Forrest Primary School eNewsletter

Message from the Principal

Have a wonderful break!

We hope over the next two weeks you all get a chance to have a bit of a rest and spend some quality time with your children! If you are travelling, take care and we will see you all again on Tuesday 14^th October.

Floriade performance

Our year five and year six students performed at Floriade last Monday and did amazingly well! So well, they were featured on the ACT Education Directorate’s Facebook page I’m told. Our students excel at so many things (please see Nicola Sneddon’s piece in the newsletter on Limelight as another example) and it is joyful to see the look on their faces when they have met a challenge or a worry and overcome it.

Exhibition

Thank you for the wonderful attendance of parents at this week’s Exhibition parent information session. Exhibition is such an important milestone in children’s education in an IB Primary Years Programme school and seeing the support from parents here was astounding. We hope your year six children engage with you in some of the national institutions we have here in Canberra to support their Exhibition journey.

Prime Minister’s Spelling Bee

A huge congratulations to David in year six who came 16^th in his age group in the Prime Minister’s Spelling Bee! This is an amazing result in a national competition, again highlighting the excellence of our students here at Forrest.

Staffing

I will be away all of the first week, and a few days in the second week, as I have been seconded to the office to work with other principals on the annual teacher transfer round process. During this time Georgina Sofatzis and Nicole Jaggers will be jointly running the school. I’ll pop in every afternoon following this to catch up on any issues and support the team after hours.

P&C Fundraiser

A huge thanks to the volunteers who attended the recent Bunnings Sausage Sizzle fundraiser for our P&C, and especially to Tracy Thomas who coordinated the event. These fundraising opportunities support our school to have excellent resources which help us educate the children and enhance the experiences our families receive. We hope this fundraising will enable us to purchase a portable sound system which will support us at the end of year events such as the Colour Run (also organised by Tracy!), Shivoo and the year six graduation.

Chris

Big Action Week!

Week 9 was a massive week of supporting the Earlyact Club with their amazing fundraising events!

We had 8 different groups fundraising for 8 worthy causes. Events and causes included –

Collection of school supplies for Buk Bilong Pikini. An organisation that promotes literacy in Papua New Guinea -
Taking action in nature by planting trees in your community, entries went in to win a raffle prize!
A raffle that helped raise money for the Great Barrier Reef
An animal dress up day and collection of pet supplies to raise money/awareness for the RSPCA - $211
A talent show to raise money for the Red Cross - $221.50
A mufti/free dress day to raise money for sea turtles in Australia - $262
A cake stall to raise money for the Salvation Army - $398.45
A glow stick disco to raise money for Care Australia - $363.85

Thank you to the entire Forrest Primary community for supporting our Earlyact groups in raising awareness and funds for these amazing causes.

The Earlyact Club is already planning events for term 4, so keep your eyes peeled!

Limelight

It’s Time to Celebrate Our Students!

Ms Low and I had the absolute pleasure of taking 56 students from Years 3–6 on an incredible journey of creativity. Starting last term, students rehearsed a variety of songs and dances before participating in the Education Directorate’s Step into the Limelight showcase — a celebration of the performing arts in ACT public schools.

Our students worked with determination to learn the lyrics, perfect the choreography, and collaborate as a team. Their efforts culminated in two amazing nights of performances, sharing the stage with more than 1,500 students from across Canberra.

We are so proud of their hard work, dedication, and the joy they brought to the stage!

Nikki Sneddon, Art teacher