Tēna Koutou Katoa, welcome everyone to the start of a new year. We hope that you all had a lovely Christmas and a happy and healthy start to 2023. We are excited to be entering a new year with you all. We think of our Auckland schools and all those in upper North Island at this time. Please keep them in your thoughts and prayers and here's hoping the sun shines brightly for them soon.
We are sending this newsletter out today as we wanted our new families to be able to access this and we are truly blessed to have so many new ones join our school family. We say...
WELCOME, NAU MAI HAERE MAI to the following amazing children/tamariki and their families/whanau who are joining our school/kura...
STAFF AND CLASSROOMS 2023
Over the holidays there have been some minor changes to our staffing - please see below the latest update for our school. We are blessed by the calibre and commitment of our all our team here.
- Michael Anderson - Deputy Principal CL50, Year 5/6 - Room 8
- Corina Cheetham - Teacher, Monday-Thursday Year 1/2 - Room 3 / Mrs Cheetham has also been accepted into the Reading Recovery training programme. She will be teaching this programme from 9-11 every morning.
- Kendyl Clark - Part time teacher working in all classrooms
- Anna Davis - Part time teacher (.5) - Room 6 (Year 4/5)
- Caroline Gilligan - Principal/teacher - Room 6 (part time)
- Dave Lloyd - Our amazing school caretaker
- Kathy McKenzie - Our amazing school cleaner
- Julie Moor - Scale A Teacher - Room 4 Year 2/3
- Colette O’Connor - Part time teacher - Room 1/2
- Davinia O’Callaghan - Maternity Leave for 2023
- Helena Pedley - Director of Religious Studies (DRS) Year 3/4 - Room 5
- Louise Sheehan -Teacher support - Room 3/Teacher Aide
- Frayne Smith - Teacher Aide, our Māori leader
- Jemma Smith Teacher - Room 1 (Year 0/1)
- Claire Warren - we welcome Claire to the school as a part time teacher Year 1/2 Room 3 (Friday)
- Karen Worsley - Office Manager - your wonderful first contact in the office
Over the next week, we will be getting HERO and Seesaw up and running again for the year. These will be our main communication pathways this year. We will send out instructions to our new families on how to set these up within the next week.
UNIFORM
We continue to gently phase in our new school uniform as we have over the last year. The children all look amazing in it.
We have a summer uniform (short sleeved polo top/shorts/skort) for Term 1 and 4 with our winter uniform items (long sleeved polo tops/long navy pants) over Term 2 and 3 - if you decide to purchase the winter uniform items. There is a PE uniform that is worn for sports activities.
BUILDING UPDATES
We thank Chris, Luke and his team for their help in getting our basketball hoop up and running for the new school year - it looks sensational and will be absolutely enjoyed by all our children.
Over the holidays we have had Craig and his painting team working extremely hard in our school/kura. You can see this with the front of the Admin block, inside our court yard and the main library. We also thank Awesome Art for all the work they are doing for us.
We have put up new blinds in the newer part of the school and office area.
David, our caretaker has been very busy, painting the back fence, and the caretakers shed.
A large tree was cut down by the end of the Resource room as it was leaning too close to the end classroom and sadly we lost one of our big trees out the front.
We are also upgrading the carpet in the admin area, the staffroom, the concrete areas/drainage around the back as well as the windows in the library.
We will keep you posted on this.
**SCHOOL EVENTS TO MARK IN YOUR CALENDAR**
On Sunday February 12th we have our Feast Day, Our Lady of Lourdes mass. This is a lovely time when the parish and school come together. Following the 9.30am mass the school pool and the school will be open for the next hour. We ask that everyone brings a plate for a shared morning tea for this special day.
THURSDAY 16th FEBRUARY - GOAL SETTING EVENING: 3.15-7.15pm
We would love the opportunity to work alongside you as we set our Term 1 goals with you and your child. These will be 10 minute catch ups with you and your child's teacher which you can book online at the end of this week/early next week. We are working with our SCHOOLAPPS to do this.
Further information will be coming out later in the week to share the link with you to book your appointment with your child's teacher. We will be in touch.
MAJOR FUNDRAISING EFFORT FOR TERM ONE
Some of you may be aware that our much loved senior playground/fort is in need of a major rebuild. We are working with the Board and the Diocese to see what we can do. We are looking at a Cookie Time fundraiser in the first four weeks of this term with a Pie Drive in the second half. We will keep you in the loop as we move forward with this. We appreciate all your support in all that we are striving to do to improve our school.
Abundant blessings to you all for the term ahead. It's going to be a fabulous one.
The OLOL Team
