Dear Parent and Caregivers,

PARENT TEACHER INTERVIEWS

Thank you to those families who booked and attended parent teacher interviews last night. Again, it was lovely to see the partnerships and positive conversations happening in the EPAC around student learning and how best to support our learners moving forward this semester. If you missed an interview and would still like to meet with your child’s classroom teacher, please contact the office or your child’s teacher via email to find a mutually convenient time. Our bookings were certainly close to capacity, which is testament to our supportive and caring community and the value we place on educating our young ones and supporting them to be the best they can possibly be.

CITY DISTRICT TRACK AND FIELD TRIALS

Congratulations to all of our Athletics team who represented our school at the City District Track and Field Trials last week over two days, with some pleasing results. Congratulations to Ashton, Chelsea and Alexia who placed in their events and have been selected to go on to the Metropolitan North Trials shortly. Ashton won his 100m and 200m events, Chelsea won her Shot Put event and Alexis placed 3^rd in the High Jump event. We look forward to following their progress at the next level. 

We were also notified yesterday that we have placed 3^rd in the Small Schools Competition at the carnival which means the number of placings/points we received compared to the size of our school is a fantastic effort also.

Thank you to Mr Woodrick for all of his organisation in selecting and nominating our team and then managing our team on the day. Thanks also to Mrs Fitzpatrick who attended the carnival as our representative official.

EXCURSIONS

This term we have many exciting excursions and activities planned. These include:

• Yr 3 excursion to the Nudgee Beach Environmental Education Centre on 15/8
• Yr 2 excursion to Lone Pine on 21/8
• Wakakirri team travelling to the perform at Logan Entertainment Centre on 24/8
• Maths Tournament team travelling to Albany Hills SS for their competition on 28/8
• Yr 5/6 students attending the Volley Ball Cup at Craigslea SHS on 31/8
• Yr 4 excursion to Everton Park SHS for the MADD Day on 7/9
• Our winning Reader’s Cup team travelling to the STATE Finals at Morteon Bay College on 7/9
• Prep excursion to Nudgee Beach Environmental Education Centre 14/9

With all of these excursions happening this term on top of some other incursions and all of them requiring permissions and some payments, I encourage parents to stay informed and to meet deadlines for permissions and payments. If activities have a payment required, the payment and permissions need to be submitted to the administration office and if the consent is just a permission with no payment these forms need to be handed to classrom teachers. 

MULTI-PURPOSE ROOF

We are still patiently awaiting the safety certification and council approvals to enable the hand-over of the multi-purpose court. 

CAMP AUSTRALIA OSHC

I openly acknowledge that the changeover of OSHC providers at our school from YMCA to Camp Australia has not been smooth, based on the many complaints and concerns that have been raised by school staff and parents, with both Camp Australia and myself. I have continued to follow these up at the highest level and feel now that we have been listened to as we have held the company to account, based on the winning tender they submitted.

We have recently been in high level talks with Camp Australia's General Managers and Sales Managers from Sydney and Melbourne to work though the concerns and complaints. These managers have flown up to view the service and to meet with me for these talks. We have discussed the actions required to turn things around and have created an action plan to be implemented. I feel more secure now that they have employed a Service Director (Tina), who is out of ratio, to deal with incidents and build relationships, as well as coach new staff. In addition to this role, they have the current Service Co-ordinator (Julie) who is in ratio and also another Service Manager (currently being recruited- in ratio).

They have implemented compulsory training for all of the staff at the service and are working hard to ensure more consistency of staff and less reliance on agency temps, to assist with more consistent supervision for our students. They have listened to our concerns and have reviewed processes and procedures and we have been supporting them to implement improved processes to ensure the safety of our students. I believe that as these new processes are implemented and with the additional staffing that things will settle down and the community trust in the service will rebuild, we will once again have an OSHC service that we work well with and can rely on to provide exemplary service to our ESS families.

FULL SCHOOL REVIEW

This fortnight I would like to share the last of our key affirmations from our Full School Review conducted at the end of Term One, before I profile the improvement strategies recommended by the review team, in the next newsletter. These affirmations are listed in the Executive Summary available on our school website which informs our Quadrennial School Review.

Students enjoy a range of learning opportunities to develop skills in areas of interest.

The school promotes the Arts through its instrumental music, strings, band, junior and senior choir, dance and drama, including highly regarded Wakakirri performances. Students are offered the opportunity to participate in many co-curricular clubs as part of lunchtime activities arranged by staff and supported by parents. Parents are appreciative of the wide range of learning opportunities and experiences offered, particularly in cultural pursuits. Students express appreciation for the time staff take to provide them with these learning experiences.

Again, this was wonderful to have affirmed for our school staff and is very positive feedback.

CHANGES TO EDUCATIONAL REGION STRUCTURE IN QLD

As you may have heard on the news this semester there were changes made to educational regional structure with the Department of Education.  Whilst we were in the Metropolitan Region previously, we are now in the new Metropolitan North Region, which takes in all schools south of the Brisbane River right up to the South Sunshine Coast area.   With this we have a new Regional Director and we also have a new School Supervisor.  Previously we were supervised by an Assistant Regional Director but this role and supervision and support structure has also changed under the DoE’s new strategic direction ‘Equity and Excellence’. Our new School Supervisor is Mr Evan Willis and he will be visiting our school for the first time on Monday, August 14 to meet with myself and school leadership team. Below is the link to the DoE’s new Strategic Plan 2023-2027.

https://qed.qld.gov.au/our-publications/strategiesandplans/Documents/strategic-plan-23-27.pdf

STAFFING

• Next week I will be on Long Service Leave to attend my eldest daughter’s wedding in NSW. Mrs Tina Burrows will be the Acting Principal in my absence.
• Miss Ellie Mastrapostolos has been extended as the temporary Business Manager at ESS until January 16, 2024 behind Mrs Leanne Haslam, who has been extended at Eatons Hill SS. It is anticipated that these positions will become permanent at that point.

Till next time,

Mrs Anne Robinson

Principal