Nau mai haere mai ki te panui o tenei wiki i a tatou e whakanui ana i te wiki o te reo Maori

On Thursday night we had the final meeting of the current Board of Trustees. I would like to thank all those who have stepped down for their service to Somerfield Te Kura Wairepo school community over the last three years. The tenure of this Board coincided with some tumulous years, aside from finishing off a building programme they supported myself and the team through an unprecedented time of a pandemic. These past two years have required us to be nimble, agile and flexible as board to navigate the ever changing environment and requirements  while keeping in the forefront the wellbeing needs of tamariki and staff.

Thank you to Marty Needham for being chief cheerleader of Somerfield Te Kura Wairepo. His advice and guidance in things culture have helped us in this part of the journey. Nalini Meyer brought her skills and knowledge of governance to policy work and was a great sounding board for myself of the wider education landscape that always impacts on schools. Mark Callaghan was our treasurer ensuring we had the funds we needed to do whatever we had planned. Mark was on two boards and this was helpful at time when sharing governance ideas. A huge thank you to Craig Weston. Craig not only contributed to ensure the board understood what governance was and at times, is not but he took the lead in our redevelopment build. From inception this was an eight year project and Craig guided us all through so our tamariki have the lovely school we have today. Craig has lent his expertise to all things property and personally I have been very grateful for his skill and knowledge in this area.

Congratulations to who are our new Board of Trustees. The staff and I look forward to working with them over the next three years.

On Friday I was lucky enough to have a peek at the PTA cookbook. This is a accumulation of a huge amount of work undertaken from an amazingly dedicated group of our PTA, their helpers as well as our tamariki and whānau.

Firstly, I like to thank Vicki Hubbard for her vision and passion in getting this project off the ground. Vicky is the first one to acknowledge that it has been a great team effort and a huge team it is too. As a school community we should salute these people who have helped us find another way to celebrate our diversity. Many thanks to all these people and companies:

• Angela Edwards - sourcing Sponsorship and pricing for printing and all round cheerleader :)

• Rei Akiyama - Graphic design and book layout.

• Sarah Greig - Illustrations as well as front/ back cover and headings.

• Yrs 3, 4, 5 and 6 created the illustrations with Sarah's guidance and Jane Brittenden's support.

• Lisa and Candace in the office for helping with contacting families, checking names, ages and class queries.

• Parents for assisting with language speech bubbles and recipe support.

• Tamariki for their recipes and beautiful stories.

• Teri Tinirau for assistance with the Maori wording and explanation in the PTA welcome.

• Jacob Katsipis and Katie Jenkins for assistance with language speech bubbles/chasing up queries.

• PTA proofing team - Angela Edwards, Teri Tinirau, Sarah Benton, Tash Dillon

• Caxton Design & Print are printing the recipe book for us.

• Tim & Jo McHarg of McHargs Bookbinders and Printing Finishers who are binding the recipe book for us free of charge.

The Sponsors - whānau and local community support

La-Dee-Dah Jewellery Design

Caxton Insurance Life

Kick The Tyres Pre Purchase Vehicle Inspections
Number Works'n'Words
Valley Threads Sewing School
Next Step Realty Limited
Totally Gluten Free Bakery
Winchester Electrical

Zaffron Restaurant

McHargs Bookbinders & Print Finishers

We will be launching the cookbook soon so watch out for information about the launch and snippets of information as teasers from out PTA!

Congratulations to our EPro8 teams who competed last week and have made the semifinals on 22 September. They made 3rd and 4th in their recent qualifying event  so are up.

I'm now signing off for the next couple of weeks and leaving the school in the very capable hands of our Deputy Principal, Nicky Horne.