DUFFY PRIMARY SCHOOL

NEWSLETTER 11 - WEEK 6 TERM 4

UP & COMING EVENTS

Preschool Wombats End of Year Celebration (Friday, December 13)
Preschool Possums End of Year Celebration (Monday December 16
Last day of School Year (Tuesday, December 17)

2025

Uniform Shop Open (31 January 8.30-10am)

Preschool Possum Class and Kindergarten start school (Monday 3rd February)
Continuing Students return to school (Tuesday 4th February)
Preschool Wombat Class start school (Thursday 6th February)

Did you know?

You can find notes on our website.

Click here for school notes!

EXEC TEAM'S MESSAGE

Dear Duffy School Community,

I can’t believe I’m already writing an end-of-year message! I’m sure many of you, like me, are wondering where 2024 has gone.

We bid farewell to our Year 6 graduates as they head off to various high schools in Canberra and other parts of the country. It has been a privilege to be part of their journey, and they have all contributed to the Duffy School story in a positive way. We wish them all the very best and look forward to seeing them again in the future and hearing about their achievements. We also extend our best wishes to any other students and families leaving Duffy at the end of this year.

A huge thank you to parents, carers, and friends who have supported students and staff this year. Your understanding, patience, and contributions of time and effort do not go unnoticed and play a significant role in building strong partnerships as we all strive to do the very best for our students.

On behalf of the staff, we would like to express our gratitude to the community for your support of Duffy Primary School throughout 2024.

End of Semester Reports

On Monday 9th December, all families should have received end of semester reports for 2024 via email. We congratulate all students for their many achievements. If you have not received a report for your child/ren, please check your junk folder and then contact the front office - duffyps@ed.act.edu.au

Staff Farewell

We would like to share with the school community our staff changes for 2025. We bid farewell to some amazing team members who are moving on to new schools in the ACT or taking leave.

Congratulations to Ryan Weir, Ben Peel, Sarah Burke, and Claudia Robinson, who have successfully secured positions at new schools in 2025. Vicki Shaw and Samuel Crowe will also be taking twelve months of leave.

We also say goodbye to Jenna, Issy, Shiara, and Gabby from our Learning Support Team, as well as John, who has been our IT support.

A huge thank you to these staff members for their dedication and commitment to their students. You will be missed by the Duffy PS community.

New Teachers for 2025

Next year we welcome a number of new teachers to Duffy PS. Dan Gatwood, Josh Smith, Sammy Noble, Lauren Lutton and Catherine Moore join our team. We are very excited to have secured such quality educators for 2025.

Class Visits for 2025

Duffy's annual Class visit day took place yesterday, an exciting event where students get a glimpse into 2025 by meeting their prospective teaching teams. This session was thoughtfully designed to support a smooth transition into the next school year, helping students approach 2025 with confidence and enthusiasm.

During Class Visits for 2025 yesterday, students spent time participating in activities led by their likely teachers for the upcoming year. While specific teacher and class allocations weren't shared on this day, the activities are aimed at fostering familiarity and easing transitions to set the stage for a successful start in the new academic year.

Dan Gatwood

Josh Smith

Sammy Noble

Lauren Lutton

Catherine Moore

To further support this process, in Week 10, your child (K- Year 5) will receive a post card from their 2025 teacher. Kindergarten students will receive a personalised letter from their class teacher via the mail in the New Year. Please know that the placement of students with teachers has been undertaken with great care, considering each child’s unique needs. We value your trust and understanding in this important process.

Staff at Duffy Primary School 2025

Preschool

Possums - Ferzana Shaikh

Wombats - Ferzana Shaikh

Preschool Relief - Nat Clendenning

Kindergarten

K Green - Wendy Driver

K White - Brooke Sedgmen

K Blue - Claire Stevens

Year 1

1 Green - Karla Jensen

1 White - Emily Toze

1 Blue - Katie Withers

Year 2

2 Green - Lucy Kelly

2 White - Carla Magro

Year 3

3 Green - Dale Larsen

3 White - Rose Lee

3 Blue - Lauren Lutton

Year 4

4 Green - Teagan Gaukroger

4 White - Rachel Pummeroy

Year 5

5 Green - Pipp Hall

5 White- Sammy Noble

Year 6

6 - Josh Smith

6 - Kristy Williamson

6 - Dan Gatwood

Griffin

Griffin Green - Catherine Moore

Specialist teachers

French - Katrina Sinclair

PE - Chris Currie

Sustainability - Ilse Arellano

Music - Kylie Brown

EALD - Bridie Morrell

Literacy/Library - Catherine Nash

Start of Term 1 Dates 2025

Friday 31 January 2025 - Pupil free day

Monday 3rd February 2025

First day for:

Preschool Possums (beginning of the week class)
Kindergarten
New students to Duffy Primary School

Tuesday 4th February 2025 - All students return.

Thursday 6th February 2025 - First day for Preschool Wombats (end of the week class)

We would appreciate that if you do notice any activity around the school over the break that looks out of place or evidence of vandalism, you please report to the police.

On behalf of the staff, we would like to wish our community a safe and relaxing holiday period and we look forward to seeing those of you returning in 2025.

Warm Regards,

Katie, Arilia, Sarah and Fiona

YEAR 6 GRADUATION

Congratulations to our Year 6's to graduating this week! It was a fun filled day with their Graduation Ceremony in the morning, a Laser tag and Pizza excursion. We wish them all the best in high school!

P&C COLOUR RUN

The Colour Run was a great success! As always, we are so thankful for our wonderful P&C for organising and helping put together the day. Also a big thank you to the parents who volunteered their time for it. Our students had so much fun and went home super colourful!

A MESSAGE FROM THE BUSINESS MANAGER

STATIONERY PACKS for 2025

Payment can be made by Direct Deposit, Quickweb, credit card or cash at the front office or the Parent Portal. If you have not yet registered for Parent Portal, which allows you to make part-payments, the front office is happy to support you through the process.

RIDING TO SCHOOL

Please remind your child/children, if they ride their bike to school, to use the spider playground entry gate. Some children are still riding through the carpark, and I have witnessed some near misses with cars.

SECURITY

Keeping our children safe at school requires that EVERYONE (including parents) coming into the school need to sign in and sign out at the front office.

Alice Lollback – Business Manager

E: alice.lollback@ed.act.edu.au

Phone: 6142 2513

SCHOOL BOARD NOTICES

As another school year draws to a close, the Duffy School Board would like to share our gratitude to the wonderful staff, students and community of Duffy Primary School. It is an absolute privilege to represent our incredible school and 2024 has been another outstanding year of growth and achievement for the students at Duffy. We wish you all a joyous, rejuvenating and safe holiday season, filled with family and friends.

Best wishes,

Duffy School Board

School Board Vacancies

POSITIONS VACANT: Duffy Primary School Board Members

The Duffy Primary School Board is responsible for setting the strategic direction of the school and acting in the best interests of the school and its students.

The board meets regularly throughout the year and is comprised of representative members from various stakeholder groups e.g. parent/caregiver members, P&C association and/or local community members and staff members.

Several board positions will become vacant in March 2025, and we will seek nominations in early Term 1 to fill the following roles:

· 2x staff member – with a term of 2 years

· 1x parent member – with a term of 2 years

· 1x P&C member – with a term of 2 years

To learn more about the roles and responsibilities of board members, visit the School Boards page.

Further information about the nomination process will be provided early Term 1.

SCHOOL ANNOUNCEMENTS

Parent Portal is now available as a mobile app!

You can now access Parent Portal with the Sentral for Parents app. Download Sentral for Parents for free through the App Store or Google Play Store

Parent Portal is a secure online platform used to share student information between you and your child’s teachers.

If you’ve already registered, you can download the Sentral for Parents app to receive notifications when new information is available.

If you haven’t registered for Parent Portal yet, use this Parent Portal access link to log into or create your ACT Digital Account. To access Parent Portal, you will need your access key, you should have received this by email when we launched

If you can’t find the email with the access key, please contact the front office team for help.

Some reminders about what you can do with Parent Portal:

notify us if your child is sick or explain an absence
book parent-teacher interviews
receive academic reports
receive our school newsletter
receive messages from your child’s teachers
make payments
access the school calendar and your child’s student timetable.

Head to our website for all the details: Parent Portal - Duffy Primary School (duffyps.act.edu.au)

School Uniform

The School Board endorses the wearing of uniform as it is part of the school ethos of helping to create a sense of belonging and pride in the school and so engender a positive school spirit. Students at Duffy Primary School are encouraged to wear their school uniform or school colours each day.

Students must be in uniform when attending excursions or outside events; this is to ensure their safety. When parents complete permission notes for excursions or school events, they are acknowledging this requirement.

MESSAGE FROM ACT DIRECTORATE

The ACT public school term dates for 2026-2030, including student-free days, are now available on the Education Directorate’s website. Each year, the first day of every term is a student-free day. We use student-free days for staff development, enabling us to plan in a student-free environment.

Use these dates when planning your future holidays.

Free Period Products Available at ACT Schools

All ACT public schools are stocked with free period products so students can access them no matter their circumstances. This is part of the ACT Government’s commitment to ensuring students feel comfortable and confident within our schools.

Free period products are available at our school’s front office. Students can access them at any time by talking to our helpful front office staff.

Sanitary pads are available from the front offices of primary schools, while pads and tampons are available at the front offices of high schools and colleges.

Because menstruation is a fact of life, we believe free access to period products should be too.

To learn more about this equity initiative and other places where free period products are available, please visit: https://www.act.gov.au/community/women/free-period-products

A MESSAGE FROM DUFFY P&C

Uniform Shop

Have you got your uniforms sorted for next year? Don’t worry! Although the uniform shop is closed until next year for stocktake, you can still place your orders online through Flexischools and they will be filled in the new year.

The shop will also be open on Friday 31st January 8.30 to 10.30 to get any last minute items before school starts.

If you are doing a cupboard clear out and have some uniforms that no longer fit but are still in good condition, please consider donating to the uniform shop. Donations can be left at the school reception during office hours.

The uniform shop is run by the P&C volunteers with all funds raised going back into the school. Thank you for your support and we hope everyone enjoys the summer holidays!

End of Year Wrap Up

Another year has passed seeing the P&C donate a lot of time and money to the school. What did we do?

Thank you to ALL volunteers throughout the year who have helped to make these events successful for our kids and community. We are already looking ahead to 2025 and some of the things we are aiming for. Apart from our business as usual, we are looking at another author visit, junior school nature playground upgrades and soccer goals on the oval.

We always welcome new attendees to our meetings and committee – “obligation free”! If you would like to have a chat about anything, please email duffypandc@gmail.com.

Happy Holidays from the P&C Committee

Find the Duffy Primary Parents and Citizens Association on

Facebook!

@duffypandc

Don’t forget to connect with your Year level parent community on Facebook – this is a great way to stay connected, get year/school specific information and even organise gatherings.

Just search “DPS Year” on google and the groups will pop up, or head to the Duffy Primary Parents and Citizens Facebook page for more info.

SCHOOL LEADERS

Prime Minister

Racquel S

Deputy Prime Minister

Ma'asi T

Opposition Leader

Ella B

Deputy Opposition Leader

Colin F

Speaker

Rain T

COMMUNITY ANNOUNCEMENTS

2025 School Year Equity Fund Now Open

To ease the pressure of back-to-school costs, eligible Canberra families can apply now for 2025 Future of Education Equity Fund payments.

The Equity Fund supports eligible low-income families and independent students from preschool through year 12 with a one-off, annual payment to help cover the costs associated with schooling such as uniforms, sport equipment and activities, tuition and music lessons.

The 2025 school year payments for eligible families are $400 (preschool), $500 (primary school), and $750 (high school and college).

Payments of completed applications will begin earlier than previous years, with the first payments to families expected from 6 January 2025.

Families will have until the end of November 2025 to apply for the Fund. Check your eligibility and find more information about supporting documents on the Equity Fund webpage.

Save the Date – Safer Internet Day 2025: Together for a Better Internet

Mark your calendars! Safer Internet Day (SID) is on Tuesday 11 February 2025. The theme is “Together for a better internet.” This event helps make the internet safer and more positive, especially for kids and young people. In Australia, the eSafety Commissioner leads this day. It's a great way to start the school year with a focus on online safety.

When you sign up, you’ll get ready-to-use content for school newsletters, social media, posters, and flyers. You’ll also get fun resources like activities, virtual classrooms, and teaching tools to help you talk to students about online risks, how to report harmful content, and the importance of being kind online. Register online through Safer Internet Day 2025.

Let’s work together to make the internet safer for everyone! If you have questions or need help with online safety education in your school, contact the Online Safety (eSafety) Education team on EDUeSafety@act.gov.au.

Parentline ACT

Parentline ACT offers free and confidential telephone counselling for parents and carers in the Australian Capital Territory. This service provides guidance and assistance on various parenting issues, ensuring you have the support you need with no appointment necessary. Parentline ACT is open on Monday to Friday from 9:00 am to 4:00 pm. For support, call (02) 6287 3833.

Learning For Life

The flyer below shares information about an opportunity that has been made available to families at our school called the Learning for Life Scholarship Program. It’s run by the Smith Family organisation. They provide financial support to families who are eligible to help with costs related to education, such as book packs, uniforms and excursions. They also provide access to education programs that can further support your child.

To be eligible, you must;