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

2018 Theme is Manaakitanga

Congratulations to all those students who received awards and acknowledgement at our Sports Prizegiving and our Senior Prizegiving. They were both wonderful evenings of celebration and acknowledgement of our students’ success. I would also like to thank our community sponsors for their attendance and generous donations of prizes, as well as our team at the College who work tirelessly to put these evenings together. Thank you also to all the families and whānau who joined us to celebrate the achievements of our students. There is still much more to celebrate and I encourage you to add these dates to your calendar.

• Graduation Dinner Tuesday December 4;

• Year 9 and 10 Prizegiving Tuesday December 11 at 9 a.m., then students are finished for the year;

• Year 7 and 8 Prizegiving Tuesday December 11, at 1.00 p.m., then students are finished for the year;

• Community Presentation by Mark Osborne on the Future of Education, Wednesday December 12, refreshments at 5 p.m. and presentation at 5.30 p.m.

Student Engagement and Success

I was fortunate to attend Year 10 camp this year at Findlay Park from Tuesday November 6 - 9. What a fabulous camp it was, with many exciting activities and opportunities to challenge thinking and skills, and develop teamwork. Highlights for me were seeing individual students try new activities like paddle boarding and banana boating, as well as watching the very powerful haka performances from each of the camp groups. Congratulations to everyone involved and thank you to all our wonderful staff who were on camp supporting students to develop confidence and achieve success.

NCEA exams have been underway now for two weeks and have been going well. Our juniors have also been sitting their end of year exams this week. Thank you to all the exam supervisors and staff who support our students in exams. This year we have the highest number of students we have ever had with special assessment conditions (e.g. needing reader-writers, extra time etc). Our Learning Centre Manager, Barbara Jacobson does an incredible job coordinating our students and their required support people to ensure that they are in the right place and this is a significant job to manage.

Congratulations to all our Student Leaders for 2019:

Head Boy - Davinder Kumar

Head Girl - Maddy Schnackenberg

Deputy Head Boy - Tom O’Brien

Deputy Head Girl - Irene Vakasiuola

Student Representative - Liona Vailea

Sports Captains - Olivia Jones and Michael Gilliver

Arts Captains - Phoebe Robertson and Louie Campbell

Academic Captains - Stella Hamilton-Wallace and Lucy Gibson

Cultural Captains - Khan Ahomiro and Nadia Smith

International Captain -  Cara Weber

We are excited and proud to have you leading our College in 2019.

On Friday November 16 we welcomed approximately 140 Year 6 and 8 students into our College as part of our 2019 Transition Day. What a wonderful day we all had, getting to know each other and forming connections in preparation for next year.

Community Information Evening - Wednesday December 12, 2018 - Future Focused Education and 2019 Improvements

To support the improvements we have made to our learning programmes and timetable in 2019, staff will be working with Mark Osborne and his team from Leading Learning.

With change occurring globally at an unprecedented rate, schools and communities are facing increased demands on them to prepare students for the future. This presentation will explore some of these changes and the shifting skill set that will increasingly be required by all of our young people and what schools can do and are doing to meet this challenge.

Mark Osborne is the Director of Leading Learning Ltd and has been a teacher, school leader and consultant for more than 20 years. He works nationally and internationally on future focused education, innovative learning environments and educational leadership, helping schools build great places to learn and the capabilities to make the most of these spaces. Mark is also a doctoral researcher at the University of Melbourne, currently looking at change leadership in innovative learning environments.

Prior to becoming a consultant, Mark was on the foundation leadership team at Albany Senior High School. He has also worked extensively in libraries, with digital technologies and in market places, working to create diverse, inclusive communities that help each other learn.

There will also be a presentation on the timetable changes and Senior Courses for 2019 and an opportunity to ask any questions. Please also refer to the Student Question and Answers about the 2019 Curriculum & Timetable Improvements for more information.

Please come to the College hall for refreshments on Wednesday December 12 from 5 p.m. with presentations commencing at 5.30 p.m. We look forward to seeing you there.

Staffing updates

Joining our team in 2019 are:

Linda Hammonds (Year 7 and 8)

Andy Chuang (Maths/ICT)

Aroha Koria (Te Reo and P.E./Health)

Isis Metcalfe (Science)

In 2019 we will place high priority on following up attendance.

To support this we have created four new positions within the school which we are calling House Leaders. They will track attendance and the academic achievement of senior students in their Houses and support the development of House spirit.

• Gledstanes House Leader - Chloe McDonald-Nairn

• Stewart House Leader - Vetekina Pekipaki

• Mulgan House Leader - Simon Quin

• MacMillan House Leader - Sarah Quilty

Community Connections

On Friday November, 2nd the New Zealand Defence Force’s Kiwi Blue Team dropped into our College from the sky. It was a magnificent display set against the amazing backdrop of the Kaimai Ranges and the blue sky of the Bay of Plenty. They parachutists then followed their amazing display up by working with our students to teach them about the Science of aerodynamics. Special thanks to Science teacher Anderley Middleton and the Kiwi Blue Team. Days at work do not get any better than that!

Community Suggestion Box

A reminder that there is a ‘Community Suggestion Box’ available on our website for our school community to have their say and communicate their ideas and feedback to the College. These comments will be addressed each month through the Principal’s Comment of each newsletter.

There will be a special Principal’s newsletter published at the end of the year to confirm all the details needed to get prepared for 2019. Best wishes for the last few weeks of the year.

Ngā mihi nui

Carolyn Pentecost | Principal