Newsletter Issue 4

Kia ora, Nameste, Talofa, Konnichiwa, Guten Tag, Gidday, Vannakkam, ni Hao, Kia orana, Hola, Salam, Sa wat deekha, Dia Dhuit, Goeie Dag, Bonjour, Καλημέρα, Mālō e lelei, Greetings everyone

Looking back at last year’s newsletter for this time of year, we are in quite a different place as a school in regard to both sickness and staffing. Last year 25% of our teaching team were unwell in June alongside 20% of our students. Today we are fully staffed and have 89% of our children at school.

What is making the difference?

We are still experiencing a teacher shortage. The Ministry forecast that during 2025 an additional 750 Primary School teachers were likely to be required. There is still a shortage of relief teachers.

Investing in People

This year the Bellevue Board has invested heavily in additional staffing - both for teacher aide support and for additional teacher time. This has made a significant difference to our team’s ability to cater for the students in our care as well as responding to the demands of the changes in education. This has reduced class sizes in most areas of the school and meant that we could retain the quality staff we already have, rather than needing to employ people half way through the year.

We would like to thank our Bellevue Board for prioritising the wellbeing and learning of all of our people at Bellevue.

The Week In Brief

• This week we have been practising our emergency preparedness with a fire drill. We were pleased to evacuate the whole school within 8 minutes. We practise fire, earthquake and lock down drills every term to refine what we do and ensure we are ready to keep ourselves safe in any emergency situation.

• Yesterday Kahikatea (Year 6) walked to the intermediate school in the afternoon to see their school production ‘Growing Pains’.

• Another noteworthy event that is happening daily is the establishment of our Attention Autism ‘Bucket Time’ programme - a session focused on building the ability to sustain attention for some of our neurodiverse learners.

• Yesterday everyone was looking their smartest ready for their school photos.

• Classes are excitedly preparing for sharing their learning with our whānau at tonight's Matariki event - we look forward to seeing you there!

AI Policy for Staff and Students

As technology evolves, we have implemented a clear AI policy for both staff and students. This policy outlines acceptable use of AI tools in our school setting while ensuring integrity and critical thinking remain at the heart of our approach. Students may not use AI for learning tasks but staff may utilise AI tools to support their administrative or teaching tasks. Teachers will continue to use personal and professional voice to create individualised student reports, not AI. The full policy can be read HERE. You can read the other related Digital Learning policies on SchoolDocs, where all our policies are stored.

Mānawatia a Matariki

In 2025, Matariki falls between 19–22 June, marking the reappearance of the constellation. Matariki is marked by a public holiday on Friday 20 June and Bellevue is celebrating today! There is a lot happening in all classes so we encourage you to visit the whole school. Our ‘Community Voice’ survey goes live today too so, if you prefer to do paper than online, please look out for the paper copies of this survey around the school to take home. You can complete these and return to the school office or your child’s whānau teacher. We look forward to celebrating with all our families this evening.

Community Voice - Planning for Bellevue into 2028

CLICK HERE to complete the ‘Community Voice Survey’ - this should take less than 10 minutes.

2025 marks the beginning of future planning for Bellevue School's vision of ‘Igniting Learning, Empowering Learners’ throughout 2026 - 2028. To give the Board a clear picture of the community priorities to guide the three year strategic plan goals, we are having conversations with our community over the coming months.

From the strategic plan, the school develops an annual plan to identify actions that will help the school continuously improve.

These conversations begin now in the form of a digital form sent home to families or available hard copy from the office. It is our aim to provide multiple opportunities, mechanisms and avenues for you to share your thoughts - of which the digital form is just one. For this reason, this process will run throughout July and August, during which time we encourage you to get involved.

You may prefer to pick up a paper copy, have a kōrero with one of our team (please let them know that you wish your thoughts to be captured), complete the online form, catch us in the playground or drop an email. Whatever you choose, we look forward to hearing your thinking!

Staffing Update

At the end of this term we farewell Kristine Medrano, who has been kindly volunteering this year in our Year 4-5 area of the school. Kristine has supported our English Language Learners at the same time as studying and doing a part time job! We greatly appreciate the time, effort and Aroha that Kristine has poured into Bellevue School and we wish her well in her next step as she pursues a career in teaching.

Reporting

A reminder that your child’s reporting on Seesaw is close to completion. All Reading, Writing and Mathematics posts, as well as one cross curricular learning story, will be online by the end of this week. For more information about our reporting to families, please follow this link to our website. Please remember to book for your child’s three way conference next week (see Mid Year Reporting later in this newsletter).

Talking with your child about their learning activities:

• Please note the focus of the post in talking with your child - for example, if the focus was to interview a peer then talk with your child about the questions they asked, did they find out what they wanted, what might they do differently, rather than the tidiness of their handwriting.

• We encourage you to also talk to them about what they see themselves doing well, how they are growing as a learner and what they see as their next learning step.

• You might like to ask them about how the example posted shows their learning dispositions, Key Competencies or our school values.

Three Way Conferences - Next Week

As with all our reporting to families, these conferences are based on the principles of ‘Information Sharing That Informs Learning’ - see image below. This may help with what to expect.

Due to the fact that we are now reporting against the refreshed English learning area of the NZ Curriculum, your child’s progress may look a little different. This document explains this in more detail.

To book for your child’s learning conversation please go to https://www.schoolinterviews.co.nz/code and enter the event code 7smmg

Please note that the library will be open with Sarah supervising any students who need a space to be while their family talks to the teacher if you wish to do so without your child present.

Using School Grounds Over The Break

We encourage our community to make use of our lovely grounds during the break and keep an eye out for our place. Some things you may need to be aware of:

• Kindy parking - The Bellevue kindy has tree work happening in their car park and so their staff will be using our car park during the break.

• Driveway - The driveway to the Rimu/Tōtara block is being repaired so there will be no access to the lower school for some of the break. Please access the lower field via the Jubilee Corner (via the Link Road gate).

• Painting - There is some final painting work being completed on the exterior of the Rimu/Tōtara block (Rooms 12- 15)

• Grass - You will notice that the fences will still be up on the area outside the office. This is only to let the grass grow. Fingers crossed for good grass-growing weather over the break!

Thanks to our Community

Thanks for another great term of learning partnerships

As next week marks the final week of the term, we would like to thank our wonderful Bellevue Community for all their contributions to our school, whether this be through;

• Involvement in learning opportunities

• Feedback and suggestions

• Governance

• Fundraising

• Donations

• Or the many other things you contribute to enable our tamariki to learn and thrive.

Reminders

• Last newsletter until 23 July: You can expect our next newsletter in the second week of Term 3.

• School Closed 20 - 23 June: Following this Friday 20 June, when school is closed for the Matariki public holiday, next Monday is the first of our Ministry of Education approved teacher only days to enable our team to become more familiar with the refreshed Mathematics learning area of the NZC. Thanks for supporting us by keeping your child at home on Monday 23 June. We hope that you can make it an enjoyable long weekend.

• Home Learning Survey Results:

The results of our Home Learning at Bellevue parent survey are HERE (follow link). We are currently using the key themes to guide the development of a consistent home learning ‘offering’ for families to engage with if they choose. This will be released in the second week of Term 3 through this newsletter and on Seesaw.

Ngā mihi nui

Annette

A reminder that our fortnightly newsletters can also be found on our Bellevue Website - scroll down to view 'previous Bellevue Newsletters' - and for more timely updates, you could follow our closed group Bellevue Facebook Page, if you are not already.

Haere mai ki te kura o Bellevue. Welcome to the following student and their whānau. It is great to have you in our Bellevue Learning Community.

Amini - Room 2

Ramin - Room 13

• Thank you Sarah Melton, Monique Lepine, Cara Worboys-Clark, and Erin & Dan Bellhouse for helping in Rimu Tōtara with our mask making!

To assist our families with locating our Attendance Procedures, please note that the below link now takes you to a 'quick link' on our website to the Attendance Procedures in PDF form.

Please do always contact the office (office@bellevue-newlands.school.nz), or call and leave a message for absences. Do not reply to this newsletter as your message may not be seen.

Matariki evening - Rimu Tōtara are collecting gently-used or new baby items for ‘The Nest Collective’ charity and non-perishable food items for the Wellington City Mission. Please bring any donations to Room 14.

Posters made by Rimu Tōtara students Felicity, Dhani, Celine and Matilda in room 14.

A wee reminder to those of you still working through the ‘Reading Challenge’ - we’ll extend it’s completion date to the end of the term (that’s another week if you need it).

Also, next week when students come to the Library for their class visit, they will have the option of borrowing a few extra books for the holidays if they wish.

Enjoy the break!

Values vouchers are handed out when students have been spotted to show our school values; Aroha, Integrity, Resilience, Creativity and Empathy. Well done to the latest students who have shown our values in many different ways.

Bellevue School offers interested families of students in Years 4-6 the chance to participate in the ICAS Assessments in:

• English (Reading)

• Writing

• Mathematics

• Science

All of these assessments are online. The cost of each of the assessments is $22.50, EXCEPT Writing which is $28.75.

This competition takes place each year in schools throughout Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, the Pacific region and South Africa. ICAS Assessments are designed to recognise and reward academic excellence. Students are asked to demonstrate a deeper, integrated, and thorough level of learning.

For more information please follow THIS LINK.

The assessments are challenging and provide an opportunity, particularly for students of high academic ability, to gain a measure of their own achievement in an external assessment situation. We would not advise that your child sit these if they are a less confident learner or would become anxious in an exam situation.

If you are uncertain about whether or not your child should participate please talk to their whānau teacher.

The dates for the ICAS Assessments at Bellevue in 2024 are:

• Writing - Thursday 7 August

• English - Thursday 14 August

• Science - Thursday 21 August

• Maths - Wednesday 27 August

A notice has already been emailed to all Rimu, Tōtara and Kahikatea families about registering for these assessments. A reminder that entries and payment must be in no later than 3pm on Monday 14 July (first week back in Term 3). No late registrations can be accepted.

We are increasingly seeing students waiting in the afternoons and getting collected well after 3pm. We kindly ask that you collect your child at 3pm, or that you have made an after school plan with them. After this time staff are often moving into afternoon meetings and cannot supervise your child.

We do understand occasional hold ups occur so please contact the school office on 478 7037 if you are running late so that we can keep your child safe.

INTRO TO SCHOOL BOARD ELECTIONS - ONLINE

Every three years all public schools in Aotearoa hold elections for their School Boards, and this is going to happen again in 2025. The Board is a key part of our kura; they do a lot of important things behind the scenes that, while they may not be visible, are really important to keeping our school running. Our Board write our strategic plan, consult with our community about things that matter, make sure our finances are being spent wisely, and ensure that we are giving effect to Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

Our board is made up of five (5) parent representatives, the Principal, and one (1) staff rep elected by the staff. The Board need to appoint a Returning Officer, who is responsible for the running of the election and this year we have appointed Election Pilot as the Returning Officer and for the election to be provided online. They have been assisting schools with elections for over 20 years and have been the only election provider accredited by the Ministry of Education to provide online election services since online elections started in 2022. Important things like the nomination and voting forms will be sent to you by email directly by Election Pilot. If we don’t have an email address for you don’t stress, because Election Pilot will send these out to you by post so you don’t miss out.

There are a lot of rules around School Board elections that need to be followed and the main ones are the Education and Training Act 2020 and the Education (Board Elections) Regulations 2022. Your name and contact details have been provided to Election Pilot to enable them to deliver elections services for our kura as required by legislation. They will use your contact details for the provision of election services for Bellevue School only, and your details will be deleted 60 days after the election date as required by legislation. If you have any questions about the election process, then the best people to talk to are the team at Election Pilot.

You can contact the Returning Officer directly on 0800 VOTENZ (0800 868 369) or election@electionpilot.nz. We will continue to keep you updated through the various stages of the election process, and our election date is Wednesday 3 September 2025.

In each of our Term 2 newsletters we are including a short piece from the existing members of our Board so you can get a little taste of what makes them tick.

Mandy Mackay - Board Secretary

I have been a parent of a child at Bellevue School since 2011 and have been an active

member of the school community, joining the FUNdraisers and later elected onto the Board

in 2016. It has been an honour to contribute to Bellevue’s development over the last few

years and continue building an environment that our Bellevue whānau are proud of and enables students to be the best they can be.

I used to find the time commitment a bit overwhelming, and now appreciate that many

hands make light work and just how amazing our Bellevue whānau is. I encourage you to get involved with the school community, it’s extremely rewarding and supports the kids to achieve success.

If you want to contact me my email address is: manderin.mackay@gmail.com

Our Kelly Club Before- and After-School care is proud to provide a safe and fun environment for your little ones.

Check out what the kids have to say about our before and after school care programme.

"We have lots of fun!"

"You get to hang out with your friends longer."

"I love the staff because they are very kind"

Te Paemanu Korihi, Virtuoso Strings (based in Kenepuru) is currently accepting applications for music tuition scholarships.

The six eligibility categories are

1. Māori ancestry

2. Indigenous Pacific origins

3. Marginalised Cultural or Ethnic Group

4. Refugee Background

5. Disability and

6. Financial Hardship

Please note that applications close on 29 June. Limited places are available. Applicants who progress through to the second round will be invited to a short interview, between 1 to 4 July. All applicants will be notified of their application result no later than the 10 July.

For more information, please email the office: office@bellevue-newlands.school.nz or contact@virtuosostrings.org.nz

Matavai is the Ministry of Education monthly e-newsletter offering key updates, Pacific education stories and details of upcoming events. Share with Pacific parents and communities through your school.

Subscribe for free at:

Subscribe to Matavai Pacific e-newsletter – Mailchimp

Read the latest issues here:

Matavai issue – 13 June

Facebook Scams – What to Look Out For: Wednesday 18th June @ 7.00pm

This webinar is an introductory session for anyone wanting to feel more confident and informed about online scams on Facebook.

Follow this link for more info and to register (or copy and paste into your browser)

https://netsafe-org-nz.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_xGa9dpJuTwWHchbMKqX1GA

Please follow the link to order online: www.lunchonline.co.nz

Username bellevue-newlands, password 'grow'

Wednesday 18 June

School Matariki Evening - 5:30-7:00 pm

Friday 20 June

Matariki - School Closed

Monday 23 June

Teacher Only Day - School Closed

Tuesday 24 June

Mid Year 3-Way Conferences 3:15 - 8:30pm

Wednesday 25 June

Mid Year 3-Way Conferences 3:15 - 6:30pm

Thursday 26 June

Newlands Intermediate School Open Evening - 6.30-8.00pm in the NIS hall.

Friday 27 June

Final Day of Term 2

Friday 11 July

Call for nominations for School Board Election

Monday 14 July

First Day back of Term 3

Tuesday 15 July

Whānau Māori Hui 6pm - 7:30pm

Tuesday 22 July

Whānau information session on Literacy. 6:00pm-7:00pm at School

Thursday 24 July

Newlands Intermediate School in Action morning 9.00 - 10.30am.

Wednesday 30 July

Nominations close at 12 noon for School Board Election

Wednesday 3 September

School Board Election

Tuesday 9 September

Votes counted and results declared - School Board Election

Wednesday 10 September

School board takes office