Newsletter No. 10, 17 June 2022

Kia ora rā koe,

An extra special haere mai to Isla and AJ VdS who joined us at Sumner School recently.

I hope you are all well and that you are managing to avoid the winter bugs that are in circulation at the moment. Huge thanks to you all for all you are doing to keep these germs away from school so that we can continue to keep school and programmes running as usual. We don’t take this for granted and really appreciate your support with this. As a result of your continued support we are seeing that our overall absences from schools related to sickness are continuing to trend downwards with roughly half the number of absences we had a couple of weeks ago, which is amazing!

Earlier today our Awaroa (Years 7 and 8) ākonga had the opportunity to share their learning with their parents at assembly. It was fantastic to see so many students up on stage, proudly sharing their learning. I was again reminded how lucky our children are with the opportunities they are given, especially while they have also had to navigate pandemic restrictions. Huge thanks as always to the generosity of our parents who volunteer their time to support learning programmes and run sports teams so that we can continue to provide these experiences for our children. Make sure you take the opportunity to have a Sneak Peek with our Media Team so that you can see all that the school has been up to over the last fortnight.

Spotlight on Te Aratai… Earlier this week I had the opportunity to attend the official opening of Te Aratai (formally Linwood College). For those that don’t know this school it has been completely rebuilt with some amazing new facilities on offer for the students who live within the Zone. The opening was a great opportunity to see snippets of the school in action and the talented young people who attend this school. I was particularly impressed with the quality of musicians who performed at the event and the Student Leaders who spoke about their school with such pride and enthusiasm. Another highlight for me was listening to Jacinda Ardern talk to these students about ensuring they utilise all the support and experiences made available to them during their high school years. If you have the chance I would urge you to go and have a look around Te Aratai.

Spotlight on fundraising… Next Wednesday the PTA will be hosting their ‘Pre-loved Clothing Sale’ from 5-8pm in the Hall Foyer. Please come along and support this event - I am sure there will be many a bargain to be found and all money raised will go towards the purchasing of resources for our structured literacy approach, including decodable texts across the school for those students who need them.

Another way that you are able to support our school is through the payment of the School Donation. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, as a Decile 10 school we receive the lowest amount of funding from the Government, which limits the curriculum and learning opportunities, including additional support that we are able to provide for our children. Therefore, this year we are again requesting a voluntary donation from you to help us provide the very best learning experiences possible for our children.

The donations that we receive make a huge difference to the learning opportunities and experiences that we can provide for our students. A large amount of your donations go towards enabling us to provide increased learning support for our students in the form of additional adults working within our learning spaces. These additional adults positively affect the learning of all of our students because more adults means more focused support for our learners. This donation has been added to your child’s account on Hero and if you are able to, we would greatly appreciate your payment of these. A reminder that donations are tax deductible, so please ensure you request a receipt on HERO to look into claiming this tax back.

Spotlight on our fabulous Support Staff… Last week was National Support Staff Week and so this is a great opportunity to say THANK YOU to our Learning Support Team. We are so incredibly lucky at Sumner School to have such an amazing bunch that we get to work with everyday! They are without a doubt the ‘super glue’ that keeps us all together! Deb, Sue, Yvonne, Mel, Annah, Anna, Kerri, Breda and (our new Caretaker) Craig - thank you so much for all that you do to support our staff, students and families at Sumner School!

And finally… Next week (Friday 24 June) is the first-ever Matariki public holiday. Matariki is traditionally a very special time in the Māori calendar as it signals the Māori New Year. The appearance of Matariki stars is a time of remembrance, joy and peace. It is also time for communities and whānau to come together, share kai and celebrate new beginnings. We look forward to celebrating Matariki with you all in a special community evening on the Thursday 30 June (see information below).

Have a wonderful weekend - stay warm!

Ngā mihi,

Anna Granger

Hagley Winter Sports

On Friday 10 June, three teams headed away to compete in the Hagley Winter Weekly Sports event. All of the students involved were super keen to get to their venues for their first game of the season. A huge thank you to all of the parents who are involved in this event, transporting to and from the venues each week. Students arrived back to school just before the 3 o’clock bell, super excited about their efforts. Congratulations to all of the teams for their outstanding results.

On the 15 June Sumner School had two Te Onepoto students attend the Gymnastic event being held at the Christchurch School of Gymnastics. Vinnie entered into the National Competitive Grade and Jenna entered into the recreation and regional competitive event. It was a great day for both of these students and well done to both of them for their determination and perseverance in this sport. Congratulations to Vinnie who placed 2nd on floor, 4th on vault and 6th overall.

Firstly, thanks so much to those of you who have been making rubbish lunch free boxes.

Keep it up.

Weeding at Sumnervale

Over the last 3 years, Year 3 and 4 students have been involved with planting and weeding at Sumnervale (opposite the playground, just by those cheeky horses). Although the rangers are no longer involved in this project it would be great if our community could continue to care for this area. If you have a chance to jump over the fence and do some weeding and tidying up in this area it would be greatly appreciated. The plantings are part of an overall plan to encourage native birds back into our area.

Send a pic into us of you in your gardening gloves to Mrs Reid or Mrs Williamson

lreid@sumner.school.nz or ebrownecole@sumner.school.nz

Nomination round

Our school will be undertaking a parent election for 5 School Board vacancies. This process will start with the issuing of nomination papers to our caregiver community by Friday 15 July 2022. Please check your email and postal address are correct on HERO or you won't receive voting papers.

We have employed CES to undertake the election process on our behalf. This year with legislative change, our nomination form and full instruction on how to place your nomination into our own School’s Election website will be emailed to you if we have your email address in our database or you will receive it by post if we don’t have your email in our database.

Nomination papers will also be available at the school office. The school will send those on to CES for processing upon receipt from candidates.

Nominations close on Wednesday 3rd August at 12 noon. Election day is Wednesday 7th September.

We look forward to your participation in this process.

Wayne Jamieson

Returning Officer

CES

89 Nazareth Avenue | Middleton | Christchurch | PO Box 414 | Christchurch 8140

P (03) 338 4444 | Cell 021 399 744 Web www.cessl.org.nz

The Hapori Group will be selling baked goods on Thursday 23 June to fundraise for Ukraine.

Before school outside Rapanui and at lunch time by Te Onepoto.

Items priced between $1-$3

World Vision's 40Hr Famine will take place over the weekend of 2nd and 3rd of July and our School Council students are busy organising an awareness campaign. Ideas for challenges and sponsorship will be coming your way soon. Please join our team by signing on here.

Exciting news - our preloved clothing sale is back for 2022!!
We would love your help with donations of good quality used (or new!) clothing we can sell at this event to raise funds for our school.

Donations of clothing can be delivered to the school office.
Save the date: 22 June, 5 - 8pm for the sale.

Riley J, a year 8 student of Awaroa has been selected for the Canterbury 13 & Under Indoor Cricket Team that will be travelling to Wellington in July to compete at the Indoor Cricket New Zealand Junior Provincial Tournament. Such a wonderful experience for him. We need your help with the following fundraising:

CookieTime Fundraiser

Original Chocolate Chunk

25g Rookie Cookies

$20 per bag of 20 Cookies

Please text or phone your orders to Hayden on 021 222 0433 stating name and how many bags you would like and he will be in touch. Orders close 30 June.

We really appreciate you getting behind one of our students and supporting his goal

Parent Drop-ins to see a Mana Ake counsellor/Kaimahi are up and running. Due to Covid Orange Setting these will be organised via Zoom or a phone call.
If you would like to meet with one of the Mana Ake team please talk to your child's teacher and they will book in a time for you.

Mana Ake encourage parents to visit https://manaake.health.nz/supporting-your-child/ and the Free Parent Helpline 0800 568 856. This is available from 9am to 9pm Monday to Sunday.

The Mana Ake website has a section on Big Worries - Mana Ake which is particularly relevant with what’s going on in the world currently.
Parents going to this site can be assured of finding up-to-date and quality information on wellbeing and parenting skills. Another useful link for families and parents. https://realparents.org/

In 2022, we will be reviewing the policies related to Health, Safety, and Welfare throughout the year. In term two, the review focus is on our Healthcare and Behaviour Management sections.
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​Instructions for reviewers:

1. Visit www.schooldocs.co.nz
2. Search for Sumner School (Username: Sumner, Password: Wakefield).
3. Search for the above policies in the search bar.
4. Read the policy.
5. Check the red Policy Review icon at the right-hand top corner of the page. a new screen will appear.
6. Select your role (Board member, staff member, or parent/caregiver) from the drop-down list.
7. Enter your name (optional).
8. Submit your ratings and comments.

To book a place, go to Parenting Place | Parenting Courses , find the age group and use the drop-down function to find the course. If you have any questions, please get in touch!