Warm Pacific greetings

I have been hearing from Rangatahi that it's been great to be back at school, and you can certainly feel the excitement and optimism around this year. For the first time this year, we are now together as a school whānau. I want to acknowledge our Year 9 students to the school, new students who have arrived in Year 10-13, and our nine new staff.

At Mana College we step into 2024 with much excitement, expectation and demand for our young people. As I have said to our rangatahi at our first full school assembly, we are Mana College and we want and expect the best from you. We ask young people to bring their best self into the college, regarding their behavior and actions, their learning, homework, and uniform. In the next couple of weeks it’s important to settle into the routines and patterns of excellent behaviour and learning and there also may be some adjusting from the summer break and or being in a new school.

Cell phones

A reminder that the government has mandated that all schools will be cell phone free, and ‘away for the day’ to minimise distractions and reduce online bullying. We have a term to work through the policy and have been advised that there should be no cell phones by term 2. For now, we have created a system which we think is reasonable. For this term students, if they chose to have phones at school, should have their phone in the bag and away. They will be able to use their phone outside of class at intervals and lunchtimes for this term only. Any breaches of the cell phone rules will involve working with the student and whānau.

Toka Āhuru

A reminder that each young person has a Toka Āhuru (learning advisor) who will be a regular contact point for home and school communications.

Students are expected to be at school by 9.00am and in their Whare Āhuru (Learning advisories) four mornings a week (Wednesday is a late start at 10.00am). We have designed a curriculum for each year level focusing on developing the competencies around ‘learning to learn’ at Year 9-11 and ‘learning to leave’ at Year 12-13. We're looking forward to bringing this together this year.

We have a range of communication strategies between home and school depending on the situation. We will publish these periodically on our newsletter and website. A reminder that if you have a concern or complaint we ask you to contact the teacher/dean or senior member directly to make an appointment. 

Please do not expect to arrive at the school and meet with the staff member immediately as they may have classes to teach. Please also be mindful that you may have only part of the story and be open to engage with the problem or situation. We are a school that values manaakitanga, whanaungatanga and want to work to keep everyone's mana intact through our dealings with each other.

Have a restful weekend and we look forward to next week and Year 9 camp.