Dear Families,

What a wonderful way to start the day, enjoying the warm sun on our faces and welcoming in more and more students.  Today we start the return of classes from Year 3 to 6 so it feels like we are so close to being back to normal.  Unfortunately we hear of other local schools being closed and we hope that the systems we have in place we reduce the impact of having to have a school closure forced upon us.  Families, sporting clubs, business and industry have many things to deal with and schools are no different.  As a school and personally I have had many obligations handed to me that I have minimal and no choice over which can be overwhelming and time consuming.  Can I thank those in our community who continue to reach out and offer even the simplest of positive feedback and gratitude.  It is really appreciated.

With our return to onsite learning the staff are looking forward to taking advantage of this term to put in place an exciting few months of engaging opportunities and to drive learning across the curriculum.  We will be heavily focused on the 3R's as we always should but also working within the guidelines to continue to look for moments of joy.  We will probably be on the lookout for people to help us out deliver these things and at the moment site visitors and contractors look like needing the follow the same guidelines as staff (eg.masks, vaccinations).  Fingers crossed we keep hitting the various milestones that drive  the relaxations of the various restrictions in place.

Throughout the year we have put in place various learning interventions across all year levels.  We are thrilled to announce that we have been able to secure funding to add further staffing this term to help support students and staff across the school.  Mr.Jed Foenander has started work this week and he may be familiar to some families as he completed some teaching placements at Lumen Christi as well as worked as a casual LSO until he graduated as a teacher in 2020.  Jed is a local lad who spent time as a teacher in Sydney this year until interrupted by COVID and he has landed back in the Latrobe Valley.  We are thrilled that this sliding door moment appeared and we were able to secure Jed so are able to put further support around our students as we try to take advantage of onsite learning this term.  Welcome Jed!

Finally, our school song WE SHINE has a lyric that over the years I have highlighted - I may have even sadly got the students almost chanting it like yellow-n-black!  The song asks us to BUILD THE KINGDOM just as Jesus challenges us to do in the Gospel.  Being a kingdom-builder requires us all to contribute to the place and people around us, acting fairly and loving tenderly.  How great it is to welcome our little kingdom-builders back onsite ..... we are so glad to have you back filling our classroom and playground with joyful noise.

Have a great week.

Take care, Dave

ONSITE VISITORS: Currently the only people allowed onsite are staff, students and required trades/contractors.  This reduces the risk of transmission which hopefully reduces the chances of the school site being closed due to us becoming an exposure site.  the reception area is staffed but our preference is for only limited access to this area.  We direct parents to call or email staff as required.  The classroom teachers are generally floating around the yard before and after school so can do quick, social-distanced chats then.  Parents are reminded of the request not to gather at entry/exit points and to wear face masks while around others at the school, especially in those busy dismissal times.  Can I thank everyone for the way they seem to be supporting these guidelines - I think the fear around having to go back homeschooling is a good motivating force!

EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT: If the school is notified that we have or have had a COVID-19 positive case on site we will directed by authorities to commence our Emergency Management protocols.  We have had a few reasons to do this over the recent times with floods and fires.  All communication will come initially via Schoolzine emails and app alerts, social media is a secondary source of information and is generally used to notify families that an important email/alert has been sent.  The school website also has an Emergency Management menu which will be a resource page for information.  It is a timely reminder to make sure all families have their SIMON/PAM accounts working and that we have accurate details eg.mobile phone numbers.  In the case that the school needs to close during a day the same procedure will be followed so we ask parents to think about what you would do if you were notified that the school was closing immediately and you needed to collect your child/ren.

REMOTE LEARNING IF THE SCHOOL SITE IS CLOSED: If we are directed to close that Remote Learning would shift to only being available by providing the Learning Portal on Google Classroom, if uncertainty around the availability of staff to conduct Google Meets.  It would be highly unlikely that we would be able to distribute devices.  In this scenario we would not have any staff onsite so the Office would not be staffed nor would we offer onsite supervision.  Hopefully we do not have to deal with this but it is important for families to consider what they would do in these situations.

SCHOOL EVENTS: At this stage we are extremely limited to what events we can conduct and almost our whole calendar of events is paused.  We continue to plan and complete the organisation of these events (eg.camps and swimming) even though we can not conduct them under the current rules. Once we are reopened fully I think we have to deal with a range of issues not limited to; enforcing density limits and only vaccinated persons being allowed onsite.  We continue to receive sensible advice from DOSCEL around how we meet the directives issued by government.

MASK WEARING IN SCHOOLS: The most current information from the Victorian Government can be found here.  Attached is a letter to school families as supplied by DOSCEL.

#Current information as at: 11/10/21 11.15pm

In Week 4 the Years 3 to 6 begin fulltime on TUESDAY.  The decision to commence fulltime on the Tuesday is a directive of the Victorian Government.

During Term 3 and 4, the children have been learning about protective behaviours using the WA Child Protection Program called, ‘Holding Hands’.  As part of our Child Safety theme, we thought we’d reflect on the life of Daniel Morocombe by honouring Daniel on Friday, October 29th. Each class will participate in a whole school simultaneous video viewing, which will remind them of the importance of  Child Safety and the right to feel safe.  On this day, we will teach children to recognise, react & report any harmful/unsafe situations and use their 5 network support people if needed. 

Child Safety Day for Daniel Objectives:

• To raise awareness about Child Safety 

• To educate children regarding their personal safety and empower them to recognise, react and report any unsafe situations.

• To honour the memory of unsafe scenarios such as that of Daniel Morocombe 

On Friday, October 29th at 11:15am - each class will watch this video then make red hearts and pin them onto their tops to remember Daniel and  our theme focus of ‘keeping kids safe’, and ‘Every child has the right to feel safe all of the time’.

Mental Health & Crisis Support website links