TERM 2, 2006	Previous   Next

An action-packed meeting last week started with a presentation from Jacky Burgon, GSE, with some very interesting developments that will be upon us before we know it! If you haven’t received her PowerPoint that was e-mailed out last Friday, ring Barbara (939 9707) and she’ll send you one. Let’s hope the work Jacky and her team have done will culminate in more effective services for us all.

Welcome to new and/or acting principals Gail Lucas (Makara Model), Carmen Jennings (Adventure), Janet Evans (Dyer St), Lloyd May (Maungaraki).
Congratulations to Kevin Ryan who is moving to Raroa Intermediate, and farewell to Jo Williams, Whareama School, who is heading to China in September to be the principal of an international school. Cor blimey! These kiwis end up all over the place!

Congratulations to Neil Withington who is currently at VUWCoE as the Visiting Principal Fellow. Neil will be touching base with many of us over the next term or so and would welcome a phone call to VUWCoE if you would like to touch base with him. An experienced principal (presently Hutt Intermediate), Neil is available to offer advice and support, often quite helpful when you need to have a talk with someone not directly connected with the current issues you are juggling with.

Early in Term 3 you will be receiving detailed information and registration forms for our conference, 26-27 October. Organiser, Neil Worboys, is very happy with progress. The format will be very similar to last year, with Te Papa as the venue and the emphasis on key speakers – with a few surprises! Maximum attendance will be 300 and you are welcome to register your management team.
A reminder that there will be no WRPPA conference in 2007 as the International conference
is sited in Auckland, and we will need our $$$$$ to get to that.

Our association finances are in a healthy state, despite spending $8 000 more in 2005 than we took in – now that makes up for the $8 000 we took in but didn’t spend in 2004 – swings and roundabouts at its best, I say!
Now, to the 43 schools who have not yet paid subs for this year, there is a gentle reminder enclosed with this newsletter. To the 13 who haven’t yet paid this year, nor last year, there is a not so gentle reminder with this newsletter and an “Alas, dear friend, farewell”, should payment not be forthcoming by the next newsletter in Term 3.
And, as always, if we’ve got it wrong, please ring our hardworking treasurer, Dennis Thompson on 939 9112, with your payment details. He promises to dutifully grovel!

Study Award
With WCoE now becoming VUWCoE, our traditional study award funding has become a little unclear. We are currently re-negotiating this with our partners, VUWCoE and Furnware and will have news at the next meeting as to where this is going. In the meantime, if you have a cunning plan in mind, jot down your thoughts and let them develop into a possible application.

Cluster Grants
Congratulations to the South Wairarapa Principals Association. Your grant application to explore innovative ICT projects in Auckland has been accepted and a cheque will be winging its way to Gladstone School just as soon as we release the carrier pigeon.
It’s not too late to apply for a cluster grant – just e-mail Barbara and ask for an application form.

We are intending to run further accreditation courses for Principals Appraisers and Principals Appointments, to broaden the base of available competent people to carry out these very important roles. Watch this space!

The VUWCoE Advisory Committee have met. Of interest was the unanimous voice of trainees and school practitioners that practical work in schools was the most effective learning within teacher training and that the new model is more theoretically based than previous. We are currently exploring some anecdotal statistics re student dropout rates, which at first glance look a tad alarming!  In the meantime, should you have any thoughts about the graduate programme to take to the next meeting, Jeremy Edwards (475 7596) or Bryan Gwilliam (472 4779) would be keen to hear from you.

2007 is not that far away and it will be time for a change in the WRPPA Exec. Please give some thought to putting yourself forward for Junior Vice-President, Secretary or Treasurer. It is a great way to be well-informed of issues of regional and national interest.

SMS
Are you anywhere near making a decision yet? There’s good information coming out of Leadspace which may help you. Caroline Stewart, a practising principal with expertise in this area who has been seconded to MoE for the year, suggests that when you are looking at this information, check out customer satisfaction, as well as the improvement made on the second set of graphs which would indicate responsiveness to sorting out issues. One principal strongly recommends getting admin sorted thoroughly before embarking on the curriculum aspects. Some questions principals are asking:
“How quickly will the new curriculum be available on the systems?”
“Are we moving to a centralised data base that can be used by MoE for their own purpose, possibly not ours?”
“Do the accredited systems suit the MoE’s needs, but not necessarily schools?”
We’ll survey you again in Term 3 to see what’s up then.

Have you checked out the new NZCER PAT self-marking website? It’s worth 30 minutes per class input for the great data popping out the other end.

The vexed question of 2007 term dates! There seems to be universal agreement that teachers have arrived back in Term 2 looking pretty darn tired, not to mention children who haven’t recovered from sniffly noses and other interesting ailments. A solution for 2007 is currently being negotiated with all parties, which is looking hopeful for a full two week break at the end of Term 1, school finishing on Thursday December 20 and the start date staying the same. WRPPA has sent a letter to the Schools Consultative Committee supporting the suggested changes for 2007. This should be confirmed shortly and, no doubt, gazetted.  2008 and beyond requires further thought and debate. Do we really need to run with half days any more? Are we able to tie the primary, secondary and tertiary dates more appropriately together? Is the timing of holiday breaks right? Should we average out required days per year, with unders and overs allowable to match the way particular years fall?

We are at risk of losing WWSTA as we now know it. You will have received a flier with options that came from the AGM. These options will be voted on at a meeting on 22 August at 7.00pm at Eastern Hutt. If you value the service you get from WWSTA, we suggest you encourage your board to be represented at the meeting or at least indicate their option preference as requested. This will be counted as a vote.

1:15 ratio is coming for Year 1 classes – but not necessarily as we thought! It may not mean more class spaces, but could mean availability of specialised staff. Property adjustments are not expected to be made until 2008 at the earliest – so clear out that store cupboard, you may just need it for an office!

Mana Education Charitable Trust
How close to closing did it get! Hearty congratulations to the principals and others who came on board as trustees, to help Angela Ryan get everything up and running again. Not only has the trust initiated many exciting ventures, they are already financially viable and need to employ more staff. A plea to schools who are notoriously slow payers – please get your MEC payments off to them as soon as possible to help with the cash-flow – that would be an enormous help. A big change is the broadening of the base to include early childhood and secondary sectors – this can only be good news. If you have any suggestions for courses etc, Angela is only too pleased for you to get in touch. If you have any cluster initiatives going, Angela can take the organisational stress away from you – think about it. There are still some major challenges ahead – relocation of the site being a biggie!

You may recall me asking for interest for a talk by Blair Koefoed on his recent research into the effectiveness of reading recovery. This will be arranged for September as an after-school session to enable you and interested staff to get there.

NEXT MEETING
Our next meeting is at the Silverstream Retreat on Wednesday 23 August, preceded by a principals NZEI meeting to discuss/debate the contract round key points.

Timeline is:

Noon: Light lunch at the retreat, paid for by NZEI and WRPPA
12.30: NZEI meeting
2.00pm: Afternoon tea
2.25pm: WRPPA Term 3 meeting, I will ask for an RSVP closer to the time.

Cheers  
Barbara Hay

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