E ngā reo, e ngā mana, rau rangatira mā, ngā matā waka, tēnei te mihi nui atu ki ā koutou katoa. Ko te wawata me te tumanako ka noho ora mai koutou katoa.

This is the final newsletter for the term and a time to press pause and reflect on how we have coped and managed as a school community in such a disrupted term. We have recently bought back our assemblies this week, reminding us who we are, what we are about and celebrating and acknowledging the achievement of others. At the assemblies we acknowledged all our staff and students for displaying and committing to our school values:

• Showing each other respect as members of the school community at a difficult and challenging time.

• Taking responsibility for their learning whilst we have been in an alternating school and coping with personal disruptions to learning through Covid. In particular too, our year 9’s who have transitioned to WHS so well this term.

• Our students are striving to achieve their best by attending the Mentor interviews and setting goals for 2022.

Term 2: Focus on attendance

Our focus for Term 2 will be on ensuring that our students are at school learning as much as possible. We know that, for the majority of our students, the best place possible for wellbeing and learning is at school with their friends, teachers and other school staff. We also have very good systems in place to keep everyone as safe as possible. This is why the government has determined that we should remain open at the Red setting of the Covid Protection Framework.

NCEA Achievement

We are focussed on improving student outcomes and ‘challenging students to achieve’. Our NCEA results have improved significantly over the last few years and we are proud that our overall NCEA pass rates are significantly higher than national averages and averages for similar schools across NZ.

We have a commitment to ‘challenging ourselves to improve, being better than before’, this means we relentlessly pursue ways to strengthen what we do as a school, as a staff member and as a student. This is reflected in our 2021 NCEA data below:

Our reflection on our NCEA results is that again, Covid had an impact on students' achievement. In particular students who prioritised passing the year, making a choice to focus on achieving rather than striving for Endorsement (Merit and Excellence).

We have developed a range of action plans to support this which have been presented to the BOT. In addition we have created a number of positions in the school to oversee our achievement focus. These include your child's Student Mentor, please contact them if you have any concerns in the first instance around your child’s achievement.

Miss Crook oversees our raising achievement plan with Mrs Jones who has a focus on Māori student achievement. You can contact them at shannon.crook@whs.co.nz and renay.jones@whs.co.nz

Declan Manning (HOD Maths), is our Excellence Co-ordinator and is focussing on supporting targeted students for Merit and Excellence Endorsement and in the Puawaitanga (ALP) programme. If you would like to talk to Mr Manning email him at declan.manning@whs.co.nz

In the meantime, please continue to have conversations with your child about their learning via Google Classrooms and your child's achievement and progress by logging onto Kamar Portal here.

Next week we will resume as a full school, we welcome back both Juniors and Seniors. Our last day at school for students is Wednesday the 13th April, we have a Teacher Only Day on the 14th of April.

On behalf of the school we wish you a happy Easter and a restful and relaxing holiday.

Take care, stay safe.

Martyn Knapton

Congratulations to all students who made the long journey down to Twizel. Final results from Maadi Cup 2022 for the WHS rowing crew:

• Christiaan Nel & Indy English - 3rd U18 Novice Double sculls
  
• Luke Berquist & Zak Boonen - 4th U17 Double sculls
• Ryan Calder & Shaun Snow - 6th B final U17 Double sculls
• Graceyn Growden - 6th C final U17 Single sculls
• Luke Berquist, Zak Boonen, Shaun Snow, Ryan Calder & Conrad Hopkins - 2nd U17 Coxed quad sculls
• Christiaan Nel, Indy English, Kikiwa Tua-Swain, Lucas Weijers & Evia Linnell-Olsen - 2nd U18 Novice coxed quad sculls

Volleyball

Health services provided FREE in school:

• School Nurse: daily except Wednesday morning
• School Doctor: Tuesdays P2