Dear Parents/Carers

Welcome back to Term 4! Although we have experienced quite a bit of wet and windy weather and not many warm spring days, hopefully that will change very soon. This term always seems to ‘fly by’, particularly for our Year 10 students. As we return from a break, it is valued if parents and carers support their child(ren) in re-establishing an effective daily routine for school, just like staff at school need to remind students of our expectations and positive habits here at school.  Constructive habits, good routines and clarity about ‘the rules’ helps reduce the cognitive load on young people and the certainty helps them be better prepared for learning and to regulate their behaviour.

As mentioned at the end of last term, over the holiday break we commenced the cabling work for our new electronic scoreboard for our oval. Unfortunately, due to the wet ground over the break, this will take a little longer that initially planned. Nevertheless, it is an exciting project for our school and should result in a great asset when finalised. Similarly, as part of the Department for Education, Children and Young People’s Renewable Energy Program, our school has had a significant array of solar panels installed on the northern roof of C Block. This will hopefully reduce our energy consumption moving forward in an environmentally friendly manner.

On the last Monday of Term 3, I had the pleasure of hosting Jess Teesdale MP who is the Federal Member for Bass. It was wonderful that Jess could find some time in her schedule to visit our school. Being an ex-teacher, she was certainly able to interact effectively and ask good questions of our students and staff. It was wonderful to share with her many aspects of our great school and to discuss ideas together. Thank you to Jess for visiting Kings Meadows High School.

Today we have students visiting the Launceston Airport as part of our partnership with Beacon and this Thursday and Friday our junior students are involved in the Touch Football tournament. Students applying for Beacon Ambassador leadership positions have also been engaged in interviews as part of the selection process. Recently, we have also conducted a series of excursions to Launceston Toyota in Kings Meadows for interested students across all grades. This opportunity exposes them to this industry and the range of different careers available. Thank you to teacher, Maddy Pearce for facilitating these valuable experiences for our students.

Last Saturday afternoon and evening we hosted the Tasmania Institute of Sport (TIS) MasterChef Challenge whereby some of their athletes had to work in teams to design and prepare a meal focussed on nutrition recovery.  Thank you to one of our Food Technology teachers, Todd Nankervis, for supporting our visitors from the TIS with this event. I hope the team from the TIS found the experience worthwhile and our great facilities supported their event effectively.

As you can probably see from the information in the paragraphs above, at our school we very much value seeking and creating meaningful partnerships with our broader community as a means of connecting and contributing to our community but also in the hope it provides opportunities for our students and school in general.

This week, students from every year group commenced PAT testing. PAT stands for Progressive Achievement Testing and is another compulsory set of testing that we are required to undertake. Nevertheless, these tests provide us with a meaningful set of time series data that we can use effectively to support teaching and learning at the individual, class, grade and whole school level. As with any tests, it is not the ‘be all and end all’ and students should not be unnecessarily stressed by undertaking these tasks. However, as with any work students do, they should endeavour to fully engage and give their best effort.

Next week we have our annual Athletics Carnival commencing on Tuesday, 28 October here at school (noting it was originally planned for Wednesday, 29 October) and Thursday, 30 October at St Leonards.

Friday, 31 October is a Professional Learning Day, so students are not required at school on that day. This leads into the long weekend as Monday, 3 November is the Recreation Day public holiday. I hope everyone finds some time to undertake recreational activities that they enjoy over the short break.

Regards,

Cary Stocks
Principal