Dear Parents/Carers

With comedy night just around the corner I thought I’d start with a joke… Why is six afraid of seven? Because seven ATE nine!! 

You will have picked up my notification sent on Monday regarding your child’s class placement for 2023. Again, I encourage you to email through any preference you have for your child in terms of class placement. These thoughts should be based around your child’s learning needs and are not driven by their friendships – the children will, as always, be given the chance to voice who they want to be placed with. 

Any submissions should be made as soon as possible. It is important to note at this point that we do try to honour most requests but there are no guarantees, and I cannot place all students by parent request. 

I am able at this stage to share our school structure for 2023. The school structure is developed with substantial consultation across the teaching and non teaching staff at Parkhill through our Consultative Committee. Consideration is given to many factors including cohort make up, parent feedback and student numbers. 

Next year we plan to run the following classes:

Our Koori Ambassadors have been busy planning for our next event, they are working with Desiree Schlack who has taken on the role in Bella’s absence. Thanks Des for taking this on.

It was great to see that school communication had such a positive response in our recent Parent Survey. I would like to remind you that our policy states that teachers will respond to emails within 48 hours. If you are trying to contact your class teacher during the hours of 8:30 and 4pm you will need to send that correspondence through the office at parkhill.ps@education.vic.gov.au. Our teachers are generally with children, or preparing for class between these times, and will not be actively checking emails during the day. Anything urgent should always include the office. 

I would like to thank Dan Edwards, our School Council President, for the work he has done pulling together an election lobby group. The group has developed a letter outlining our next projects to send through to our local political parties. Check out his section below. 

Lastly I would like to remind you about signing in. It is amazing to have so many parent helpers in and around school on a daily basis – it really is wonderful to have our parents back onsite again! If you are helping out at school, please remember to sign in. This includes reading support, garden, incursions and excursions.

SOCIAL MEDIA

It’s concerning that many of our students as young as Y3 are actively engaging in social media practices. I wonder how many parents are aware of their child’s online activities and how many platforms they are accessing. Many children in our upper school are known to have a variety of accounts. 

I ask you to have a check of your child’s device – consider how often you check their device history and your awareness of what they are doing online. We hear lots about online safety and how to help our children access the online world safely. 

There are many places you can find information about platforms and recommended ages to signup as well as guidelines for parents to help support their children. Online activity is something that is monitored at home but has a huge impact on the playground at school. 

https://www.esafety.gov.au/parents/skills-advice/are-they-old-enough

Have a super weekend.

Best wishes,

Elaine Mitskinis

Principal