It is very nice to welcome all our young people back to school this term.

A school is really only a very quiet set of buildings without the students and having them back and hearing them all as they go about their school day reinforces that it is the people that are the school and give it its life.

We have been fortunate with the weather which means students are able to enjoy lunch outside in our beautiful grounds, long may this continue.

You will be aware that we start this term with the PPTA industrial action still taking place and that rostering home will begin next week along with a strike day on 9 May. We appreciate that this can be very disruptive for parents and whānau. Let’s hope that progress is made in the negotiations between the PPTA and the government and the teacher’s collective contract is sorted sooner rather than later.

During the last week of the term we held Parent Teacher Interviews for our Year 9 and 10 whānau. We had a very significant response from parents with nearly 1900 individual interviews taking place. Parent Teacher Interviews for Years 11 - 13 will take place at the end of this term.

On Monday we had a government mandated teacher only day around the changes to NCEA. Learning Areas spent the day planning for the new NCEA Level 1 Achievement Standards which are to be implemented in 2024. There is a huge amount of work that needs to be completed by our teaching staff to ensure the successful implementation of these standards, and delays in resources available to our teachers will affect this workload. You may be aware of the recent government announcement that the implementation of the new Level 2 and 3 Achievement Standards has been delayed until 2026 and 2027. This does relieve the workload pressures somewhat.

Our students are widely involved in many activities and Term 2 has a whole host of things to look forward to. We have winter sports starting, a Dance and Drama evening, a Music concert, various curriculum based trips away, school cross country, the Big Sing and a CGHS/CBHS combined major production just to mention a few. These activities are what gives schools their life and vitality and makes them exciting places to be!

Ngā mihi nui

Peter Sawyer, Acting Principal/Tumuaki