Background Information

In early September this year schools across NZ will be voting for their school Board of Trustees (BOT) Members. Here at St Joseph's Catholic School we will have 5 parent positions available. Our BOT is made up of parents or community members who are passionate about their local school as well as the Proprietor’s and staff representatives.

What is Governance?

Governance has an important role to play within a school. The best way we like to describe governance is ‘hands around - not hands on’. We provide the guidance, support and oversight that allows Grant and his team to get on with the mahi.

What are the time commitments?

Guidance, support and oversight do take some time, it is not just turning up to the monthly meetings. Depending on what is happening within the school and the subcommittee of the board you may be a part of, your time commitment can be between 10-15 hours per month. This would include your reading and preparation time for board meetings, responding to emails between meetings and being available every now and then to support.

What skill sets do I need?

The number one skill set you need is a passion for our school, a want for our school to be doing well and a commitment to supporting Grant and the team that work hard for our tamariki.

Outside of this, your own expertise can be of value to support the mahi of the Board. This may be a wide range of backgrounds including property management, finance, human resource, employment and personnel, policy review and implementation, teaching, learning & pastoral care, business experience, diversity, Inclusion, whānau and cultural engagement etc. Please note, that these are not essential.

If I would like to know more, what should I do?

As a board, we would value the opportunity to invite members of our community who are interested in the BOT to join us over the next few meetings to understand how our board operates and works to support Grant and the team at St Joseph’s Catholic School.

If this is something that you would be interested in please make contact with either Pat Peoples the current Board Chair (or Presiding Members as it is now called) via email: patrick@schick.co.nz or Grant Stuart - St Joseph’s Catholic School Principal: g.stuart@stjosephs.school.nz and we can give you further information and when our scheduled meetings are.

Ngā manaakitanga

St Joseph’s Catholic School Board of Trustees.

Lunch time gymnastics will be held in term 3.

Registrations are open now on enrolmy

https://enrolmy.com/st-joseph-catholic-school-fairfield/book-now/74-Lunchtime-Gymnastics-Term-3

Hamilton City Council is committed to working with parents and schools to explore ways to reduce parking concerns when dropping off and picking up children.

Schools in Hamilton face recurring issues around poor parking and driver behaviour, particularly in the winter months, such as parents parking on footpaths, across broken yellow lines, in front of residents’ driveways and double parking.

“This creates an unsafe environment for children, as well as frustration and concern for the schools and the residents that are living next to them,” said Council’s School Travel Adviser Cam Ward.

“With school rolls increasing and many parents wanting to collect their children by car, especially during these colder and wetter months, traffic congestion is inevitable.

“The majority of parents make smart choices, however most schools experience issues with a handful of parents.”

Some helpful tips for school drop-off and pick-up include:

• Park further away, rather than right outside busy school gates.

• Plan to pick up your children on side roads or in safe pick-up areas nearby.

• Encourage the use of active transport (biking, walking, etc) for those children who live close to school.

• Encourage children to have rain jackets and umbrellas for their school commute.

• If you are collecting your children by car, consider arriving five minutes after the bell when more carparks should be available.

“If more families choose to adopt some of these parking behaviours around schools, it will really help ease the congestion issues we see outside of schools,” said Ward.

St Joseph’s Fairfield has opted into the government initiative to provide period products for students. This initiative aims to provide free period products to children and young people in all schools across New Zealand. Periods are a fact of life for half the population. Despite this, young people don’t always have access to the products they need to feel comfortable at school, engage in their learning, and manage what should be a normal and healthy part of life. If you want to know more, click here for a link to the Ministry of Education information.

At St Joseph’s, we have put in place a discreet delivery system so that girls can take home a monthly allocation of period products (two boxes per month). We know that some girls at this age might feel too shy to openly discuss period products with their peers or a staff member, so we want to make access easy and remove any embarrassment for them.

Click here for more information.

Each girl can fill in this Google Form which lets them select from various products.

admin@stjosephs.school.nz

There are lots of programmes and activities locally and across New Zealand on our Linku2 School Holidays website for the upcoming holidays. This website has some great ideas on holiday things to do and help support our local businesses.

We have listings for all regions of New Zealand but if you specifically wanted to link to Hamilton region you can do so by CLICKING HERE or for the whole of Waikato broken down into districts you can CLICK HERE.

July 18th - 22nd, 8-13yr olds, $525

OSCAR Available

We have an awesome week planned that includes rock climbing, archery, target shooting, bush walks, orienteering, team building and confidence activities.

A typical "Kiwi Outdoors" camp with an emphasis on mountain safety and bush survival skills.

Planned and run by local teacher Todd Burton and based at Aongatete Outdoor Education Centre, this one's going to be awesome!

Drop off / pick up Hamilton, Tauranga, or at the venue.

More info and to book now visit www.edventure.co.nz, phone 02102241576 or email mark@edventure.co.nz

See you on your next EDVENTURE