St Patrick's Paraparaumu

The function of the Education Review Office has changed and developed over  the last 20 years. Once upon a time reviews were compliance orientated. Now they are much more focussed on working with schools to support them in the process of continual development and improvement.

ERO do not rate schools.  Their job is to identify areas of good performance, identify areas for improvement and make recommendations for ongoing development and improvement.

The basis for their report is an onsite visit (a snap shot of what they observe the school is doing). They also review student achievement data, schools systems, Board and teacher’s documentation and hold information gathering interviews with the Board, staff and children.

All schools get recommendations and areas for improvement, usually focused on furthering government and the school’s own priorities. This time around they are also gathering information on how well schools are ready to give affect to the revised NZ curriculum in 2010 and beyond.

The final report will be published in the new year and a community summary sent home to parents. The Board will then use the reports recommendations to review and revise our forward planning to ensure the school continues to provide effective learning opportunities  for our children.

Otaki Kapiti  Schools Photography Competition

Dates: October 14 and 15

• To celebrate digital photography work completed by students in the OK Cluster.
• To allow students to exhibit photographic work in a public environment
• To promote to the wider community the ‘professional development in ICT contract’ in the Otaki Kapiti area.

There will be two sections in the competition

Junior – up to an including year 6

Senior – year 7 upwards

Photographic ideas Your photographic compositions could be:

Landscape- photographs of any landscape near or far

Portrait       individual photographic studies of people

Sport-         photos of sporting activities

Nature-       photos of plants or animals

Rules

• Only one entry can be made per student.
• Each photograph should have a sign that states:

the photographer, their age, school, the section entered and the title.

• All entries must be in to school office  by Wednesday  September 23^rd.
• The photographs must be mounted prior to judging

Competition judging

The competition will be judged by well known New Zealand photographer Julian Ward. Julian Ward has published several books of photographs including the recent  ‘Wellingtonia’ which was an exhibition in the museum of Wellington City and Sea and book of the same name.

• The photographs will be judged on photographic technique and creativity.
• One major prize of a digital camera will be awarded for the top  photographs in each category.
• Certificates of Distinction and Merit will be awarded for photographs selected by the judge

There were two key note speakers Professor Grace and Michael Paul Gallagher sj.  Professor Grace’s topic was “Catholic schools facing the challenges of the 21^st Century”

Through extensive research the following 10 major challenges have been identified:-

• The challenge of secularisation in culture and society
• Impact of global capitalisation and of its values
• Changing nature of Church-state relations
• Responding to Vatican II principals of renewal of mission with special reference to the preferential option for the poor.
• The responses of contemporary students to Catholic education
• Issues of faith formation in a context of rapid change
• Catholic schooling and the changing role of women
• Challenges of recruitment, formation and retention of catholic leaders and teachers.
• Moral and social formation in Catholic schooling
• Financing the educational mission in changing circumstances.

He shared some thought provoking statements:

“In New Zealand, the Catholic school is an integral dimension of the mission of the Church and in many respects it is “the most widespread and effective ministry in the Church” (Williams, 2004, p. 83). It provides the Church with a privileged opportunity to actively engage in the dialogue between faith, culture and life: The Catholic school is a privileged place. Its task is to continue to be an instrument of evangelisation, helping young people to move from religious theory or practice by rote to a true life experience, where religious values have greater relevance. (Lynch, 2005, p. 6)”

“There is a developing awareness of the importance of the spiritual dimension of the person and an increasing ground swell for values-based education among many parents. The current popularity of Catholic schools, many of which are oversubscribed and have waiting lists for non-preference students, provides an opportunity for evangelisation. In order to accomplish this, Catholic schools will need to clearly articulate their purpose and aims. They are called to be prophetic, to act as leaven in contemporary New Zealand society which is becoming increasing secular:

A Catholic school cannot simply be an annex to contemporary society. Its vision and the vision of its pupils cannot be limited by the ideology of the moment. Its vision is the vision of the Kingdom established by Jesus Christ. It is a vision that does not permit compromise. The Church is not an entrant in a popularity contest, anymore than was Christ himself. Christ commissioned his Church to preach the Gospel in season and out of season, welcome or unwelcome (Williams, 2004, pp. 85-86).”

OUr Vision

St Patrick’s, a school community united by our Catholic faith, nurturing children to become life-long learners.

OUr Mission

Providing a quality education in a Catholic environment.

OUr core values

Faith learning integrity respect

Our prayer

Let it be known to all who enter St Patrick’s Primary School

That Christ is the reason for this school

The unseen, but ever present teacher in its classes

The model of our school

The inspiration for our students and staff.

Staff are looking forward to attending  and appreciate the cooperation and understanding of parents during this short disruption to the daily programme. This is the first time ever that all the staff  have been offered opportunity to attend this very important convention attended by catholic schools from throughout the country. It provides high quality speakers and workshops across a range of current education topics all with a special character focus. It also showcases best practice from around the country.

Staff will be attending sessions on; Boy’s education, the revised NZ curriculum, using IT to support classroom learning and teaching, as well as a variety of sessions focused on authentic contexts for developing our Catholic special character.

One that grabbed my interest  is;  9 year olds blog the big questions.  God… is like nothing – but he is something.

Certainly a wide range of worthwhile topics. This is an opportunity for staff to mix with other catholic educational professionals and  opportunities to reflect on what they and  others are doing to provide children with a quality special character education.

Please read and comment.

On Tuesday evening a group of 30  parents, staff and Board members met to reflect on the discussions and ideas that came from the values consultation workshops run by interLEAD since the start of the year.

It was given the title of ‘Ultimate factors – Greatest Gains’ a shared values evening.

The purpose was to try and identify the factors and values that will give the school the greatest gain.  The discussion and workshops have resulted in some key ideas, core values and strategies which the Board will refine into a vision statement.

Our mission remains the same  ‘To provide a quality education within a Catholic environment’ 

Our vision will be the means by which we achieve our mission. Our core values become the rock on which we build.

Below are four core values that have been indentified by those involved in the ‘shared values workshops’.  Other values were also identified as important and at this stage have been loosely grouped in with the ‘big’ four.

We would like any feedback and additional comments you may have, including your thoughts about what you mean by these particular values. You are encouraged to add comments to the blog or email us on principal@stpatspara.school.nz or bot@stpatspara.school.nz

After defining our vision and core values the real challenge begins. How as parents, teachers and pupils do we give practical effect in and around the school, making sure, as one parent put it,  ‘we are all singing from the same song sheet’.

Identified core values

Respect  

Friendship      Forgiveness    Community     Purity     Prudence

(Self, Others, God, Environment)

Integrity

Honesty          Justice           Fairness

Learning   

Participation              Discipline        Courage

Faith                       

Love       Trust          Hope  

MB2 wrote to Kapiti Observer asking if there were people who would lend telescopes to the school as part of our “Planet Earth and Beyond’ studies. Moniques letter was published. The response was amazing.  We now have enough to organise some vieing evenings and allow parents to arrange to take them home at the weekend to use with the children.

We finished a busy positive term with a lovely reflective eatser liturgy prepared by all the classes. We started with the juniors sharing about jesus riding into Jerusalem on a donkey and finished with the seniors sharing about Jesus being raised from the dead. We used, drama, songs and action to bring the stories alive. As opportunity for the children to think about what Eatser means at a level they could understand.

Mons Carde sent us on our way with a special Easter blessing.

It was great to see so many of you at the Badge and Excellence assembly last Thursday.  Each class took the opportunity to share some of the work they had been doing as part of our “Colour my world” theme this term.  Drop by your child’s classroom and get them to talk about what they have been learning.

The blog on the school web site is proving to be an interesting and interactive place for children, especially those in MB3. Have a look because it also shows other things that have been happening at school as well.  A couple of classes are sending home their class journal. There are also a couple more blogs being planned as well.

Each teacher in the school has an allocation of release time from their classroom. This release is provided by the Ministry of Education as part of their employment contract for such things as individualised testing, professional development, programme development, beginning teacher’s support and school management responsibilities. We are given additional staffing from the Ministry of Education to enable this to happen.  Staff with senior leadership roles, for example team leaders or deputy principal can have up to one day a week release or even more.  This is the same throughout NZ schools.  We have the challenge of timetabling this release so that the work being done while the teacher is out of their room compliments and adds benefit to the overall learning of the children. We try to use the same teachers wherever possible.  What we can’t plan for is when teachers are sick (and there are times of the year when becoming sick is an occupational hazard). During these times we use a pool of relievers coordinated by the local principal’s association.

This means that children throughout the school will not always have their classroom teacher every day of the week.  Wherever possible we try to ensure children know which teacher they have teaching them ahead of time.

Some schools have permanent job share positions.  Miss Gunson works at another local school providing the same kind of teacher release as she provides here at St Patricks.

One of the advantages of this resource provision is that children learn to be resilient and relate to a variety of teachers and teaching styles. They also benefit from the various skills and knowledge these teachers bring to our school.