Welcome back to 2020, the year we celebrate our fifth birthday. I hope everyone had an enjoyable holiday. I had a great break at home with my family and am proud to say that we are now enjoying sitting out on our new deck which I helped to build:)

We have the following new staff members joining us this year - Miss Melissa Grant in Te Ara Tupu, Miss Holly Miller in Te Kete Kākano, Mrs Amanda Skinner part-time in Te Ara Maia and Mrs Mel Stenhouse who will be teaching our Reading Recovery programme. We also have 34 new Y1 learners and 21 new learners across the school who have joined us. We welcome all new staff, learners and families and hope you love being part of our school community. Our school roll is sitting at 592 learners. 

Our staff have been busy preparing for an exciting year at WRPS. You can see from the picture above that we already have a group of keen gardeners working with Miss Sarah Kerkhofs at lunch-time on a market gardens project. We also have ice-skating lessons, camps, lots of sports, kapahaka, pasifika - all sorts of exciting opportunities for our learners.

A big thank you to our parents and whānau who contributed fully for trips and camps last year. We had a number of parents who also made contributions to support other families which was amazing. We really need these payments to be made as we do not have the funding to pay for them. Unfortunately we still have approximately $6,500.00 outstanding from last year's trips and learning experiences which we are really hoping to recover. Please remember you can pay off these trips by setting up a payment option with the bank. For juniors the cost for trips, shows and swimming is approximately $100-$115 each year. It is more costly for our seniors, particularly in Year 7/8s, but they have the wonderful experiences of winter sport, camp and technology.

On Tuesday 11th February, GROW [our PTA] are holding our 'Back to school and welcome party' from 4.00-6.00pm, by the Adventure Playground. Our staff will be outside from 4.45pm after their team meetings to meet with anyone who is able to come along. Bring your own picnic rug and dinner, although GROW will have a free sausage sizzle.

Ngā mihi nui

Sylvia