A message from our School Council

Hi everyone, my name is Lucy Sinclair and I’m the new Vice President of the School Council. I like to think of myself as your Salina Meyer (VEEP)! I’ve got girl/boy twins (Everly and Harvey) in grade one and I’m excited to be on the council this year. 

It’s my turn to report on the last school council meeting (26 July) for the school newsletter.

We covered a lot in the last meeting as we took part in mandatory Child Safety training, which was interesting as it not only covered off the usual safety training but addressed a large component on online child safety standards. It also touched on the importance of all visitors needing to sign in. If you’re visiting the school - it’s vital that you sign in at the office. This includes all grandparents, friends, carers and family members. If there is an incident at the school, the office needs to know exactly who is on school grounds at all times. 

Council approved the Grade 1/2 camp risk assessments. The overnight camp at Mt Evelyn (9 - 10 October) looks super fun!

NPS is getting a new bike shed! We approved and endorsed funds raised from the 2023 fete for the bike shed. The shed will have racks for 32 bikes and 20 scooters. The below renders of the proposed bike shed where done by James from B2 Architects (full disclosure – James is my husband!). More renders are available on the NPS Facebook page. The environment committee is now seeking three quotes to build the bike shed. These will be brought to the school council for approval in the next few months. Watch this space!

Next up, the Council discussed Code Camp as an alternative after school and holiday program. Code Camp offers a range of STEAM, coding, animation and Minecraft engineering – teaching kids to get creative with technology. We hope to bring more news about this later in the year.

The school is getting 12 new smartboards. We approved funds to purchase 12 HDI LED interactive screens to be used in classrooms. Thanks to the school’s ICT team for putting in the work to research and source quotes. 

Teachers fundraising wish list. Thanks to our wonderful teachers for putting together a wish list for our fundraising goals. This list, combined with areas identified over the years for improving the school grounds has been extremely helpful for what we’re raising money towards. 

SAVE the DATES

Trivia Night is now locked in on Thursday 26 October at Welcome to Thornbury. Start doing the Good Weekends Quiz. Funds raised from the trivia night will go towards the grade 5/6 wish list for new recording equipment. The 5/6's are hoping to get cameras, microphones, greenscreen and studio equipment to support their digital technology learning.

We were pretty stoked to hear that Parents Battle of the Bands raised $3000! This will go towards instruments for our new music program.

The next school Working Bee is happening on Saturday 26 August – please mark this in your calendar.

‘arts n craft’ and social events The school council and subcommittees have big ideas for our beautiful school, but we need your help! We can’t do it on our own. If you want to make our amazing school even better, please put your hand up and email us – lucycsinclair@hotmail.com or joanne.pitt@hotmail.co.uk. It would be great to have a parent from grades 3/4 😊

Jo is exploring options to create an N sculpture featuring a mural at the front of the school. Ideas so far with Amy (art teacher) have been students decorating tiles on the N. If you’re in the carpentry/building/sculpture space or a budding handyperson – please get in touch with Jo. 

Are you a knitter or a crocheter? We’ve been discussing ideas of Yarn bombing the Friendship Tree! We’d love to explore this idea further as a lunch time club. Please reach out to Jo.

NPS Parent Movie Night – thanks to the great bunch of parents who came to the movies on Tuesday to see the latest Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning movie. Tom Cruise hasn’t aged, even when jumping from a motor bike off a cliff! 

Thanks for reading, 

Lucy 

Artist impression north side of bike shed 

Artist impression inside the bike shed