Three Southern Steel / Silver Ferns players visited us on Monday. Thanks to the North Otago Netball Centre, Miss Tangney and Mrs Brien for making this happen. Our netball players were delighted to have a training session with the Silver Ferns.
Sent by Christ
Some of our staff are participating in the parish prayer/reflection program "Sent by Christ." We are meeting early on a Wednesday morning to reflect and pray for 3/4 of an hour before we start our school day. It is awesome. Thank you Mrs Plieger for organising it for us.
Sports Coordination
Please be aware that Miss Pope's normal hours of work are 9.00 am to 3.00 pm on a Tuesday. She is not available to take messages or discuss St Joseph's sports outside of these times. That means email or Facebook messages. She has another job and cannot talk about St Joseph's business at her place of work. We have to respect the boundaries of her job. I know that we are still in a changeover and the hours have been cut (beyond our control) but we sometimes have to be patient. The touch draw used to be emailed to us and now we have to keep checking their Facebook page to see when its out. We've asked for it to be emailed as its a much smoother communication system. Please be patient and respect Miss Pope's non-work time. Thank you.
Our sports liaisons will be hearing from us soon and we will be starting the process of getting our Winter teams underway.
Our Budget for 2017
Yesterday Sharni Cunningham (BOT Treasurer), Anne Rzepecky (Office Manager) and myself attended a finance and budget workshop in Timaru. It was very useful and actually quite interesting. One of the things we learnt is that it is a good idea to share your budget with your community and let them know what you are spending your money on. This is pretty dry stuff but you should know, so here it is. This may explain why we completely rely on community and personal voluntary contributions to make the school run.
| INCOME | |
| 010 Government Grants | 385,276 |
| 020 Investment Income | 500 |
| 030 Trading (hiring out hall) | 2,400 |
| 040 Fundraising (mainly from Home and School) | 14,000 |
| 050 Activities (contributions made by families) | 10,240 |
| 412,416 | |
| EXPENDITURE | |
| 055 Discretionary Welfare | 0 |
| 060 Library | 1,700 |
| 070 Teaching Resources (includes books, swimming, PE equipment, photocopying, teaching materials, assessment materials, student leadership etc) | 36,700 |
| 072 Professional Development (see notes below) | 27,900 |
| 075 ICT Plan (leasing of Chromebooks and ipads) | 24,500 |
| 080 Equipment Repairs | 2,500 |
| 090 Staff Expenses - board funded extras for teaching and learning (see notes below) | 136,758 |
| 100 General | 1,500 |
| 110 Communications (phone, internet, post) | 4,000 |
| 120 BOT Expenses (training, small fee paid per person per meeting, principal appraisal) | 11,250 |
| 130 Audit Fee | 6,084 |
| 140 Admin Consumables | 13,500 |
| 150 Non-teaching support staff | 47,000 |
| 160 Administration (insurance, copyright fees etc) | 12,615 |
| 170 Caretaking & Cleaning (materials, rubbish removal etc) | 4,300 |
| 180 Light, Heat & Water | 16,300 |
| 190 Grounds (mowing and upkeep) | 4,300 |
| 200 Repairs & Maintenance | 21,600 |
| 210 Capital Purchase | 0 |
| 220 Staff Wages (caretakers, cleaners) | 40,592 |
| 230 Fundraising on behalf of | 1,300 |
| 240 Activities (the balance that we do not get back from parents for camp, technology, other school activities) | 5,747 |
| 420,146 | |
| Operating Surplus/(-Deficit) | -7,730 |
Notes: We are running a small deficit budget this year. which we will not make a practice obviously. We are doing that on purpose knowing that 2017 is a rebuild and consolidation year. We want to make sure our teaching staff are well supported and receiving quality professional development so that we can grow and continue to reach the excellent standards we all expect from St Joseph's School - reaching for the stars as lifelong learners in the Catholic faith.
Professional Development Expenses $27,900
Professional development in 2017 will include:
- Masters papers for senior and experienced staff in Applied Collaborative and Digital learning so that we can lead the school effectively into the future.
- Training and resourcing in a consistent and deep phonics (sound to letter / spelling / reading) development for all of the junior teachers. Further development of spelling programs for senior learners.
- Training in Special Education Needs - in depth learning support development for our SENCO
- Training in Mindfulness - one of our staff will become a certified Mindfulness educator and lead the rest of the staff. We are doing this because the times we live in mean our children are bombarded with stimulation on all fronts and various forms of media play a big part in our children's lives - which has advantages and disadvantages. We are noticing that our children often find it difficult to settle to schoolwork and need to develop attention span and resilience. We want to help our children to centre and be truly present in the moment and take control of themselves and their lives.
- Training in Autism for all staff.
- Development in understanding and meeting the needs of English Language Learners.
- All staff are also working towards the Diploma in Religious Education
It is a big year as you can see and we are dedicating a huge amount of resource and energy into investing into the future of our school and into the future of your children. This is why in 2017 we must stay focused on our primary goals because they are actually big goals and should make a big difference in the long run.
Board funded extra personnel for teaching and learning $136,758
This includes:
- Our contribution to reading recovery provision (we do also get some Government assistance)
- Extra release for staff to help with professional development
- Leadership release for leadership staff for developing the school and raising/maintaining standards.
- Funding for extra teaching to meet enrichment and learning needs
- Funding for our teacher aides - we are very generously funded for teacher aides. Each hub has a dedicated teacher aide who works with the hub teachers to support the learners within that hub. We are VERY lucky to have the level of teacher aide support and experience that we have available at St Joseph's.
So please do understand that we need your contribution. Also we cannot carry sports fees for you - if you sign up for sport and do not pay, that adds to our deficit. The parent contributions that we ask for are really needed to provide the standard of education that you and we require for your children. There are no frills. All frills are provided by the amazing Home and School - which is you, the parents, fundraising. Every school is in this boat, its how it goes.
I sincerely hope this newsblog hasn't been too dry and boring. I promise I won't talk about budget in the next one.
God bless,
Lorraine Frances-Rees
Principal
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