I'm so proud of our school as we saw it at last weekend's Ball. Fingers crossed we can have a great double hitter this week with our Junior Semi-Formal and our evening for parents to discuss common concerns on the same night.

Before I get all excited about our events, we have some staffing news: 

• Mr Quinton Gately, who has been covering Food Technology as we couldn't get our South African teacher into NZ, finishes with us next week
• He will be replaced with a permanent appointment, Mrs Kate Cronin, who used to teach PE and Health here and has recently been at Oxford Area School. We are lucky to have Kate return and it's likely that she'll teach senior Health next year as well as Food Tech
• Whaea Catherine Messenger-Weepu will leave GHS at the end of the school year. Catherine has made a huge impact in her three years here, notably with the formation of the kaupapa Māori pathway and growing such a positive culture around Te Whare Akoranga and te ao Māori in general. She will be spending more time with her own whānau next year as well as continuing to work in the community.
• Asti Trouland, our Hauora Coach, will finish her main contract with us at the end of this term. Naomi Le Couteur will start in this role from next term. Naomi is an experienced yoga and mindfulness coach and shares our vision for the importance of this in education.

Last weekend's Senior Ball was a huge success, with 170 senior students looking incredible. The Year 13s had learnt to waltz and everyone socialised with such amazing good values that the evening was just amazing. The staff band played (and actually sounded great!), the stunning catering was done by our cafe, MummHG's Kai, and our PTA parents set up a glitzy entrance and were very supportive. The student and staff team worked so hard,  and I want to thank Miss Tealy Wood for her outstanding management of the Ball as well as Mr Rowan Haigh for his hands-on oversight. The student team was: Abby Dodd, Ellie Brown, Jenna Williams, Skye Simmers, Bethany Seifert, Amanda Cook, Ben Anderson, Breigh Jones, Lana Gorrie, Millie Cropp.

This Thursday, 17 Sept, we have our Junior Semi-Formal open to all year 9 and 10 students. This is a fun evening with a tropical theme and everyone who goes has a great time. The night is well supported by our senior students and I encourage all students in years 9 and 10 to go.

On the same night, for parents and whānau, we have experts from Community and Public Health, Primary Health Organisation, STOP, Salvation Army and the Police coming in to facilitate discussion between parents about "teen issues" of common concern. This was inspired by some of the behaviours we've seen since lockdown - nothing bad, just normal parenting stuff - and should be a really interesting evening. Numbers are limited and you can book in through our Office or this link. 

As I'm sure you all know, we're sticking at Alert Level 2 until at least Mon 21 Sept. It's nearly the end of term and a busy time for everyone so please look after your own hauora / wellbeing and let us know if we can do anything...for example, we've had very few requests to use the fund we set up to help families with school costs.

Noho ora mai

Andy England

Principal