From the Principal

Tena koutou katoa. Nga mihi nui atawhai.

Alert Level 2 is here – and we are returning to learning onsite. It will be an almost strange experience after being restricted to our own small bubbles for so many weeks.

We have been busy making all the preparations for the students returning to the college site. We are conscious that, after this period of time, we are not going to be able to just launch straight into the learning programmes and not give students some time to adjust to this new ‘normal’.

We will begin Monday with Atawhai time – time to reconnect and to share what this experience has meant for them. We also want to make sure everyone understands how the school will be operating at this Alert Level. We have updated the student information sheet for Alert L2 and all students will be given a copy to read and sign at the beginning of the day. This will also be posted on our website and in all google classrooms so that students and parents can refer to it again at any time.

Our AskYourTeam survey has given us some insights into how our community was feeling about the online learning. Our parents had a participation rate of 24%. The responses to the statements about ease of access to the online learning material, communication from the college, effectiveness of the online timetable were all very positive – with an average agreement rate of 78% (range from 86% to 71%).

The students had a participation rate of 47%. Their responses to the statements about ease of connecting to teachers and peers, ability to focus on their learning and the online timetable were also positive – with an overall average of 70% (range from 83% to 52%). Their response to selecting where they thought they were at in their learning showed 84% were on track and were either all up to date or just had a few things to complete. That was very reassuring as we return to learning onsite.

The staff participation rate was 67% and they had an average of 83% in agreement to statements about wellbeing, teaching online and communications. Again, very reassuring.

We still have some analysis to do on the free text responses and we will review these responses to include them in our future planning.

We look forward to welcoming all of our staff and students on Monday.