Newsletter 24th October 2023
From the Principal
A warm welcome to our new families. We have much to celebrate such as our Cultural Festival and a special thanks to Bunnings for helping rebuild our gardens and the arrival of our new classrooms. Work will continue on the new rooms as they finish off decking, wiring etc. They will be ready for junior students next term.
This week the junior school are off to the Stardome and the senior school are learning cycle safety skills.
Sun Hats
These are compulsory in Term 4 and Term 1 for obvious reasons. Please ensure all hats are named clearly as often they are left on the field and playgrounds so we can unite the hat with the right student.
Education Review Office
Pakuranga School Profile Report
Te Ara Huarau is the evaluation approach that the Education Review Office (ERO) is using in our school. This is a developmental approach to evaluation where ERO and our school work together over time rather than one off reviews that happened previously. Te Ara Huarau is used in most English-medium state and state-integrated schools.
ERO maintains a regular review programme to evaluate and report on the education and care of young people in the schools. Our school worked alongside ERO to write our Profile Report. This type of report will only happen once as part of our initial engagement with Te Ara Huarau. The profile report reflects our strategic goals and a shared evaluation focus on one or more areas that are important to us as we work together to improve outcomes for all our learners. ERO, like us, has a strong focus on equity and excellence. Future reporting will show our progress and achievement towards meeting the goals we have set. Public reports like the Profile Report are published on ERO’s website.
In line with this ERO report our schools strategic goals for 2024 are:
Goal 1
Students learn, achieve and progress in the breadth and depth of the New Zealand Curriculum,
Goal 2
Assessment for Learning develops students’ assessment and learning to learn capabilities.
Goal 3
Students participate and learn in caring, collaborative, safe and inclusive learning communities.
Goal 4
Collective capacity to do and use evaluation, inquiry and knowledge building to sustain improvement and innovation.
Goal 5
Community collaborations enrich opportunities for students to become confident, connected, actively involved lifelong learners.
There is obviously significant detail how we will work towards achieving these goals which will be available on our website before the start of the 2024 school year.
Parking within the Barrier Arm Area
Parents from the Day Care and parents with the disability card have access via a code. If you are allowed in by the teacher on duty it is only because the bulk of the traffic has gone and it is safe to do so. Please do not tailgate other cars in. The barrier arm was installed as a response to requests from the council and police. Prior to this we had major traffic jams, and safety concerns.
Reminder - Disability Park Use
With an increasing numbers of permit holders please remember:
- Your disability permit can only be used by you
- Mobility parking permits are issued to a person, not a vehicle.
- The permit is used if the permit holder needs to get in or out of a vehicle.
- If the permit holder is going to stay in the car, the vehicle must be parked in a standard parking space. A permit can not be loaned to anyone, even if the person is running an errand for the permit holder. Permits can be cancelled if they are misused.
Thank you for helping us keep all children safe.
Fintan, Sue and Monique
Upcoming Teacher Only Day
A reminder that school will be closed for students on Friday 17th November. We will be holding a teacher only day for professional learning around the new curriculum with facilitators from the Ministry of Education coming in to support staff on this day.
Cultural Festival
It was a delight to celebrate the return of the PHS Cultural Fesival with bright blue skies and a warm evening on Thursday. A huge crowd gathered to picnic on the field and enjoy the hard work that has gone into preparing the night's entertainment. Students and teachers worked hard to put together a celebration of the many cultures we have within our school community.
A night like this doesn't come together without a number of thank yous to be made; classroom teachers, learning assistants, students, whanau thank you all for your efforts in making Thursday a truly memorable event. Thank you too to the PTA and your many helpers for ensuring everyone was well fed - those BBQs were working overtime! Finally, a special thank you to Mrs Claire Stretch for your extraordinary event planning skills, your organisational skills made it all run like clockwork.
Please click through the gallery below for just some of the photos taken on the night.
Bunnings Garden Makeover
In Week One of this term Pakuranga Heights were the lucky reciepents of a garden makeover sponsored by Bunnings through our involvement with the Garden to Table programme. Bunnings supplied not only the materials but also a lot of the labour with staff coming in to support the building and planting of 10 new garden beds over two days. A huge thank you to Bunnings for your support and to Miss Waters for your enthusiasm in pulling everything together.
Cycle Skills
Today and tomorrow our Year 5 students will be taken through a cycle safety skills course delivered by Nextbike NZ. This programme is funded for Year 5 students by Auckland Transport in conjunction with BikeReady. This is the second year of our involvement with the project and students enjoy the hands on learning no matter their skill level at the start of the day. We hope to be able to continue to provide this learning annually for students in Year 5.
Celebrating Excellence
HPPA Y5/6 Mathex Competition
In Week 2 Jai Matene, Micah Jeffery, Fotui Maile and Ava Hart represented Pakuranga Heights at the HPPA Year 5/6 Mathex Competition held at Sunnyhills School. 22 East Auckland schools participated in the competition and our team students enjoyed competing against them and having the opportunity to put their knowledge and problem solving skills to the test. Our students demonstrated great team work especially when speed and accuracy was required.
