In addition, there will be some informal collaboration and work space for students, lockers and a new staffroom for our Science domain.  The works are projected to finish during Term 3: we will be looking forward to moving in to the spaces.

A range of other, smaller upgrades have been happening around the school as well, including painting and flooring in areas of the main building which occurred over the January holidays. Students will have noticed that the sub-school doors are now also painted in their respective colours! New student drinking taps will be installed over the Easter holidays, as well as some work on the student toilets. We have also been progressing on works to repair a structural issue in the Sharman Hall. 

Term 2

We return for Term 2 on Monday 24 April, which is a regular school day. Please note the ANZAC Day holiday on Tuesday 25 April (public holiday), then we are back again on Wednesday 26th. 

There will be some minor teacher and timetable changes to accommodate some staff leave and movement during the term. Students should check Compass just prior to Day 1 to see if there are any adjustments to their timetable. 

One change will be in the Assistant Principal team: Sue Prosenica (Curriculum & Pedagogy; Gulam support) will spend Term 2 in an Acting Principal position at the nearby Princes Hill SC. Liam Ahern will be acting in her role for the term. 

Enjoy the Term holidays, and we will look forward to seeing you all in Term 2.

Ciar Foster

Principal