28 Jan 2017
Dear Families,
Welcome back to Plunkett Street Public School for 2017. The staff are very excited about the year ahead and look forward to working closely with you to support our students. As you may or may not know, there has been some staff changes this year.
After working with us for many years, in many capacities, Fran Campbell has decided on a "sea change" and has moved down the NSW South Coast. She snuck off in the Christmas holidays and therefore we have not been able to arrange a farewell get together for her. I am sure you will join me in wishing her all the best for her new adventure!
We welcome Allsion Fairweather who will be taking on the role of School Administration Officer for the term. During term 4 2016, Alli had intensive training in the new Department of Education administration and finance system and worked closely with Fran to implement the system into our school. I would like to thank Alli for taking on the role.
Kathy Armstrong has resigned from the Department of Education. Kathy also worked at Plunkett Street in many capacities for many years and we are very sorry to see her go. We will all miss her "creative flair" and her individual and small group support.
Kelly Birkett has accepted a three year tenure as a P-2 Initiatives Officer with the Department Education. Therefore we will not see her return until after 2019. We are in the process of advertising for an early childhood teacher and hope to know Kelly's replacement very soon. In the meantime, a very experienced early childhood teacher, Jane Thomas, will be working in the preschool alongside Meg Simmons our Learning and Support Officer.
We also welcome Raven Bendersky who is an experienced teacher who has worked in several schools across Sydney, most recently at Glenmore Rd Public School. Raven will be working on the Uluru class, and specifically Year 5 and 6 for literacy and numeracy.
Emma Gillogly will be taking on several different roles this year. She will be our Learning and Support teacher, our RFF teacher, our English as an Additional Language teacher, our Teacher Librarian and our sport teacher. To support our students, Emma will be taking the students in years 3 and 4 for Literacy and numeracy sessions each day. This allows all students 3-6 to have targeted, small group lessons in literacy and numeracy.
Tracey Butler will remain on the Kakadu class for the year. I will be supporting targeted students in the Kakadu class who need extra assistance or who have specific learning or support needs. I will also run the Reading Recovery program in term 2 and 3 for students in Year 1 needing additional literacy support.
Steve Smith returns as our Aboriginal Education Officer. He will be working across the school P-6.
I would warmly welcome you to our Term Launch Assembly this Friday 4th February at 9:30am. During this time the class teachers will introduce themselves and outline the terms curriculum.