W www.footscrayps.vic.edu.au E footscray.ps@edumail.vic.gov.au T 03 9687 1910 A 100 Geelong Rd Footscray Vic 3011

Friday November 29th, 2019 Next issue: December 13th, 2019 (last issue for the year)

The yard will be supervised before school from 8.45am and after school

until 3.45pm

IMPORTANT DATES

Monday 2nd December

Year 2 incursion

Friday 6th December

Year 6 Big day out

Tuesday 10th December

Foundation – Year 5 Moving up day

Year 6 Transition Day

Wednesday 11th December

Foundation 2020 Transition session

Foudnation Excursion

Whole School after school picnic

Wednesday 11th December –

Friday 13th December

Year 5/6 Portsea Camp

Friday 13th December

Parent Helpers Morning Tea

Friday 20th Decembr

Last day of Term. 1.30pm finish.

2020

Tuesday 28th Januray Curriculum Day (students do not attend)

Wednesday 29th January Curriculum Day – students do not attend

Thursday 30th January

Foundation – Year 6 students Commence Term 1

Dear families,

I would like to congratulate and warmly welcome your new

principal at Footscray Primary School, Jenny Briggs for 2020.

Jenny has written an introduction about herself and is looking

forward to meeting you all very shortly. I would like to also

thank Paul Nucci for his strong leadership at FPS whilst I have

been on leave.

On behalf of the Footscray Primary School community I would

also like to thank and acknowledge David Hook our outgoing

School Council President. David has been instrumental in many

areas at FPS and we thank him for all of his hard work and

dedication to our community. Ray Varone will be covering

David as School Council President as he wraps up his

Presidency for 2019.

The movie pop up night held last Saturday, was a huge success

and I would like to thank Zoe Allnutt and Ray Varone for

organising this event and bringing the school community

together.

As we begin to wrap up Term Four, we still have many events

upcoming at FPS. On Wednesday 11th December, we are

holding a teddy bears picnic for the current Foundation families

and new 2020 Foundation families from 3.30pm to 4.30pm;

and then a whole school picnic from 4.30pm to 6pm on the

school oval. It is a BYO picnic and we invite all families to come

along.

Last day of Term Four is on Friday 20th December and our

school has an early finish at 1.30pm. We will be holding a

whole school assembly at 1pm and invite all families to attend

our last assembly for 2019.

Many thanks,

Chrissy Purcell

Acting Principal

For 2019, the office will be open at

the following times.

*Monday 8.30am – 4.00pm

Tuesday 8.30am – 4.00pm

Wednesday 8.30am – 4.00pm

*Thursday 8.30am – 4.00pm

Friday 8.30am – 4.00pm

Uniform Sales*

Mondays 3.00pm – 4.00pm

Thursdays 8.30am - 9.30am

If you require uniforms and cannot

make these times, please email

footscray.ps@edumail.vic.gov.au to

make other arrangements.

Office Staff Term 4, 2019

Rowena (Business Manager)

Monday - Thursday

Jessie

Mon, Tues, Thurs, Fri

Katrina

Monday – Wednesday

Angie

Thursday – Friday

BANK DETAILS

Commonwealth Bank

Footscray Primary School

BSB:063 132

Account number 10090179

Please include a reference with the

student(s)’ names.

EFTPOS available at the office

Message from Jen Briggs

I would like to introduce myself as your new Principal. I am

absolutely thrilled to be joining the FPS family and I look

forward to meeting you all in person shortly. I have spent the

last three years as Assistant Principal at Derrimut Primary

School, collaboratively leading the school on a significant

improvement journey. I have a strong background in leading

inquiry and mathematics and ensuring learning is purposeful,

engaging and applicable to the world around our learners. I am

aware of the many strengths of Footscray Primary School, and I

am looking forward to partnering with the whole school

community to build on those strengths throughout 2020 and

beyond. Chrissy and David have been incredibly welcoming and

have already started an in-depth handover to make the

transition as seamless as possible. I would like to thank your

School Council for appointing me and I also thank Chrissy for

her hard work over the previous two terms. I shall see you all

soon!

Message from David Hook

It has been quite a year at Footscray Primary, but in many

respects a successful one.

After a somewhat chaotic start to the year, we are now in

negotiations with Maribyrnong Council's Open Spaces Group

about working with them to help support the local community

with some much needed space and also provide extra funding to

maintain our grounds. The shade sail replacement is now done,

further works on improving accessibility have also been

approved through a VSBA grant, and our Sensory Room is also

now up and running. We had a great response to the Readathon

which was a tribute both to the parents and staff involved in the

organisation of it as well as the participation of the students,

staff, and parents of this school in general. The Trivia Night also

went well, and our last community event of the year, the

screening of "Oddball" on the block, was also a great success.

All in all, I would say, quite a good list.

I appreciate that a lot of you are probably wondering about

what happened with the school review. The unfortunate side of

Philip leaving in the middle of the year was that the

reorganisation of the school's leadership that followed

apparently made most of the recommendations of the review no

longer relevant, so the Department feels that they are no longer

able to release anything useful. The review did also touch on

the bilingual program and while nothing direct on that seems

forthcoming on that either, we do now have a subcommittee on

Council looking at the language program at Footscray Primary

and the Department is also organising direct contact with the

Department's language unit as part of allowing the

subcommittee to recommend some options for the school.

Watch this space for further news in the new year.

OFFICE NEWS

Also on the watch this space list is the school is in the process

of setting up a "Parents and Friends" Association. Stay tuned

for news on that as well. We appreciate that not everyone is

able to get involved in the School Council or the

subcommittees, but it is no co-incidence that many of the

successes of the year have involved parents and staff working

together. This is something we can all be proud of and I hope

the active participation of the school community will continue

to improve.

Finally, this is my last official announcement as School Council

President - my son is moving on to High School at the end of

this year. Ray Varone is taking over from me untill the

elections at the first Council meeting next year. She is a long

standing parent member of the Council and I trust she will

enjoy the same support I have.

Best wishes for the New Year, and seasons greetings to you

and your family.

Thanks,

David Hook

School Council President

Footscray Primary School

Staff Car Park

A reminder to all families that the

staff car par is strictly for staff

only. Students, parents and carers

are not to enter the staff carpark

under any circumstances. We

understand it can be difficult to

find a car park during busy times

but the safety of our students must

come first. This includes walking

and riding bikes through the car

park.

At pick up and drop off times

please use pedestrian gates

provided on Commercial Rd,

located at after school care and

near the Greenwood building or on

Herbert st. There are also

accessible double gates on

Commercial Rd for bicycle access.

During school hours, please

access the school via the main

gates on Geelong Rd.

Lost Property

A reminder to families to please

check lost property regularly for

missing items. With the weather

warming up we seem to have a

large collection of school jumpers

that have not been collected. Any

lost property that has not been

collected by the end of term will be

taken to charity.

Readathon Update

We are very excited to share some of our recent literacy

purchases as a result of our highly successful Readathon!

Based on Mark’s intensive research into student interests and

requests, Units of Inquiry and teacher requests for Mentor Texts

to support literacy teaching, we have purchased a wide range of

books to stock up our school library.

We have also purchased: guided reading sets for small targeted

teaching groups in Reading for Years 3-6.

Decodable Big Books to support the teaching of

phonemic awareness and decoding strategies.

Guided reading sets from the Yarnin’ Strong series for

Years 3-6.

We are also very excited to share that we have purchased

$2000 worth of Take-Home Reading books for F-4.

And this is only the beginning!

Stay tuned for more updates on our Readathon fundraising

purchases!

Kathy Winton

Teaching and Learning Leader

Well Done Steve

Congratulations to FPS parent

Steve Mitchell, who recently

won the 2019 John Hinde Award

for Excellence in Science Fiction

Writing (Unproduced) for his script,

COWTOWN.

Steve studied filmmaking at VCA

and professional screenwriting at

RMIT. He directed The Unusual

Suspects, a finalist at the Tropfest

Film Festival, and wrote and

produced the acclaimed low-

budget feature The Heckler, which

won an award at the LA Comedy

Festival.

Steve received the award at

the Australian Writers’ Guild’s

inaugural Powerhouse Mixer

event at the Powerhouse

Museum’s Apollo 11 Exhibition in

Sydney.

Well done, Steve!

Patrick’s Memory Tree

In loving memory of Patrick Gordon-Martinez, the school community has planted a Corymbia

Citriodora - a lemon-scented gum - in the garden at the front of the school. When it grows, the tree

will be a tall one, reminding us of Patrick, who was often the tallest in his class.

A few weeks ago, Year 4 students, some of Patrick’s friends from Year 5, parents and a few of

Patrick’s former teachers, gathered around the newly planted tree. The children brought with them

hand-drawn memories on circles of recycled cardboard. There were lots of pictures of bikes, books,

Dogman, fast cars, soccer balls, a campfire, and even a taco or two. After a short reflection, each

child tied their circle around the tree, hanging their memories side by side.

All students are invited to continue to visit the tree, not only in memory of Patrick, but of other

people, events or things that now live in their memories. The stakes surrounding the tree are slowly

being ‘yarn-bombed’ with finger knitting. Other students and families are welcome to add to this at

any time.

School Calendar – Term 4, 2019

*F-6 students commence Term 1 on Thursday 30th of January, 2020.

MONDAY TUESDAY WEDNESDAY THURSDAY FRIDAY

Week

9

2 December

Year 2

Incursion

3 4

5

6

Year 6 Big Day

Out

3:05PM Assembly

Week

10

9 10

Moving Up Day

F-5 students

Year 6 transition

Day

11

Year 5/6 Camp Foundation 2020 Transition Session & picnic 4:30PM Whole school picnic

12

Year 5/6 Camp

13

Parent Helpers

Morning Tea

Year 5/6 Camp

3:05PM Assembly

Newsletter

Week

11

16 17

Year 6

Graduation

Dinner &

Ceremony

Foundation

Incursion

18 19

Whole School

Sports Day

20

12:45PM

Assembly

Last Day of

Term* 1:30PM

finish

2020 Concert Band Program

Concert Band Program 2020 Registrations are open! Is your child going to be in Grade 3-6 in 2020

and interested in learning a Concert Band instrument and learning in a group with their friends?

Chasing Sound Music School has lessons available at our Barkly Street premises on the following:

flute, clarinet, saxophone, trumpet, trombone, bass guitar and percussion. No hire fee for these

instruments, merely the cost of tuition. Register your interest for this Program by visiting

www.chasingsound.com.au and clicking the pop-up link. Call Chasing Sound on 8317 1086 for

more information!