Principal's Patch

Dear Parents

A year ago, if you had asked any principal would these ‘unprecedented times’ settle and return to some sort of normality we would have been full of optimism. Unfortunately, this first term of 2022 has been like no other, even compared to what has now occurred for two years. In fact, this term has been more emotionally exhausting for school leaders than ever before (& staff and parents)! 

On reflection of the term we have just lived through, the challenges behind the scenes of the normal school day have been immense and full of challenges and frustrations. These have been caused by the late start to the school year, floods, Covid & general Covid compliance, teaching staff & cleaner shortages, the complexities of rearranging the curriculum and school events (again) and of course attempting to maintain our usual school business. It is truly like nothing I have ever experienced in my forty years of working for Education Queensland. As school leaders we have been working hours and hours over what we normally do (which is usually a 50-60hr week) including weekends and holidays, and our PBSS deputy principals have been spending up to four-five hours a day, including on weekends, sourcing relief staff, rearranging timetables, playground duties and other flow on effects that take away from their usual focus areas to improve student outcomes. At times it is overwhelming. The decision fatigue is real.

It is the very nature of being an educator to want the best for students, the school community and others in the workplace. Due to the dedication of our staff and our positive school culture, our core business of teaching and learning has continued to meet the high expectations we set for ourselves here at PBSS thanks to staff adaptability and resilience. 

As parents, a sincere thank you to those of you that have recognised and understood all of the complexities above and fully supported the school and staff in all that has evolved and continues to do so on a daily basis😊 You have no idea how much it has been appreciated! Let’s ‘hope’ for a more regular term two. 

Thank You from the Children in Northern NSW

Our school community is one to be very proud of, and this was very evident when we organised the Pal Packs for the children effected by the floods. We received approximately 250 bags full of wonderful and basic items to assist these children. We calculated that each bag full of goodies cost approximately $100 (or more), so we raised about $25,000 through this effort! 

The day was bookended by pure soul filling moments. It began in the most delightful way listening to our PBSS students voice their inner thoughts about how great they felt donating to such a cause. It was completed by the tears of happiness the principal of Murwillumbah East shed with us when Tyson, Megan and I called in to their school to drop off many of the bags. I hope you had the opportunity to read a few of the thank you messages we placed on our PBSS Facebook page. The bags went to Woodburn, Coraki, Condong and Murwillumbah East school communities. 

Learning Centre Update

At this stage, handover for the new building will be on Friday, 6th May. Obviously due to weather delays and building supply shortages this continues to change, but hopefully it will be this date or very close to it. We will move Prep P and the Year 4, 5 and 6 classes in from 6th May and over the following weeks. As Naplan and the Year 6 camp are also on the week starting the 9th May the day classes actually moving in will vary. You will be notified by your child’s class teacher when their move is complete and they have taken up residence in our spectacular new classrooms! Most of the new furniture (valued at $200,000) will be delivered over the two days of 26th and 27th April, so this will all be sorted and ready for the students when the final handover is complete. 

The Department are allowing handover of the project in parts due to the complex sections – the new building itself consisting of the 16 new classrooms and office spaces, Townson Ave staff carpark, our re-established school garden, the Lind/Townson Ave carpark & new bike racks, the new long jump pit, the oval resurfacing and the new sports/grounds shed and carpark. These will be handed over to the school at various times throughout term two.

Parking, Pick-up and Parent Behaviour – Are you modelling acceptable behaviours to our young PBSS students?

To be totally candid, in every school, pick up time is dreadful and as hard as it may be for you to believe, when compared to other schools PBSS pick up is quite good due to multiple gates, and the suitability of active travel (bikes, walking etc) that our local area provides. Unfortunately, we regularly receive complaints from other parents and the local community about poor parent behaviour at this time of day. This includes foul language, obscenities, various levels of road rage and not following parking regulations. Recently the GCCC have issued many fines to parents after taking photos of ‘illegal’ parking … please be warned when you next park! This includes waiting on any yellow lines marked on the streets surrounding the school, even on the yellow lines in the Kiss & Go queue close to the traffic lights. I have spoken at length with council about the problem near the lights with the yellow lines, but to no avail.

I wish to share a section of a letter I received from a local resident last week for you to reflect on: 

I have been a resident of 19th Avenue for nearly 48 years and have seen the street grow from a gravel road to the busy street it is today, and nice to see the suburb grow... I can understand parent frustration at not being able to get a park, just as we residents are frustrated that we cannot gain access to our properties.

This past month myself & neighbours have put up with some very rude people when we ask them nicely to clear our driveways so we have access, sometimes locking their cars and walking away for up to 15 minutes (we don’t need this). I am today writing to ask for parents or person’s collecting children from the school to show some respect to the local residents and not park across our driveways or in places which causes the traffic to block up in the street.

Thank you for your cooperation in working together to improve this. Early next term, when everyone is fresh we will reiterate the Kiss & Go rules and etiquette expected by parents to make this as hassle free as possible. 

Prep 2023 Enrolments Due Now

Please read the Deputy Principal page of this newsletter for further information.

Cross Country Cancelled Thursday 31st March

Sadly, yet again we have been forced to reschedule a school event. The Cross Country will now be on Wednesday 20th April. 

Holidays

From all of us to all of you, I hope the next two weeks provide you all with some quality time with family and friends to relax, laugh and reboot. May we all hope for sunny weather, to be well and free to be out & about, and to spend time reconnecting through special times with the special people in our lives 😊.

Kind regards

Sandy Thompson