by Office Manager

Principals Message - 9th April 2024

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Guten Tag everyone, I hope that you are all enjoying the beautiful autumn weather. The leaves are falling off our resident oak trees and keeping us busy picking them up.

We have a number of staffing changes for next term. It is with great sadness that we farewell Kelly Cross. Kelly has won a position at Blind and Low Vision New Zealand and will take up that position on the 13th of May. We wish Kelly all the best in her new role and thank her for her valuable contribution to Sara Cohen School over the past seven years. Sarah House will also be taking a break from teaching to welcome a new member to her family. Exciting times for the House household. We welcome Ashley Coney to our staff. Ashley has come to us from the UK where she held the position of Assistant Principal at a pupil referral unit in Yorkshire. Ashley comes with a wealth of experience in working with students with diverse learning needs. Ashley will become the teacher of Pikopiko class at Concord. The current teacher in Pikopiko, Candice, will become the teacher of Karamu class. We have advertised for Kelly’s replacement in Kõwhai.

Last Thursday our Board of Trustees adopted ‘School Docs’ as our suite of Policies and Procedures. By the start of term 2 you will be able to access all of our policies through a portal on our website. School Docs will keep all of our policies up to date with current legislation and will set in place a scheduled work plan for board review.

Our curriculum focus this year is literacy. We have invested in Jane Farrall’s Comprehensive Literacy for All. The key premise of this programme is that ‘No student is too anything to be able to read and write”. We previously focused on communication now we will look to all students having a literacy focus in their goals. Teachers and Support Staff are currently working through the training for this programme. 

Parent Evening: Auckland Disability Law Centre, this Wednesday 6pm- 7:30pm at Riselaw Road. This session is focused on the legal requirements of supporting a person with an intellectual disability. All are welcome to come. Thank you to Rachael Forde for organising this evening for the school community. There will be tea, coffee, water and snacks. Please see the attached flyer for further detail.

Please remember that we have school holidays coming up at the end of the week. I hope that these are enjoyable and restful.

Nga mihi nui

Matt