Kia ora, e te whānau

Thank you to everyone who came to the MFC on Friday night to celebrate Prizegiving with us. It was such a joyful night, maybe because it was the only opportunity we’ve had to be together all year. We are one of the few schools that has a whole school Prizegiving and we do that quite deliberately so that our junior students can see the older students and what they can aim for, but also so that we can farewell the Yr 13s as a whole school. It’s also one of only two events each year (the other being Athletics Day, which was cancelled in 2022 due to Covid) when we are all together as a school so we want to preserve that, especially while we are involved in a building programme and without a Hall. I also appreciate the tuākana teina relationships that are evident on the night - we saw and heard plenty of that on Friday - and the range of performances that showcased a few of our cultural groups.

Congratulations to everyone who was awarded a prize. The full prize list will be in the Reporter magazine at the end of the year, and the winners of the top awards are included in this newsletter.

NCEA seems to have started well, as have the Yr 10 Journeys - they have been so lucky with the weather, though not always with the ferries being on time. We’ve also been able to hold the Yr 10 dance and on 24 November we’ll have one for Yr 9 (and some Yr 10s who were at camp on 10/11 can also attend.) Thanks to the Parents’ Association’s Social Committee for running these and the parents who stepped up to help out. We couldn’t do it without your help.

Please follow our new school Instagram account - @wgcprincipalofficial.

This will give you all our news updates really quickly and without having to go to the website - and please, if you have information about student successes outside of school, send a photo and a short blurb through to us at elmarie.els@wgc.school.nz

You may have heard that ERO published a report yesterday called Missing Out: Why aren’t our children going to school. There is some information in the newsletter about this. While none of it is a surprise to us, it makes for sobering reading seeing it all in one document.

This is our final newsletter of 2022. Can I thank you all for your support of WGC this year. Best wishes for a restful holiday season and we look forward to seeing the students back in late January/early February 2023.

Ngā manaakitanga

Julia Davidson 
Principal