8 March 2017

Newsletter Articles

Principal’s Thoughts

Wellbeing and a Sense of Belonging

To decide which school to enrol your child in is a big decision for any parent. Every parent wants their son or daughter to have friends, feel safe and have a sense of belonging towards the school in which they attend. It is a great feeling when your son and/or daughter comes home and tells you that they love going to school. At Helensvale High, student wellbeing and belonging is something that we deliberately try to create at our school and we invest significant resources to achieve this. Some of our wellbeing initiatives include:

• Employing three Guidance Officers to support student wellbeing and mental health needs
• Providing further support via school chaplains, health nurse, visiting psychologist, indigenous support person, family reconnect and facilitating access to other community health and wellbeing organisations
• Funding a Head of Positive Behaviour and employing six Deans (one for each year level) to support student wellbeing, behaviour and attendance
• Finding time in our curriculum each week to explicitly teach our learning values of respect, responsibility and resilience
• Structuring our timetable to ensure that students in Years 7 and 8 have a home room where nearly all lessons take place, have a fewer number of teachers and undertake a weekly wellbeing and health focus through the Body and Mind (BAM) subject taught to every student

Wellbeing is also promoted by communicating a sense of optimism and positivity about our school and about learning. As a principal, as teachers, if we cannot be optimistic about the future and positive about coming to school and learning, how can we expect our students to have these feelings? Some of the most important work that we can do as teachers and parents is to promote the values of optimism, positivity, resilience and hard work. These values will stand the test of time no matter what the future brings in terms of challenges, new technologies and new types of jobs.

A teacher recently sent me the picture of what was stuck on the locker of former Brisbane Broncos Captain Corey Parker. Reinforced here are some of these old-fashioned values that I believe can also promote a sense of wellbeing in our students because they are about actions and taking control of our own destiny. Doing positive things, taking control and being proactive about learning and life has to be good for our wellbeing, feelings of self-worth and sense of belonging.

Reporting Semester 1, 2017

Mid semester reports will be emailed to parents of all students from Years 7-12 on Friday 21st April 2017. If your email has recently changed please contact the school office on 5573 8555 to update your contact details.

Mid semester reports will include a grade for Effort, Behaviour, Homework and Level of Achievement.

Parent Teacher Interviews will be held over 2 nights. Years 7 and 8 on Wednesday 3rd May 2017 then Years 9-12 on Thursday 4th May 2017. Interviews begin at 3:30pm and finish at 7:30pm each night.

Parents or caregivers can book a 10 minute appointment with their student’s teachers on PTO which opens on Friday 28th April 2017. Information on how to book an appointment will be emailed at the same time as the reports. If you are unable to make or attend an appointment, then you may contact the teacher directly by email to discuss your student’s progress within the learning area.

Staff emails are available on the school website, just follow the link below.

Phil Baillie
HOD School Operations

Year 12 Unity Day

The annual year 12 team building day was held in week 5. The year 12 students spent the morning participating in numerous team activities on the oval including the Tug of War, Rob the Nest, Ski Walks to mention a few. The students enjoyed the activities immensely with some asking if we could do this every week. It was great to see the students strategising, co-operating, sabotaging rival roll classes, encouraging others and most importantly having fun.

The students were very fortunate to listen to two high quality guest speakers in Eric Bailey and Angela Lockwood. Eric spoke passionately about his difficulty growing up in South Central LA and how it is possible for all children to be successful and what the students can do to ignite a burning desire to be successful in their own life. Angela was easy to relate to, and open with students, bravely telling students how fracturing her skull as a 17 ended her dream of playing hockey at the Sydney Olympics and made her re-think her approach to life. She focussed on the importance of the students looking after their own mental and physical wellbeing.

The day concluded with each year 12 roll class performing a class 'chant'. Some highly entertaining performances were witnessed with some interesting dance moves and song lyrics. Fabulous to see almost all year 12 classes participating with 12Q the eventual winners.

Year 8 Drama Academy

Year 8 Drama Academy students are busily working on scenes from the Australian Play, Ithaca Road.

Ithaca Road is a play about young people in transition – from primary to high school, from small community to big town, from home to boarding school – Ithaca Road unpacks fears of change and explores strategies for resilience.

Miss Chambers’ and Mrs Phelan’s students are analysing, synthesising and creating deep characterisations to bring the scenes to life.

This work has been supported by the students Line Zero class on a Tuesday morning with Grin and Tonic Theatre Company and Mr Edwards- establishing and exploring their acting skills.

EXCITE 2018

Congratulations to the 150 Year 6 students who sat the Helensvale State High EXCITE Entrance Exam on Saturday 4 March.

Jordana Kelly, Guidance Officer, offered some excellent tips on mindfulness and coping with the pressures of exams to start the day. The students then ploughed through three exam papers covering written expression, problem solving, numeracy and reading comprehension.

Mr Blackshaw and our Year 12 student leaders were on hand to meet and greet every applicant on the day and wish them well.

We look forward to the sport, arts, e4e and Japanese trials starting Tuesday 14 March!

School’s Premier League ROUND 1 Wrap Up

Helensvale SHS' involvement in the Schools Premier League began last Wednesday, with the Junior Boys and Girls. They kicked off round 1 playing against Marsden SHS at Helensvale. This competition provides our Academy students with a great opportunity to compete in regular competition against some of the top footballing schools in QLD.

Although both sides were playing these matches as a trial (1st round byes), there was some quality football played by both sides. Our Juniors performed strongly with an 11-1 win in the girls and an 8-1 win in the boys, while the Senior fixtures were tense battles with a 3-1 win to our boys and a 3-3 draw for the girls. Helensvale SHS would like to thank Marsden SHS for making these games possible.

Well done to head football coach Mr McDonell and all the football staff and students for a fantastic day.

GIPSA Sport kicks off in 2017

1500 Helensvale State High School students are about to launch into another interschool sport season. Helensvale State High has won the Greater Independent Public School Alliance (GIPSA) Cup since the competition’s inception in 2015, and if enthusiasm is a precursor to success, Helensvale State High may again hold aloft the cup in 2017.

The GIPSA interschool sport competition is played against four high schools at various venues throughout the Gold Coast from Palm Beach to Mount Warren over 5 full days on a Friday in terms 1 and 2. Some of the sports on offer for the students are surfing/body boarding, cricket, rugby league and rugby union, AFL, netball, volleyball, snooker and competitive chess. All students who have shown interest in playing in a GIPSA team have met their coach. Some teams have even undertaken trials and rigorous training sessions, to fine tune before the opening round scheduled for Friday 10th March (week 7).

If your son/daughter is taking part in GIPSA, medical notes and code of conduct forms need to be returned to their GIPSA coach as soon as possible. Without the return of this information your child will be unable to board the bus for GIPSA.

Look out for photos, videos and result updates on our Facebook page during GIPSA days to see how your son or daughter’s team is going. See the snapshot of our students competing in GIPSA in 2016 below. Go the Vale!!

Helensvale High School Nursery Opening

Helensvale State High School Nursery is opening to all parents and friends of the school community. The School Nursery will be open for inspection and sales each Tuesday - Thursday from 8am to 2pm. All our plants for sale are proudly propagated and grown by the Helensvale High School Horticulture students. Finances raised are directed back into the school community. This funds Horticulture projects throughout the year and enables the course to be fee free for all students enrolled.

If you would like to come and inspect our School Nursery than please sign in at the main office as a visitor and they will direct you to the correct area.

You are more than welcome to email at spaec2@eq.edu.au if you would like further information and an updated stock list or to organise a personal tour of our facilities.

We look forward to meeting you.

Steve Paech
Horticulture Teacher

News from our Industry Liaison

Tyla Ford – Nurse in training

Tyla has completed her Certificate II & III in Health Assistance through the Northern Collegiate Health Program hosted at Coombabah SHS each week for the last 14 months. Her teacher Gary Wellman feels she is going to make a wonderful nurse in the very near future and had this to say about her. “As I am nearly ready to retire; I can see that one day I may be requiring nursing care. If Tyla walked into my room to look after me I would relax, knowing her to be a motivated, caring, personable and professional person. I wish her well for her future academic studies and nursing career. She has been a pleasure to teach and has performed amazingly well in all the skills training and practical requirements of this course. She will graduate later this semester, as a qualified HSA ‘Assistant Nurse’, which will give her the prior knowledge required for either Diploma of Nursing, or Registered Nursing.”

Helensvale SHS has 25 students participating in this qualification through TAFE Gold Coast, which will make them employable upon leaving school, and while they continue studying at TAFE and University.

Tyla Ford, Nurse in training

Jessica McCann snorkels to success

Jessica McCann loves her traineeship with Whales/Dolphins in Paradise, with very good reason!

Jessica alternates between Tangalooma on Moreton Island in the Summer and Surfers Paradise in the Winter.

Her role varies, and includes customer service ie receiving payment and serving meals; bar work; and also being a snorkel guide, lifeguard and part of the boat crew.

Jessica already had a great deal of experience before applying for this position, as she has spent most of her young life on and in the water.

If you would like a traineeship in something that you love to do and a VP or APP Year 11 student – make an appointment with the Industry Liaison in CB08

Marine Studies out on the Water

Year 12 Marine Studies got out sailing and on the Aqua- Splash inflatable course as part of their studies. Check out their adventures below.

2017 Next Step survey

The Queensland Government is conducting its annual statewide survey of all students who completed Year 12 in 2016. The Next Step survey is a brief, confidential survey that gains a comprehensive picture of the employment, study and life choices made by Queensland school completers in the year after they finish Year 12.

Between March and June, all our students who completed Year 12 last year can expect to receive instructions to complete a web-based survey or a telephone call from the Queensland Government Statistician’s Office to complete the survey. We encourage all 2016 Year 12 students to take part. Thank you in advance for your support of the Next Step survey in 2017.

Further information on Next Step is available online at the link below or on toll free telephone 1800 068 587.

Entertainment Book Fundraising for Helensvale SHS

It is that time of the year again; the Entertainment Book for 2017 is available for purchase. This book is just $60, but comes with over $20,000 worth of value! They can be purchased by visiting:

If you buy a book online, simply come to the admin office with your proof of purchase and collect it. If you purchase the digital book, this means you will have all of the vouchers accessible on a handy app.

20% of the funds raised go towards fundraising projects within the school. Buy before Thursday the 30th March to take advantage of the early bird offer and receive an additional pack of vouchers absolutely free!!