Welcome to the start of the 2021 school year. 

A special welcome to all of our new students and their families, and especially to our year 8 students who have joined us for the beginning of their secondary schooling journey. 

In addition to the 100+ Year 7 students who have joined us from our transition program last year, we have also enrolled over 20 new students across year 8-12 and welcomed an additional 12 new families to our Renmark High School community this year.

We are also fortunate to welcome some new staff members to our team: Assistant Principal Hillary Trotter (who is looking after our school operations and the year 11 and 12s), and two teachers who come to us with year 7 experience, Damian McCarthy (Design and Technology, and Mathematics), and Becc Ward (HPE, English and Art).

It was terrific to see families who took the opportunity on Monday last week to meet new staff and to catch up with familiar faces.  Meeting the teachers is a great way to make those initial contacts and to reaffirm existing ones.  It was also an opportunity for parents and caregivers to check out our nearly completed new library space. 

The next formal opportunity for parents to talk to teachers are the three way discussions on student progress (parent interviews) in week 10 and 11 but please don’t wait until then to make contact if you have anything to discuss. As I said at our welcome night last week, it is much better to address any concerns early, so please let us know if your young person needs support as soon as possible. 

The construction of our new administration facility and student services also continued in earnest in the holidays.  With the new air conditioning, ceiling and lighting in C block almost finished, we will have some classrooms back in use and are expecting the rest next week.  The remainder of the new renovations are expecting be completed by June this year.

Renmark High School Swimming Carnival                           

Well done to all of the students who participated in our recent Renmark High School swimming carnival, and thankyou to the staff and parents who supported the day.  Congratulations to the swimmers who put in a terrific effort for their teams and those who will now be selected to represent our school in the interschool event.  Congratulations also to these four students, Alice, Brock, Jayden, and Colby who won the most dedicated award for their respective teams. For this prestigious award each team nominates a student who goes above and beyond to support their team on the day.  This commendable attitude and effort is an embodiment of our school motto “non nobis solum”, “not for ourselves alone”.  Well done!

Some timely reminders:

• The standard of the uniform has been fantastic on our return to the school, please keep this up.
• Attendance by students is an important factor in their success at school, the beginning of the year is a great time to set in place the habit of being at school on time each and every school day.
• Students are not permitted to leave the school to go down the street at lunchtime.  This is in the interests of the safety and wellbeing of our students. Students who truant from school (or from school off-site activities) put at risk their ability to participate in opportunities such as excursions and camps.
• DAYMAP is an important method of communication with families and we encourage all parents and guardians to make use of this service.  Instructions on accessing the DAYMAP program are attached to this newsletter, are available on our Facebook page and can be collected from the front office.  

Our newsletters will again be issued every 3 weeks and we encourage you to access them electronically from the Schoolzine app SZapp, DAYMAP or on our Facebook page. 

I am looking forward to working with students, staff, families and our community as we continue to make our fantastic school even better throughout this year!

Mat Evans

Principal