Tēnā koutou katoa

Term 1 is passing very quickly with our students continuing to experience and achieve many goals and successes. These have included Swimming Sports, Athletics, the Triathlon and a variety of curriculum related trips and experiences.

The Principal's comment this month has some important administration information. Please take the time to familiarise yourself with this.

Communicating with parents and whānau

Effective communication between home and school is important to ensure you are receiving important information in a timely manner. As a College we are increasingly relying on email and texting to connect with our community and deliver key messages. Please check that we have your correct contact details, including your physical and email addresses and cell phone number. This information can be updated using the parent portal or by emailing jbankers@katikaticollege.school.nz.

Modern families come in many forms and shapes. The various combinations of parent/whānau contact details can make it challenging for the school to manage information transfer. Please clearly indicate who the primary caregiver is. This is the person who will receive all the email correspondence and text messages. We are unable to send information out to more than one primary email address. We apologise for the inconvenience this may cause.

Using the parent portal is a useful way of tracking how your child is achieving at and enjoying school. You can use the portal to monitor attendance, check your child’s timetable, and review engagement reports and achievement data.

School office hours

A reminder to parents and whānau that our school office is open Monday to Friday from 8.a.m. until 4 p.m.

Shave for a Cure

On Friday April 13 our Head Boy, Cameron Hankins, and ex-student Hamish Lorney will shave their heads at lunchtime in the Action Centre to raise funds for Leukemia and Blood Cancer New Zealand. You can support Hamish and Cam’s head shave by making a donation on the Shave Website. I have agreed to join them and shave my head if they can raise over $6000 and I encourage you to get in behind them and donate to this worthy cause. Cancer is a disease that has and will affect many members of our community.

Spirit of Adventure Scholarship

Through the generosity of the Katikati RSA Village Trust we are able to invite Year 12 students to apply for a scholarship to spend ten days on board the Spirit of Adventure. Year 12 students who would be interested in this opportunity are invited to submit a letter outlining how an opportunity to take up such an adventure on board the Spirit of Adventure would allow them to develop their leadership skills and explaining how they would use their new skills to lead our College in 2019. For further information see Mr Graeme Vallely at gvallely@katikaticollege.school.nz . All application letters should be addressed to Mrs Pentecost and delivered or emailed to her Personal Assistant, Mrs Macdonald at amacdonald@katikaticollege.school.nz by Wednesday April 5, 2018.

Community Suggestion Box

Thank you to all of you who have put forward suggestions or queries using the Community Suggestion Box on our school website. We have received queries about our uniform, security for devices and cellphone use in class. Suggestions have been made for improvements to the website, using volunteers, more formal prize givings, and changes to the learning programmes we are offering at Katikati College.

Thank you all so very much for your suggestions. We appreciate and value your ideas and use them to help continuously improve the College and the quality of education your child receives.

I have expanded on my response to a couple of queries below as I believe these are concerns that many of you may have:

Cell phones in the classroom: Teachers will choose to manage the challenge of cellphones in their classroom in different ways, with some removing them completely and others using them as a tool to support the learning. My preference is to educate our students on when and how to use their cellphones in class. This is a skill that they will need to develop to be able to communicate and function effectively in all aspects of society e.g. use of their cell phone in the workplace. We are planning to have a Digital Citizenship Course for all students to develop these skills and the associated etiquette to support their use of digital technology in school and the real world.

Keeping devices secure: The College has a number of lockers designed to keep devices secure while charging them. These lockers are located in the Action Centre foyer and the Library foyer and can be used by students to securely store their device during Physical Education, interval, lunch time or sports practice. Your child just needs to bring their own padlock and key.

Uniform review: We are currently carrying out a uniform review and a Uniform Committee has been formed to oversee this. Mr Simon Finnimore is leading this process. You can email any ideas you may have about uniform to him at sfinnimore@kkc.school.nz or place your suggestions into the Community Suggestion Box. We will also be surveying the community.

The proposed timeline for phasing in the uniform change is to begin with Year 7 and 11 in 2019, with the full school being in new uniform in 2021.

Visiting Canadian rugby team

Lastly, Katikati College is hosting Robert Bateman Secondary School rugby team this week and on Friday 23 March at 1.30, our 1st XV will be playing them at the College. Please come along and support our boys for their first game of the season.

Ngā mihi nui

Carolyn Pentecost

Principal

Katikati College Vision: An innovative learning community to maximise people potential

2018 Theme is Manaakitanga