Principal's Blog 29 April 2022

Dear Members of the Yarra Valley Grammar Community

Its my great pleasure to welcome everyone back to school for Term 2. On the first day back, I visited classrooms across the school from Prep to Year 12 and am delighted to report that the students were very quickly back in classroom mode.

A lot happened at the end of last Term here at Yarra to support some of our many charities.

YVGS Charities

• Yarra’s Great Shave involved more than 260 secondary students in shaving or coloring their hair on the last day of Term in support of the Leukemia Foundation. I offer a special thanks to Mr Scott Kertes who led the team with great support from a number of staff and our student leaders. We are still collating the full amount of funds raised, but currently the figure looks just over $18,000.
• The inaugural Run4Fun @Yarra was held on Saturday 9 April, with more than 360 students, staff, families and wider community gathered to run/walk at Yarra in support of the RCH Good Friday Appeal. It was a stunning day and with great support from the Hopkins family, Rosie Brown, the Sport Department and Grounds team, and numerous staff and student volunteers we’ve raised more than $13,000.
• On Friday 15 April, 500+ students and parents (and YOG’s), supported by a team of 25 staff, came to YVG on the morning of Good Friday to collect on behalf of the Pied Pipers for the Royal Children’s Hospital Good Friday Appeal. We have once again won the Pied Pipers trophy by collecting more than $31,000.
• We have had a wonderful response from students wanting to be involved in the Refugee Tutoring program which we run in conjunction with Mitcham Primary School. Each Wednesday afternoon a minibus load of students give up their afternoon to help primary school students with language skills and a variety of learning activities. Ms Sally Younes is heading up the program this year and we thank our students for giving of their time.

COVID Rules for Schools

• Face masks
  As announced last week, face masks, while recommended, are not required in any school setting. This means students in Grades 3 to 6, staff and visitors in primary schools are no longer required to wear face masks. Any student or staff member who wishes to wear a mask can do so, including those who are medically at-risk.
• Screening requirements
  Students and staff who have tested positive for COVID-19, and have completed their 7-day isolation period, now do not need to undertake rapid antigen test (RAT) screening for 12 weeks after their release from isolation. This was previously 8 weeks.
• Household contacts
  Students and staff who are household contacts of a COVID-19 case are no longer required to quarantine. They can return to school as long as they undertake rapid antigen tests 5 times within their 7-day period and wear face masks indoors if they are aged 8 and above, unless they have a valid exemption. If any household contact returns a positive RAT result during this period, they must isolate for 7 days and not attend school.
• Vaccination requirements for visitors to schools
  Parents, carers and other adult visitors (not performing work) are no longer required to show evidence of two doses of COVID-19 vaccine.
• Community use of school facilities
  Schools will no longer need to request evidence of vaccination of staff or workers from external community groups who use premises outside the school’s normal operating hours.
• RAT screening program extension reminder
  The supply of RATs will continue for the first 4 weeks of this term. The screening recommendations remain the same, at mainstream schools – recommended to test at home twice a week.

Winter Uniform

This week is our transition from summer to winter uniform. This means that next week, all students will have changed to winter uniforms. This is a good time to remind our students that our Yarra students are NEVER poorly dressed in their school uniform. This is doubly important in the public domain where the uniform is an outward expression of our school community. Our Year 9 students travel into the city next week for their City Experience; each year I receive very positive feedback from the public about student conduct and presentation. I know I can rely on them to represent their school well.

New Staff

I am delighted to announce the new recruits to our faculty:

Mr. Paul Runting Head of Junior School

Mr. Max Humphries Teacher of Humanities in the Secondary School

Mr. David Teakle Teacher of Mathematics in the Secondary School

Ms. Kate Phillips Teacher of Music in the Junior School

Ms. Sammie Janky Learning Assistant in the Secondary School

I look forward to a great Term ahead.

Best wishes

Dr Mark Merry
Principal