Introduction

Home/School Partnership – The Keys to Success!  At Glennie Heights SS we believe that education is a responsibility shared by Staff, Students & Parents/Caregivers.  We encourage parental collaboration in all school affairs.  Many staff invite parents/caregivers to work as volunteer aides in the classroom.  All staff welcome open, direct and honest communication between home and school in the appropriate manner and scheduled outside classroom time.

 Parents hold the first key to their child/children’s success.  Every child brings an attitude to learning that he/she has acquired in the home in their early years of learning.  Parents who share an interest in learning with their children impart in them an interest and enthusiasm for learning.  Children learn to communicate (read, write, view, talk, work mathematically and often in technological literacy) at home long before they come to school. 

Staff hold the second key – by developing effective teaching and learning opportunities using the variety of physical and human resources available to aid each child’s education and development in their quest to continue the work Parents commenced.

The third key is a partnership which fosters learning.  It is the interest Parents/Caregivers, the child and the staff take in the work undertaken at school and the commitment to ensuring the best education for all, given the physical and human resources with which we work.  The keys to success in any venture is in the partnerships and relationships forged between all participants.  The embedding of the “You Can Do It!” program with the Keys to Success taught explicitly throughout the year aid the whole school community in teaching necessary skills for children to realise that effort, skills and relationships equate to success. We give your child the best education we can with your full support in all aspects of school life.  The staff and I look forward to working in partnership with every family in positive and challenging learning opportunities that will take us into the future! 

Future outlook

As an IDEAS school, Glennie Heights is working towards the development of a "shared vision" with all members of its school community in order to provide a clearly understood, collective journey into the future.  This will involve Student, Parent and staff workshops in order to develop a mutual understanding to discover what we all identify as the significant aspects of our school that we value, what we all hold as shared ideals and to set achievable goals for all to support and nurture.

Glennie Heights State School expects to improve outcomes in our Reading, Writing and Numeracy benchmarks for Yr 3/5 & 7 with particular emphasis on Yr 3 & 5 Reading outcomes.  It is anticipated that with the growth in focus on technology in the school – with new equipment, including smartboards, our school community will further embrace the importance of learning and how ICT’s appear to be embedded in futuristic careers.

As a school we are also looking to the future in ICT’s and are hoping that in partnership with Parents and an industry provider that we will access affordable computers for every child and staff member in our quest to provide for future learning of every member of our school community.

School Profile

Glennie Heights State School provides a service to families across the Warwick District.  Many families live near other local schools but choose to come to Glennie for the family ethos and the relatively small size of the school enrolment. Our student enrolment currently stands at 171 due to families leaving for overseas or other parts of the state, a trend that will continue as a number of itinerant families anticipate moving out of Warwick by the end of the semester.  Our Campus is a co-educational Primary School PREP to Year 7 

Curriculum offerings

Our distinctive curriculum offerings:   

• Information Technologies in a refurbished and upgraded Computer Lab  and classrooms to assist learning through the use of ICT’s.  The whole school access the Lab through timetables for each class and the new challenges are for staff to attain their ICT Pedagogical Licence; for everyone to implement Smartboards into daily learning opportunities and to extend the boundaries of the classroom to outside the school by communicating with and developing relationships with other schools via the internet nationally and internationally.

• Student Leadership Program  YCDI Supportive Behaviour Program - A caring and supportive learning environment where staff actively engage with students in assisting with their needs. 

• A developing, contemporary and consistent curriculum through the parallel leadership of all staff.

• Active Sport representation including school, cluster and district based.

• Reading Recovery for identified students, with Teacher based at Glennie Heights. 

• Our school is currently offering integrated KLA’s within real life-or life-like situational contexts so that learning is relevant to student needs and the connection to real life is explicitly taught and understood in order to enable lifelong learning.

Extra curricula activities

Our extra curricula offerings are in the areas of instrumental music - in strings and brass as well as recorder for students; as well as a Gifted Education program for the enhancement of learning areas in the school with the development of Learnscapes – a special project completed in 2007.

Social climate

Our pastoral care is fully embedded in our school ethos through our “Responsible Behaviour Plan” which is a consistent school wide focus which incorporates the “You Can Do It” program.  This program acknowledges desired behaviours and proactively supports students, in partnership with their families, who experience difficulties navigating their way to achieve expectations that are demonstrated socially, intellectually and emotionally.  The implementation of the Year 7 Leadership program and the Yr 6 Buddy System with PREP students assists the whole school community to share responsibility for each other in a caring and involved, responsive manner, modelling expectations in positive and proactive ways. The older students in our school are highly responsive to leadership opportunities and their level of care of younger students is a significant factor which is highly valued by all members of the school community, and this includes the recognition by Parents and students that all staff have initiated healthy, caring relationships with all members of the “Glennie” community. We implement strategies for the sharing of best practice to celebrate the achievements of students, staff and parents through weekly Parade and Newsletters as well as through holding “Rewards” days each term for successful achievement of YCDI goals.  Ongoing displays in both foyers of the school and once a year at District Office of best practice evidence.  Parent access to Guidance personnel including Behaviour specialists.  The school is currently engaged in the IDEAS Program in partnership with EQ and USQ.  Staff have access to our Employee Advisor, trained onsite Workplace Health and Safety Officer.    

Involving parents in their child’s education.

An active P&C community strongly support the school in its educational pursuits although we will be looking for new members in 2007 to replace Parents whose children have completed Year Seven.We have volunteer programs for different units of work being studied and community members are encouraged to volunteer to assist staff in any learning venture.  Staff have been strongly encouraged to talk with Parents by the end of the second week of school in order to discuss concerns about their children and to negotiate agreed intervention strategies and goals in partnership for the benefit of the child or children at risk.  Staff will be inviting Parents/Caregivers in a variety of ways to participate in a number of activities, including IDEAS workshops, Parade, special events, Tuckshop, Classroom assistance, Bus Duty, Working Bees and Planning Forums for the implementation of new ideas to enhance the school grounds and learning  or play.     

Highlights

• ·       The achievement of our first 100% for Writing in the Yr 7 statewide testing as well as our other  academic achievements in the 90%’s were big highlights of the year. 

• ·       The commencement of the Gifted Education Learning Development Centre for The Darling Downs South West Region based at our school was a new and exciting challenge for our staff to inspire and lead schools in our region - which saw many collegial events of shared learning, professional dialogue, student centred learning and other relevant group activities all of which achieved the desired results and positive feedback.

• ·       The commencement of the installation of two large(catchment) rainwater tanks to service the new toilet block and proposed native tree and fruit tree vegetation; which is now nearing completion. 

• ·       The acquisition of Funds for enhancement of our Physical Education Program; our ICT facility; our Art program and our ICT purchasing needs for new computers and other technological devices.

• ·       The successful application to have a Head of Curriculum to lead our school in QCAR expectations. 

• ·       Participation in the “Principal for a Day” program.

• ·       The provision of specific instruction to all classes on IT processes which included the use of digital cameras and designing web pages. 

Key outcomes and goals achieved

• The embedding of our YCDI program as a successful, positive behaviour program to enhance student life skills which has seen 90% of our students achieve recognition for positive behaviour

Expenditure on and teacher participation in professional development.

The involvement of the teaching staff in professional development activities during 2007 was 92 %.

Average staff attendance

For permanent and temporary staff and school leaders the staff attendance rate was 97% in 2007.

Proportion of staff retained from the previous school year.

From the end of the 2006 school year, 100 % of staff were retained by the school for the entire 2007 school year-staff changeover is temporary and been due to long term illnesses.