RJHS Newsletter - Term 1, Issue 4

KORERO FROM MEL

We are on the downward slope towards the end of Term 1 and are so excited about the prospect of moving into our new building. It is very close to being finished. We have a dawn blessing next week and the bulk of the new furniture is on it’s way. We will officially move in on Wednesday 3rd April - immediately after Easter Weekend. The external walkways on the northern side of the building will also be complete. Access to this egress and outdoor space will make a huge difference at break times for us. The final staircase and landscaping will be completed by mid-May. One final project, due for completion next term, is the shade sails being installed over the seating beside the playground and central courtyard to provide more shade and shelter for our students. We will be holding an open-door evening early next term to allow you to come in and see our new spaces once they are set up and running. Keep an eye out for this date.

This week’s assembly message has been about the ‘A’ in our SOAR expectations - I take ACTION to achieve. This is about teaching our students to be active listeners, choose appropriate places to sit in class, not allow their devices to distract them during learning time, and keep their cellphones turned off and in their bags during class time. If students use their laptops for leisure activities such as gaming outside of school time, we encourage them to have both school and personal accounts on their devices. Games, extensions and add-ons that might be distracting can be loaded onto their personal accounts and when they’ve finished with their schoolwork for the day, they can close their school account and open their personal one. Vice versa in the morning, they need to code switch from leisure activities on their devices to only using them for school work. I have also encouraged students to seek out a staff member if something is going on in their lives that requires them to check their phones i.e. family events or emergencies. We will let them do that in a compassionate and supervised environment that will prevent them from getting in trouble by trying to hide their phone use during the school day.

In the newsletter below there is information on how we are running our school cross-country and colour run this year. We have teamed up with the colour-run organisation to create a fundraising fun run for all students to participate in. I encourage you to please get involved and support our students participating in AIMS Games and NZSSS Tournament Week later in the year. There are heaps of prizes up for grabs for students, advisories and Hapū.