Friday 31^st January – School Swimming Sports Years 3-6

Wednesday 5^th February – No school for Foundation students

Wednesday 12^th February - No school for Foundation students

Thursday 13^th February – District Swimming Sports
                                       - Book Club Closes

Friday 14^th February – MTB – Falls Creek

Wednesday 19th February – No school for Foundation students

Friday 21^st February – Division Swimming Sports

Wednesday 26th February – No school for Foundation students

Wednesday 5^th March – Regional Swimming Sports

Thursday 27^th March – School Cross Country  

Friday 28^th March – School Cross Country (Back up day)

Wednesday 7^th May – school Photos

Friday 30^th May – Division Cross Country

Friday 13^th June – Regional Cross Country , Benalla

Welcome back to school for 2025 and welcome aboard to children and families who are new to Yackandandah Primary School. I encourage everyone to help families new to our school community feel welcome. Over the next few weeks, the children will settle into the routines of the school and their class. The school values of We are Learners, We are Fair, and We show Respect guide all of us – students, staff and families.

Class teachers will send weekly or fortnightly emails and/or Compass updates sharing what learning will be happening in the class, any events to be aware of and any other information of note. Newsletters are posted on the website and emailed on Monday each school week. If there are any whole school notices that cannot wait for a newsletter Sandra, or I may occasionally send out an email to all families.

During Term One teachers and parents usually catch up for a chat about your child, with the aim that both the teacher and the parent can share any information necessary to help with schooling. This catch up can be an informal chat at pickup time, a phone call, video conference or face to face meeting. For many, the catch up may not be much more than a quick hello as the parent – teacher – student may already have a close relationship. Remember that you can always email your child’s teacher if you have any questions.

Privacy

Our school collects, uses, discloses and stores student and parent personal information for standard school functions or where permitted by law, as stated in the Department of Education’s Privacy Policy. The policy can be read here: https://www.education.vic.gov.au/Pages/schoolsprivacypolicy.aspx.

Bushfire Ratings

As we are in a high-risk bushfire area the school, OSHC and Kindergarten will not operate on Catastrophic bushfire rating days. We will notify families as soon as we get notification of an upcoming school closure due to a Catastrophic bushfire rating day.

School Council

I would like to introduce our School Councillors. School Council serves a very important role in the governance of the school.

• Matt Flower, President, Parent Representative
• Janine Lerch, Parent Representative
• Sophie Dewar, Treasurer, Parent Representative
• Orrin Pritchard, Vice-President, Parent Representative
• Andrew Davison, Parent Representative
• Kate Stagg, Parent Representative
• Sarah Crispin, Parent Representative
• Brendan Hogan, DET Representative
• Michael Edwards, DET Representative, Principal
• Chris Summons, Vice-President, Parent Representative

School Council elections take place in Term One each year. There are four parent representative positions that will become vacant. Current councillors may renominate, and other parents are also welcome to nominate. More information regarding school council elections will be in future newsletters. If you would like to discuss what is involved in being on School Council or what School Council is responsible for, please feel free to chat with any of the current school councillors.

Waste Wise

We are encouraging students to bring ‘nude food’ to school. This means bringing food in reusable containers rather than in disposable wrapping. If wrapping does come to school with lunches, we will ask students to place it back in their lunchbox after they have finished eating and take it home again. Students will not be ‘in trouble’ if there is wrapping – we are simply trying to work toward the Plastic Free Yackandandah goals. Please ensure all containers and lids have your child’s name clearly marked on them.

Michael Edwards

Principal

Welcome to the new school year.

This year I will be working 3 days per week – Monday, Tuesday & Wednesday and we welcome Kerryn Roberts who is our new admin assistant.  Kerryn will be working Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

The newsletter this year will be issued every Friday – this will enable parents to see if their children are receiving an achievement award if they wish to attend the assembly.

On Wednesday, the eldest student from each family took home an envelope with various forms in it.   Please return these forms by Monday. 

• Local Excursion Permission Form – Permission form to cover any local excursions (not adventure activities) that students walk to in Yackandandah. This form needs to be returned by Monday to enable your child to walk across to the town library.  These visits will commence next week.

• Photography/Filming consent Form – Please read this form return it to school ticking the boxes that you consent to.
• Student Details - At the start of each year a copy of the student information that we have on file is sent home for parents to check and update.  Please check this form and make any updates to it and return it to school. It is very important that all the detail we have are correct including contact details, occupation codes and student medical information.  If you are unsure on the occupation code please call into the office.

Student Medical Details

If your child has any medical conditions that are not on the student detail form that has been sent home, please add it to the form with details when you return it to school.  This could include allergies, being prone to blood noses or any other type of minor medical problems.  It is very important that the school is aware of all medical conditions no matter how minor.

Compass

If your child is absent from school, is late for school or being picked up early you need to enter it on Compass with the reason. If children are absent and the school hasn’t been notified, parents will receive a generated text message at 9:30am. In the coming weeks parents will be able to consent to excursions and pay online through Compass.

If you don’t have a log in or it isn’t working, please call into the office.  It is important that all families have access to Compass.

Below is a link Below is a link which will take you to the parent guide.

CompassParentGuide.pdf   

Scholastic Book Club

Today each child has taken home a brochure from Scholastic Book Club.   Brochures are sent home twice a term and it’s easy to order and pay online through the Linked Online Ordering & Payment platform – please click on the link below.  Orders for Issue 1 close on Thursday 13^th February.  Books will then be delivered to school about 2 weeks later and sent home with the students unless marked as a gift through the platform.

https://mybookclubs.scholastic.com.au/Parent/Login.aspx

Every purchase that is made through Book Club earns our school 15% of the order value in Scholastic Rewards.  We use these to purchase more books and educational resources for the school.

Family Contributions

The Department of Education and Training has reviewed parent contribution practices and have made changes to how schools seek contributions. This means that we can no longer send statements out to families for Curriculum and Other Contributions.  Parents will still receive statements for Extra-Curricular Items and activities such as camps and excursions.

Our school relies on the ongoing support of our families to ensure that we can offer the best possible education and support for our students.  Your financial contributions assist us in doing this.  Within our school this support has allowed us to provide an enriched learning and teaching program for every student and is highly valued by our school community.  The commitment from parents to contribute benefits students and results in improved achievement outcomes, wellbeing and engagement in learning.  At Yackandandah Primary School, we design and develop learning and teaching programs drawing on the best educational knowledge and practices and strive to offer broad and enriched opportunities to students that are above and beyond what is required in the standard curriculum and what is provided for by Government Funding.

A summary of the voluntary contributions is below

School Savings Bonus

A reminder that parents need to log into the School Savings Bonus portal and allocate the $400 per student.  If you allocate it to school activities you can use it for any camps, excursions, school activities and school uniform that the school sells.  You can purchase uniform through State Schools Relief – if you wish to do that you will need to allocate it to uniforms.  The link below will take you to the parent portal.

Camps, Sports and Excursions Fund (CSEF)

The Camps, Sports and Excursions Fund helps eligible families to cover the costs of school trips, camps and sporting activities.

If you have a valid means-tested concession card, such as a Veterans Affairs Gold Card, Centrelink Health Care Card or Pensioner Concession Card, or are a temporary foster parent, you may be eligible. There is also a special consideration category for asylum seeker and refugee families.

Payment amounts this year are $150 for eligible primary school students Payments are made direct to the school to use towards expenses relating to camps, excursions and sporting activities for the benefit of your child.

If you applied for CSEF through our school last year, you do not need to complete an application form this year, unless there has been a change in your family circumstances or you have a new enrolment at the school.

If you would like to apply for the first time, please call into the school office and ask for an application form.

Enjoy your weekend.

Sandra

Congratulations to all our award recipients.

WE ARE FAIR

Grace Scobie for being a considerate partner during learning activities.

Lenny Graham for fostering a welcoming and inclusive environment in 5/6E. You make everyone feel valued and help create a positive and supportive classroom for all.  

Katherine Somerville for giving some fantastic suggestions on how to build a wonderfully inclusive and supportive classroom community.

WE ARE LEARNERS

Jimmy Wall for setting a great example for your classmates with what a learner at Yackandandah Primary School looks like.

Evie Burston for implementing strong collaboration with peers. Your ability to work together towards shared goals makes a positive impact in 5/6E.

Hudson Street for helping the Year 5’s understands how the Senior Space works and how to mee the expectations using his wisdom gained last year!

Alfie Bayne for coming into class calmly and reading. For great effort in planning and writing during our cold write.

WE SHOW RESPECT

Amelia Muth for always being ready to listen and raising your hand when you have something to share with the class.

Clyde Lucas for stepping up as grade 2 leaders and role models in our in our new shared learning space.

Hush McLennan for stepping up as grade 2 leaders and role models in our in our new shared learning space.

Paddy Grogan for stepping up as grade 2 leaders and role models in our in our new shared learning space.

Ed Hogan for stepping up as grade 2 leaders and role models in our in our new shared learning space.

Patrick McIntyre for starting the year with beautiful manners and a great attitude to learning.

Claudia Grech for contributing valuable ideas when coming up with our Classroom Agreement & displaying them beautifully!

And just like that, we’re back into the swing of routines, school pick-ups/drop offs, after school activities and launching into another year of fun, learning and growth.

Welcome back to our continuing families, and a big welcome to our new families starting on their primary schooling journey with us. It’s such an exciting time of year in schools, and Yack PS was certainly like a buzzing beehive this week with students settling into their classes and making friends.

For those new to the school, my name is Stace Hogan and I am our school’s Inclusion Coordinator and Mental Health & Wellbeing Leader. My role sees me out of the classroom Monday to Thursday and I work with our dedicated staff to implement whole school practices in inclusion and wellbeing. Part of my role is to also provide support to our staff, students and their families and this is done in many different ways.

The Department of Education is rolling out a Mental Health in Primary Schools program which will see a teacher in a wellbeing role in every government school by the end of 2026. We now place equal emphasis and importance on both wellbeing and learning. They go hand in hand, kinda like fish and chips, or cookies and cream, you can’t have one without the other.

This year, I will be attending the class parent information sessions to give a brief overview of how wellbeing looks at Yack PS and what support is available. Stay tuned to future newsletters and updates from your child’s classroom teacher for dates and times of these sessions.

Enjoy your weekend.

Stacey Hogan

Mental Health & Wellbeing Leader

News from the Art Room

The theme for the 2025 Folk Festival Street Parade will be all things BLUE and BLUES MUSIC related, so the Art room is gearing up to become a BLUE clothing Op Shop!!
We will be designing and dreaming up COOL BLUE themed costumes and making BLUES MUSIC related instruments! We would love to achieve a colour coordinated look to the parade this year, by having the colour BLUE as the dominant visual. Of course, blue can be paired up with other colours and patterns too. 

We would love families to start collecting blue, blue with colourful patterns and blue denim clothing to donate to the Art room Op Shop. We will be de-constructing and re-combining clothing to make fashionable BLUE wearable artworks. If the garment is for sharing and cutting up, there's no need to name them, however, if your child wants to wear that particular item of clothing in the parade, please clearly label and name it, including your child's class. Here are some wearable artworks that Mandy has been working on over the holidays. Clothing destined for de-construction can be of any size and shape!

Hello everybody and welcome to a new year of school sport!

For those of you who are new to the school, my name is Robyn Wilson, and I am the Sport Teacher and Sport Co-ordinator for the school. It’s my job to organise a number of sporting events throughout the year. Some events, such as cross-country and athletics, are for the whole school, while others, such as the swimming carnival, winter sports, and cricket, are just for students in years 3-6. All students in the school also belong to one of four ‘houses’: Hammond (blue), Kars (green), Wellsford (red), and Windham (yellow). If you’re not sure what ‘house’ your child belongs to, don’t stress, they will become familiar with it in the first few weeks of Term 1. I’ll also put out occasional calls for assistance in the running of events (athletics is a biggie), so please put your hand up if you are able to help out. The success of these events often hinges on the generosity of volunteers.

For now, we look towards the swimming carnival (see below) and the whole school cross-country which will take place at the end of Term 1.

2025 House Swimming Carnival

The House Swimming Carnival is taking place this Friday, 31^st January, at the Yackandandah Swimming Pool. We will begin at 9.30am, with all events finished by approximately 11.30am.

Students will swim in the age group relating to the age they will be by December 31, 2025. The event is open to students turning (or have already turned) 9 years or older by December 31, 2025. The age groups are:

9/10-year-old girls
9/10-year-old boys
11-year-old girls
11-year-old-boys
12/13-year-old girls
12/13-year-old boys

Students have the option of trying out for freestyle, backstroke, breaststroke and butterfly, with students representing and earning points for their ‘House’. All events are 50m (up and back of the Yack pool). We will be walking down to the pool and students are encouraged to come dressed in their house colours. Students still need to dress in line with our SunSmart policy, including a school hat and a shirt that covers their shoulders. They do not have to wear a ‘rashie’ when racing, but will need one if there is a free swim after the events. Students should also bring plenty to drink and eat, including their lunch. Students won’t be able to purchase things from the kiosk at the pool, so please don’t send along any extra money. Even if some students are not swimming, they are encouraged to come along and cheer on others and take part in the free swim.

District and Division Events

Qualifying for the next level of competition is based on time. The table below gives an idea of the approximate qualifying times needed for students to advance to the next level.

District is the next level, and this event will be held at the Beechworth Pool on Thursday 13^th February. The Upper Hume Division event will be held at Waves Wodonga on Friday, 21^st February. Regional swimming is scheduled to take place in Shepparton on Wednesday, 5^th March.

Robyn Wilson
PE Teacher

There are still cook books available for pickup from the school office. They will cost $40 each and payment should be made to the office using the usual processes (i.e. making a deposit quoting your name and "cookbook" in the transaction detail)

2^nd January            Edward Pendleton

3^rd January            Henry Wyatt

4^th January            Halle Smith Deans

                            Eliza Westbrook

6^th January            Oscar Bulman

8^th January            Bernard McLennan

12^th January          Pippa Graham

                            Lenny Graham

                            Lucia-Mary Gosling

13^th January          Freya Vorbach

15^th January          Patrick McIntyre

                            Kaitlyn Mclead

                            Peter Kellaway

19^th January          Penelope McNicol

                            Jed Walker

24^th January          Audrey Costenaro

                            Raffaele Gargiulo

27^th January          Olive McCalman

28^th January          George Booth

29^th January          Hugo Dickeson

                            Zack Dickeson

31^st January          Lara Bebbington

•     YFNC Under 12s Pre-Season
•  YFNC would like to invite those players (boys and girls) born in 2013 and 2014 who are interested in playing footy in 2025 season to come along to our first training season:
• Thursday 6^th February 2025
• Butson Park Yackandandah 
• 4.30pm - 5.45pm, followed by a meet and greet straight after training in visitors changerooms. 
• Please make sure they have a hat and a drink bottle. 

• Under 11s Football 
• If you have a player (boy and girl) who is born in 2015 and is interested in playing footy during the 2025 season, please get in contact with -

Kiera Maybury 0407 368 549. 

Children’s Choir

Yackandandah Folk Festival Community Choir

Do you like to sing?
We would love you to join us each Sunday afternoon in February and March to sing with the Yackandandah Folk Festival Community Choir. There is both an adult and children’s choir who perform together at the Yackandandah Folk Festival on Sunday 23^rd March.

We have the wonderful Aaron Silver and Sarah Wallis leading the children’s choir again this year. It promises to be lots of fun and a gentle, supportive environment for all ages.

Where:                      Yackandandah Public Hall (36 High St, Yackandandah)

Rehearsal Dates:     Sundays - 2^nd Feb to 16^th March

Time:                          Children - 2-3pm
                                    Adults    - 2-4pm
Performance Date: Sunday 23^rd March (Yackandandah Public Hall at midday, which is a FREE concert).

DON’T WORRY IF YOU CANT MAKE THE FIRST REHEARSAL, YOU WILL CATCH UP QUICKLY.

Please contact Cheryl Graham – 0408 393 105 for more information.