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Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou

We are still trying really hard to staff the school and we are being as nimble as we can to navigate the Industrial Action.

In Week 8 I was asked by the Southern Services Academy to be the lead principal during the Induction week at Burnham. This included inspecting the troops (the 3 services academies in the South Island), handing out a lot of awards and giving a speech. It was such a privilege to be asked to do this. I was so proud of all of our rangatahi! Read a section from my speech here:

Good morning everyone! My name is Samantha Mortimer to those who don’t know me and I am very proud to be the principal of Greymouth High School.

I’d also like to introduce Ian Johnson who is our Assistant Principal at Grey High. Myself and Ian are really happy and excited to be here today. We see the great things that our Mawhera services academy do at our school and we both were very keen to come and see our academy plus the others here at Burnham.

Last year I was fortunate to go to Whenuapai and meet up with other principals and leaders of service academies from across NZ. This gave me a much better understanding of what all of you do.

I know that you have all shown amazing mental and physical resilience and have learnt so much in your time here as well as pushing yourself beyond what you thought you could do! I expect that all of you at some time or another over these past 2 weeks had to overcome personal obstacles. I know that if it was me doing this there would be many things I would have to face: early mornings, heights, enclosed spaces, the 24 hours challenge, and many others! So you should be proud of yourselves for giving it a go and doing your best. That is all we can ask for!

I also hope that you have made some great friends while on this Induction camp. When you go through tough times together the bonds between you become even stronger! I hope that you all supported each other to be the best you can be.

I would also like to thank all of the staff on behalf of all of you, your kura and your principals. Things like this would not happen without their support and commitment.

Finally, keep working hard, keep following your dreams and take all of the opportunities you are offered!

Ka Ora Ka Ako (Healthy Lunches programme)

We are now thinking about the logistics of how to feed all of our students, how to dispose of waste food, how to distribute any meals and how to clean up quickly and effectively,

Staffing

The following staff are moving on at the end of Term 1.

Morag Newbury is retiring and she is very much looking forward to spending time with her grandchild.

Annette Jones is moving to the Southern Health School so we will still keep in contact with her on a fairly regular basis.

We wish both of them the best of luck and hope that they keep in touch

New roles

Miriam Rees has taken on the Head of Supported Learning.

Michael Hunter won the position of our new Head of Science on a fixed term basis.

Oliver Bentham is joining us as a reliever for Term 2

Samantha Mortimer

Principal Greymouth High School

Tumuaki Kura tuarua o Māwhera