Dear Parents and Caregivers,

Parents and Wantoks

The Parents and Wantoks first meeting for 2025 will be held next Tuesday February 18 at 6:00pm. The Parents and Wantoks Committee add a great deal of value to our school, and indeed other schools across Lihir. This is a fantastic opportunity for families to become involved in contributing to school events throughout the year.  

School Council

The Annual General Meeting of the School Council will be held on Thursday 20 February 2025. At this meeting, voting for the vacant position for 1 Parent Representative will occur, in the Yr 9/10 room from 6.00pm. Nomination forms are available from the school office and must be returned to the school office ASAP. If you would like to know more about the functions of the School Council, please make an appointment to see the principal.

After School Sport / Activities

My apologies, in the toksave last week, I said High School would be doing basketball this term, please disregard they will in fact be be doing volleyball commencing next Monday afternoon. Other after school activities for this term include Arts and Craft (Ms Saur and Ms Yip) and Religion lessons (Mrs R-D); a note regarding these activities went home this week. Please note all of these activities will commence next Monday 17 February.

Parent / Carer Contacts

We would like all parents to ensure that they have current and up to date contact details for the school. Please see Lorna in the office if you need to update your details - especially email addresses.  If parents hear of other parents not receiving school communication, please direct them to contact the principal.

Regards,

Mr Kevin Collins 

SCHOOL HOURS Prep - 6

Official school times are:

8.10 Bell rings

8.10 – 8.15 Home room (Assembly on Friday)

8.15 – 10.35 First session

10.35 – 11.05 Recess (15 minutes eating followed by 15 minutes play)

11.05 – 12.35 Second session

12.35 – 1.20 Lunch (15 minutes eating followed by 30 minutes play)

1:20 – 3.00 Third Session

3.00 End of school day

SCHOOL HOURS 7 - 10

Official school times are:

8.10 Bell rings

8.10 – 8.15 Home room (Assembly on Friday)

8.15 – 10.05 Two periods

10.05 – 10.35 Recess (10 minutes eating followed by 20 minutes play)

10.35 – 1.20 Three periods

1.20 – 2.00 Lunch (10 minutes eating followed by 30 minutes play)

2.00 – 2.55 Third Session

2.55 – 3.00 Home room

3.00 End of school day

2025

Term 1 Monday 27 January to Thursday 3 April

Term 2 Tuesday 22 April to Thursday 19 June

Term 3 Monday 14 July to Thursday 18 September

Term 4 Monday 6 October to Thursday 4 December

• Week 4: P&W Meeting (Tuesday 18 February)
• Week 4: School Council AGM (Thursday 20 February)
• Week 7: NAPLAN testing for year 3, 5 and 7 students
• Week 10: Parent / Teacher Interviews
• Afternoon activities: High School Volleyball, Primary Art and Craft, Religion, Swimming Lessons. More information to be provided.

PE lessons

This term, all primary classes from prep – year 6 will be participating in swimming lessons. High school will do swimming from weeks 2-7 and volleyball weeks 8-10. Students will need to bring appropriate swimming attire, towel, thongs/slippers. If a student is unable to swim, please notify their respective class teacher or myself Judith.Meauri@newmont.com .

 PE days are as follows:

Monday – year 1/2

Tuesday – 3/4

Wednesday – year 9/10

Thursday – Prep and year 7/8

Friday – year 5/6

If you have any questions about sport or swimming, please do not hesitate to contact me.

After school and Saturday sport

After school activities for this term include Arts and Craft (Ms Saur and Ms Yip); Religion lessons (Mrs R-D); and High School Volleyball (Mrs Laien and Ms Baiwan). Due to the disruptions to the beginning of this term, these activities will now commence next week. A note regarding Arts and Craft and Religion lessons went home this week, please note numbers for these classes will be capped.

Kind regards,

Ms Judith Meauri (Sports Coordinator) 

After-school swimming

These will commence from Tuesday of week 2. Notes were distributed this week to students and were to be returned Thursday of this week. Please see schedule attached on this toksave.

Classes will be as follows:

• Babies / Water awareness – Must have an adult in the pool.  (20 minutes duration)
• Beginners level 1 / Learn-to-swim (ages 3.5 - 5) – Must have an adult in the pool.  (25 minutes duration)
• Beginners level 2/ Learn-to-swim (ages 6 - 8) – Must have a supervisor at the pool.  (30 minutes duration)
• Juniors: Ages 8 – 11:  Able to swim 25m freestyle and backstroke with aid - must have supervisor at the pool.  (35 minutes duration)
• Intermediates (ages 8-10) – Must have a supervisor at the pool.  (40 minutes duration)
• Advanced (ages 11+) – Must be competent in freestyle, breaststroke and backstroke; some younger children who demonstrate competent skills may be placed in this class. (50-60 minutes duration).

Kind regards,

Ms Judith Meauri  (Sports Coordinator)

The LIS library will be open for borrowing next week and we encourage all students to regularly borrow. Primary students do need to have a library bag. This will be provided to new students. Students can also return and borrow books at some lunchtimes.

Library days are as follows:

• Tuesday - Kindy and year 1/2
• Wednesday - year 5/6 and year 7
• Thursday - year 3/4 and year 8
• Friday - Prep
• Year 9/10 students do not have a set borrowing time; however, are encouraged to borrow at lunchtime.

Kind regards,

Ms Grace Savitas (Librarian).

Work Ready Program

Batch 1 of 2025 WRP Trainees have commenced the second week of training this week. The 17 Trainees are from different villages on Lihir main Island as well as the surrounding Islands within the Nimamar LLG of New Ireland Province. This is the first cohort for this year and we expect another 3 more cohorts throughout this year.

All the necessary pre-hire administrative requirements have been satisfactorily completed and the program has commenced as expected without any hurdles. This program will run for 8 weeks and end on the 28th of March 2025.

FODE

Our FODE program has also commenced lasat week and students are continuing at their own pace with assistance of the WRP Staff.

Kind regards,

Mr. David Wengip