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Update: 14 March 2014

This is the first of what we intend on being regular email updates, primarily for the purpose of keeping our Rotorua principals up to date with the progress of Excel Projects. Hopefully this initiative will be one way of better informing education leaders and their staff of what is happening in their town. This is a direct result of the feedback Excel Rotorua received at a meeting of the Rotorua Principals Association on Thursday 13 March 2014. We are now underway with projects that will contribute to Excel Rotoruas vision to lift student achievement and make Rotorua a great place for education. Heres a rundown on progress to-date, ahead of this months newsletter, which will have more in-depth detail.

Project 1 Sight and Hearing

The aim is to remove sight and hearing as a barrier for Rotorua learners and the first phase of this project will be an audit of selected schools to get an idea of the extent of any problem and inform what needs to be done to address it. Excel Rotorua and Lakes District Health Board representatives will meet next week with the four schools involved (Rotorua Primary, Western Heights Primary, Rotokawa Primary and Malfroy School) to agree on how the audit will be conducted. Leith Comer (Excel Rotorua Lead) leads this project. Status: On track

Project 2 Literacy and Numeracy

Twelve early childhood centres and six primary schools have signed up for this project and will receive professional learning and development in teaching literacy and numeracy. Most will focus just on literacy and facilitators will provide a full-day workshop for teachers with follow-up visits to their schools to see them at work and provide feedback, set goals and further develop skills. The literacy programme will focus on oral language and we aim to set something in place that can be sustained into the future. This project is co-coordinated by Ann Anaru (Te Taumata/Excel) and Eden Chapman (Principal, Horohoro School). Status: On track

Project 3 Transitions
There has been good support for this project from within the local education sector but with some questions over how it should be delivered. We are re-evaluating the current purpose, which is to implement a Rotorua-wide four intakes a year policy to consider other options that might gain wider community support. There is already some groundwork been undertaken on the Eastside, through the Ministry of Education, which is engaging wh!nau of the community, ECE centres, K"hanga Reo, Schools and Kura in a combined shift to create effective engagement in early childhood settings which will lead to transition options. This project team includes Mercia-Dawn Yates (Te Taumata/Excel), principals from Glenholme and Lynmore, staff from Otonga Primary and Westbrook Primary School, representatives from the ECE sector. Status: Work in progress

Project 4 High Relational Trust

This project is well advanced. The Ministry of Education has almost completed a stocktake of functions and services it delivers at local, regional and national levels. We will go through that information, identify who is receiving these functions and services in our Rotorua Education sector, and invite those people to carry out an analysis of the effectives of the functions and services they receive. The results of this analysis will be provided to the Ministry of Education, to inform them of the future configuration of functions and services delivery preferred by the Rotorua Education sector. Leith Comer (Excel Rotorua Lead) leads this project. Status: On track

Project 5 e-Learning Community

The purpose of this project is to support schools and early childhood centres to collaborate to form a Rotorua-wide e-learning community. Our vision is for every child to own a personal learning device and be digitally connected at school, in the community and at home. This projects relies upon Principals leading, schools and teachers collaborating, and a connectedness between teachers, learners and wh!nau. Excel Rotoruas role in this project is to support Principals in making this happen. We would like to invite all Principals to attend a hui at the Sudima on the 20 March 2014, where they will be asked to commit this kaupapa. Leith Comer, Mercia-Dawn Yates, Sue Winters and Adam Ellis make up the e-Excel team. Status: On track

Project 6 Engagement and Attendance

Being delivered by the Rotorua Community Youth Centre Trust, led by centre manager Laurie Durrand, this project will have two areas of focus responding to early signs of nonengagement at school (intermediate age) and data collection and analysis to inform future services. The one-year trial will see a youth worker taking referrals and dealing with why a student is becoming disengaged, before truancy becomes an issue. Students will be referred to other services and agencies or engaged in activity as appropriate. Status: Work in progress

Project 7 Cultural Responsiveness and Wh!nau Engagement

Former Rotorua teacher Greg Allen is the enthusiastic manager for this project, being delivered by Te Arawa Tangata which operates under the auspices of Te P#mautanga o Te Arawa Trust and aimed at lifting Maori achievement at NCEA Levels 1 and 2. Greg and a team of tutors will work with 60 !konga in years 11, 12 and 13 to help them succeed through a programme that will incorporate marae-based tuition and ongoing pastoral support. Wh!nau will be part of the process and there will be a noho marae this term before the programme proper starts next term. Status: On track

Project 8 Teacher Support

Supported by principals, this project aims to ensure our educators have access to support that contributes to the quality of teaching and learning in the classroom. A survey will be sent to all schools this month for teachers to provide information about barriers they face and what extra resources and/or support are needed to effectively raise student engagement and achievement. This project team includes Mercia-Dawn Yates (Te Taumata/Excel), principals and senior staff from Westbrook Primary, Kawaha Pt Primary, Lynmore Primary and Rotorua Intermediate School. Status: Work in progress

Project 9 Learner Wellbeing

This is another project being delivered by the Rotorua Community Youth Centre Trust, this time through its Rotovegas Youth Health services, provided at the centre and in high schools and led by GP Dr Tania Pinfold. The aim is to address issues identified through contact with the health centre as being barriers to education and will deal mainly with secondary schoolaged students. A social worker will work with young people referred from the clinic, linking them to other agencies and services and following through on progress. Status: Work in progress

Project 10 Data Accuracy

Principals have been hugely supportive of this project and will be leading it with Ngakuru School Principal, Grant Henderson the project co-ordinator. The aim is to ensure data collected to inform Rotorua districts educational profile is useful, accurate, relevant and informative. Educators want to see improvement in the quality of data, the processes for collecting it and in the way it is aggregated so that it is more accurate and useful. Status: On track

Project 11 Education Leadership

There is an opportunity to have a world-class leadership expert (Dr Vikram Murthy) deliver a three-day programme to look at leadership and collaboration in a changing environment. Our initial thoughts are to offer this professional learning and development to Rotorua principals with the first day-long session to be scheduled for April and two day-long session in May and June. We would like to restrict this leadership and collaboration programme to Rotorua principals. Principals can contact Mercia-Dawn Yates (Te Taumata/Excel Rotorua) on 920 4369 to find out more and register their interest. Status: On track As mentioned at the start, we intend to make this email a fortnightly edition, please feel free to add comment directly to Mercia-Dawn Yates at mercia@taumata.org.nz. Noho ora mai, Excel Rotorua Team

He tangata i akona i te marae, t!nga ki te marae tau ana

A person taught at home shapes well on the marae