Tēnā koe, Talofa Lava, Mālō e lelei, Sanbonani, parents, caregivers, whānau and students.

Thank you to our AJHS families, our whānau, and our staff for your tremendous support and work this term.

Last week, we hosted ‘sell out’ audiences for our school production Mamma Mia! Watching the show brought so many emotions, seeing our students perform with happy hearts, soaring spirits and excited confidence. This experience evidenced one of the many rich opportunities our adolescent students have in this school environment, enabling them to express themselves in so many wonderful contexts. Congratulations to our Performing Arts faculty and all our staff and parents who contributed and supported our Mamma Mia! show.

I would like to acknowledge our Board of Trustees for their continued work as governors of our school. During a time where our school and society has moved through the impact of a pandemic, extreme weather events, social change, and the 18 months of my Principalship, they have remained steadfast in their care and commitment to our strategic endeavours, and support of all our staff and students.

At the start of Term 3, during Week One, our Year 8 students are attending their annual camp at Tōtara Springs, Matamata. We wish all our students a fantastic time to experience challenges they rarely face in daily life, helping tol grow their confidence, teamwork, and relationships in ways that often don’t occur at school. This camp would not be possible without the parent contributions, so we appreciate our community support to provide these unique opportunities for our students.

As you will no doubt be aware, our society and socially concerning adolescent behaviours are, in general, becoming more extreme. As a school, in order to keep up with the evolving change our pastoral care and learning practices require, we have developed two new fixed term Assistant Principal positions for the remainder of this year. (We will evaluate our capacity to continue this for 2024.) Congratulations to Nicola Kaiwai (Head of Health and Physical Education) and Grant Macpherson (Whanau Leader of Makomako) who have been appointed to these positions. They will both bring extensive leadership and educational capabilities to our senior leadership team. They will also retain their current middle leadership positions.

Enjoy your holiday te whānau, and take care.

Cushla Shepherd

Principal/Tumuaki

Albany Junior High School