Dear Families, Students and Community Members,

This week marks the last week of the Headstart curriculum. All  students and teachers have put in a huge amount of effort to push through a whole new unit of work and their first learning tasks for the next year level up. All reports should now be available on Compass for students and parents.

Students spend a great deal of effort and time completing assessment tasks that give teachers an accurate judgement of where student understanding is at, based on the Victorian Curriculum Standards. Teachers also spend an enormous amount of time assessing student work and entering feedback on Compass for students to read and identify areas of strength and areas for improvement. We would like to take this opportunity to encourage all students and parents to discuss and reflect on their achievements from the reports but also on areas for improvement, which will provide a goal for students to set for themselves for next year. Our focus as teachers and a College community is on constant student improvement, no matter what their level of ability and understanding is.

We congratulate all students who received nominations for their achievement or effort in their subjects this year. Their efforts will be celebrated at the Awards Night to be held at Kingston Town Hall on Thursday night, with rehearsals being held during the day on Thursday.

It is at this time that we also keep in our thoughts our Year 12 students from 2018 who receive their VCE results in the coming days. We wish them all the best in their endeavours and with their choices for further education or employment.

This year has been a big year for teachers who have maintained a constant focus in their professional learning on Literacy and Connecting Feedback to Data. We have completed our triad peer observations where we identify a particular focus for improvement in our own classes based on student feedback and receive feedback from our peers about the teaching and learning practices that occur in the classroom. Just like we ask of our students, we also strive for constant improvement in our learning and teaching practices. A big thank you to all staff for their efforts this year.

Finally, congratulations to all students on their efforts this year and their progression academically, socially and emotionally. We wish all students, parents and their extended families a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and a well-earned, relaxing holiday break. We look forward to 2019 being a successful year for all.

Bryony Lowe

Instructional Coach Learning Specialist