At our Quiz night we raised a whopping $5293. Thank you so much to everyone who came on the night and to the staff, led by Tania Gallagher who made this happen - ngā whetū kohara!

In addition, you, our families generously made donations toward our planting.  These total $1153, thank you so much! Added to this, we have an incredibly generous parent who gave us an incentive and wero (challenge) - "if you raise $5000 at the quiz night, I will match it". This would have made our total  $11,446. However, our generous parent donated $6000, making our grand total $12,446.  Amazing! 👏

Please save the date of Sunday 30 October.  From 3pm onwards we will be inviting families to join us to plant our fabulous new plants.  Members of the Boffa Miskell team will be here to help us and we invite you to stay on with your family and enjoy a BBQ tea with us. More details to come.🌿

Pictured above are some of my visitors from Y1&2 who join me for a hot chocolate for winning a values award.  We tell jokes and I learn lots of things about parents and teachers.  Don't worry, what happens at 'hot chocolate time', stays at 'hot chocolate time'. 🤣 

We are on the move again!  This time it is our Junior School's turn to move out of their classes, while they are refurbished.  This 'move' will take us through to 2023, with classes returning to their new spaces in the early months of the new year.

Having just moved the Y7&8 team back into Wheriko, I can honestly say that you can make old buildings shine. The staff and students are delighted with their new spaces.  Please pop in and take a look. 🤪

At the beginning of next term, there will be changes (again), to the layout of access in and out of our school.  Merrin Street is going to look and feel different with it becoming the main site access for our contractors, Citycare.  For that reason, we are creating a safe 'pedestrian only' access to our school from Merrin Street, for our students and visitors.  This will be well managed and will require your cooperation, with the overall goal of safe dropping off and picking up.  At this time, the Greendale entrance will be available again, as will Brookby Crescent, but Beatrice Crescent will still be used by our landscape team for the first few weeks of the term.   

Next week, I have a 'site set up' meeting, to establish many of these details and once I have reviewed the site in the school holidays, I will send you an update on what school access definitely looks like for the new term.  Please diary to look out for this article, I will send it on our two channels and add it to Facebook, so it can't be missed.  It will be very important reading.

This Saturday sees clocks 'spring' forward for daylight savings, so that we can enjoy longer evenings.  An hour less of sleep,🤭 but a great reward.

Last week I attended the NZ Principals' Federation conference as part of the organising committee, here at Te Pae.  It was the biggest group of Principals ever, with just over 900 attendees.  If you haven't seen Te Pae yet, you are in for a treat when you do, it is amazingly impressive. Principals travelled in large numbers to show their support for Christchurch's return to hosting and they were so very impressed with our city.  The stand out speakers of the conference for me were the young people, who sent strong messages of 'see us, hear us and adapt and change with us' to the delegation of school leaders.

On the first day of the term, it will be time to 'bless' our new Hall, Hīnātore.  In order for the two classes to occupy it in term four, it is tikanga to complete its blessing at this time.

What a milestone this is for our community!  It is an impressive building and we would love you to stay, when you drop your child off on the first day and enjoy this short service with us. We will be meeting in front of Hinatore at 9.10am. When the short service concludes,  you will be able to come inside the hall and look at the facility in full. Teachers will continue to advertise this in their weekly notices to you.

It has been a privilege to watch an incredible piece of history unfold, with the passing of Queen Elizabeth II. Whether you are a royalist or not, the precision, discipline and service on display has been incredibly impressive.

I hope you are enjoying the warmer, drier weather and are looking forward to a spring break.🌻

Kind regards

Lisa