Tēnā koutou,

As we move towards the end of the year, it is timely to give you an update on how the new hub building is progressing. We are on track to meet the final completion date of May 2023, and we will be looking to have our learning teams move into the new building for the second half of the year. The windows and roof are fully installed, and most of the outside cladding is now up. Inside, the framing is well underway and the interior walls are being lined.

For those of you who have not yet seen this, or those who would like a reminder of what the building will look like when it is finished, here is our architect’s walkthrough of the new hub. Our plan for using the hub in 2023 will be to move Pōhutukawa Hub out of the library and hall, and have them based on one of the floors of the new hub. Harakeke Hub will move onto the other floor of the space, leaving our Kikorangi and Mawhero spaces free for terms 3 and 4. We will use those spaces as needed, for example to run co-curricular lessons. It will be an exciting new step in the growth of our school, and teams are beginning to plan and prepare for how the new spaces will be used.

As I talk about moving forward as a school, it was lovely spending time on Friday evening hanging out in the school grounds and connecting with tamariki and whānau. The weather thankfully held up, and many families came down to chat, play and enjoy the sunshine. It was a low key, social affair, and it was really nice to see parents re-connecting and tamariki playing together. More than once I heard people greet each other and comment on how it had been a while since they’d last caught up. This is what we would like to do more of as a school - create opportunities and events where we can come together and connect.

Another enjoyable aspect of Friday evening was dashing off from the community gathering with Kalesha and Brent to attend the Northern Wellington Student Citizenship Award ceremony. Huge congratulations to our wonderful Musa Hisham who was awarded the Year 6 Leadership award for 2022. Please see the attached article in this digest to read more about Musa’s achievements. The award ceremony is always one of the highlights of the year for me, as we celebrate the fabulous student leaders from our local schools. I always come away from this event with a strong sense of pride in the recipient from our school, but also joy from hearing the stories of other students from local schools and the wonderful things they are doing and achieving. It always fills me with a firm belief that the future is in very good hands.

Kia pai tō wiki, enjoy the week ahead and appreciate and enjoy the family and friends around you.

Ngā mihi nui, 

Urs Cunningham