Kia ora Koutou RVS Community We look forward to seeing you all back shortly! I pray you have managed some memorable family time and are enjoying the kiwi summer. 2022 remains uncertain in regard to COVID related implications but we will keep you informed regarding offsite activities, such as camps, and any changes to onsite requirements as they become known. As I write this, the guidelines remain the same as they did in the orange level at the end of last year. See HERE for more details. Hebrews 6 speaks of Jesus being the hope that anchors our soul & brings security. As Christian parents and staff in a Christian school, we can carry and exemplify that hope to our children through Jesus in these uncertain times. I wanted to mention a couple of things as 2022 gets underway. Firstly, I am excited to welcome the following staff to our team: Mr Peter Olliver (Classics, Social Sciences, Christian Studies) Mrs Jenny Olliver (English) Mr Ryan Peters (Maths, Business Studies, Accounting) Mrs Colleen Petaera (Y7&8) Mrs Janet Guard (Music & English) Mrs Cheryl West (Careers and Learning Pathways) Amazing people to add to our already amazing, committed team. I thank our Heavenly Father for bringing us the people He knows we need. Buildings There are four projects currently on the go here at RVS. 1 - The construction of the New Entrant (Kea & Koru) class, due to be finished by T2) 2 - The new basketball court for Middle & Snr students 3 - A hallway in Rm 3 to connect the Koru & Kea class to the A Block toilets 4 - Construction for the new Y11-13 classes (F Block) will begin later in the year
You will hear from me again in a week or so. Look forward to seeing the students back bringing life into the rooms and hallways. God bless, Dave Pauling Principal I am most pleased to announce today that.... THE COURT FUNDRAISER IS DONE!! THERE IS ENOUGH TO GO AHEAD!! WELL DONE AND THANK YOU!! That's right, the Middle/Snr hard court has reached the threshold to go ahead. The contractor has been advised and work will start as soon as they are ready. This is great news!
Thank you first to our Heavenly Father for His provision, to all those who contributed to the project, huge appreciation. Also to the CREW for their contribution and to our proprietor, Elim Blenheim for their hard work and large contribution. The large hard court will be situated in the area to the south of the science lab and to the east of C block. 2022 will also see the construction of a beautiful new Y0-1 double classroom (beginning soon) and 'F block', an amazing new space for our Y11-13 students. We are blessed, Dave Pauling Principal Good morning RVS Community, You will have heard on the news yesterday that Marlborough will move to Orange on the traffic light system from December the 3rd, Friday. Please see below for information provided to us from the Ministry of Education regarding this move. I would also like to take the opportunity to welcome Mr Peter Olliver and Mrs Jenny Olliver who will be joining us next year in a permanent capacity. They both bring a wealth of experience and skill and we are privileged to have them on board. I also welcome Mr. Gareth Bolstad to the team. He will be teaching in the Middle School through to the end of the year.
The Y10 Graduation Dinner has been brought forward to this week due to the implications relating to the Traffic Light restrictions. Please see Mrs. Pigou's email for more.
May you and your families be blessed with the constant awareness of His goodness toward you in this time. Christmas is a precious time as we remember the stunning lengths taken to connect us back to our loving Heavenly Father through Jesus. God bless, Dave Pauling Principal From the Secretary of Education: The Prime Minister has confirmed all of New Zealand will move onto the COVID-19 Protection Framework (CPF) at 11.59pm on Thursday 2 December. The very good news for all schools is that there will be very little to no change needed for the remainder of 2021, regardless of which part of the country you’re in. (Level 2 rules will still apply at RVS) Schools will retain their existing COVID-19 settings until the end of the 2021 calendar year, but guidance will recommend that schools outside of Auckland align their practices with the COVID-19 Protection Framework settings, which will come into effect for all schools from 1 January 2022. New COVID-19 Protection (Traffic Light) Framework Elimination and the alert levels have worked well, with New Zealand having the lowest numbers of cases and hospitalisations in the OECD. While controlled, Delta is in our communities and the strategy now focuses on minimising its impact. With 85% of eligible New Zealanders now fully vaccinated, and by mid-December it is expected to be approximately 90%, this allows a careful reopening while continuing to protect New Zealanders. This means that we don’t have to change the way we are operating classes this year and everyone can continue to attend school onsite. For next year, we can confirm that everyone will be back onsite for learning from the start of the school year, regardless of what setting under the new Traffic Light Framework we will be in (Red/Orange/Green). This is good news and means we can plan for a great 2022. Health measures in place at school This year and next, health, safety and wellbeing will continue to be a priority for us and the same public health measures you are very familiar with will remain in place:
And if we are at Red at any stage next year:
With all these measures in place, public health has confirmed the risk of infection remains low when at school, with households continuing to be where COVID-19 is spreading the most. As noted by Dr Caroline McElnay, Director of Public Health: Our experience in New Zealand and overseas with COVID-19 shows that it does not affect children and teens in the same way it does adults. Children and teens don't become as unwell if they do get infected, and they don't tend to pass the virus on so much as adults when in a classroom setting. Compared to other places, schools and early learning services are not environments where we have seen significant spread of COVID-19. Household members and work colleagues who are in close contact with people with COVID-19, are the most common sources of transmission. However, if we do have someone confirmed with COVID-19 in our school, we have a plan in place to manage this and will contact you as soon as possible. If you’d like to learn more about the framework visit COVID-19 Protection Framework. Secretary for Education Iona Holsted Kia ora RVS Community,
As you will be aware, we are working through the vaccine mandate outcomes here at RVS. Privacy rulings limit what I can say but I do wish to update you as the mandate comes into effect tomorrow. Many of our staff have received the vaccine while a small percentage have chosen not to. I know this is the case in many other schools across the country. The situation is difficult and we have continued to do our best to support all people in our community while keeping the school in good stead. We are a united bunch, even if we don't agree on every detail. To the few staff not returning tomorrow, we pray for His provision for you and His blessing. You are still a part of our community, albeit from a distance. To those continuing on tomorrow, we pray also for continued blessing too. Regarding parents onsite and vaccination status. Parents are still able to drop their children off at school regardless of status but should only stay for the 5-10 min standard turn-around time, should remember distancing rules, and should not enter the classroom. We will update this as soon as any rulings change. I encourage you to continue to keep in touch with your student's teachers however you can. The isolation that COVID times can sometimes cause needn't be our story. Even with the loss of some of our much loved traditional ways of connecting due to Level 2, we can utilise other means. I thank you for your ongoing support and let's keep going, our young people are worth it! God bless, Dave Pauling Principal Kia ora RVS I hope you have had a great time with family and friends over the two long weekends. We managed some time in the Queen Charlotte Sound, boy we live in a beautiful part of the world. Speaking of landscapes, the COVID horizon continues to shift and we have been working through the education mandate lately. The implications for the RVS community are wide reaching but not insurmountable, difficult but we will find a way through. There may well be cancellations of activities as we struggle to staff different areas, we apologise in advance. I know for certain that there are many in our RVS community praying for the situation we find ourselves in and we are incredibly grateful. We have been advised by the Ministry of Education that they still wish us to avoid all gatherings for the foreseeable future, particularly under Level 2. For this reason, amongst others, the Board of Trustees has made the decision to cancel prize giving for 2021. This is done with a heavy heart as it is one of our favourite, God glorifying, positive celebrations as a community. We will still be awarding students but will use the new school magazine as a forum to present these award winners to the community. Every family will receive a copy of this magazine in the last week of term.
A big thank you to Mrs. Rebecca Silva for organising the 2021 Run for Bibles. Also to those who worked hard to raise funds for the Bible League. A magnificent effort providing 235 bible packs for others who need them. See more about the Bible League here. Thank you to all who filled in the recent Special Character Survey. The proprietors will collate these and use them to help guide planning in the future. You are a wonderful, busy community and the fact that so many took the time is appreciated.
The Special Character Review initiated by our proprietor Elim and facilitated by Mr. Mark Larson has been an incredibly positive experience. He spoke with many stakeholders, collected the community response and spoke with the BoT last week. He will provide feedback to the proprietor via a report. I will share a summary of the community survey when it is made available. COVID has caused quite a delay to the beginning of the next building project here at RVS. ‘F’ Block was planned to begin in October but will hopefully begin soon. ‘F’ Block is a northern extension off the Art/Tech room completing that block. It will be used predominantly by Y11-13 students and features:
With the continued growth of the school, we continue to experience need for more room, particularly at the junior end of the school. We had been looking at re-arranging the current staff-room/office area but could not meet the needs we have which are:
Building for this will start ASAP allowing our new entrant students to use this area early next year to release space for our Y12 students until ‘F’ Block is completed. God is good. I thank Doug Clark & Glenroy Housing for their consistent work behind the scenes to keep the ball rolling. Here is an image of the new Kea block. We will be starting back next year on Thursday the 3rd of February. Other 2022 Term dates can be found here - Term Dates 2022 So there is still much happening at RVS, even though it may sometimes feel like things have slowed or succumbed to the events around us. We talk often as staff about the importance of each day, hour even minute when working with young people and schools are a place with so much life in them. Stay in touch and God bless, Dave Pauling Principal Tēnā koutou katoa and welcome back to T4 RVS community. We are nearing the end of Week One, Term Four 2021 and surrounded by the continued uncertainty around Covid levels, mandates and other such concerns. I am so very grateful for a sovereign Lord who is surprised by nothing, who is always good and who is faithful. Please continue to observe Level 2 protocol here at RVS including distancing and continuing to drop students outside classrooms. It is disappointing that the casual Talent Quest we are having tomorrow can't be attended by parents due to recommendations from the Ministry related to Covid, our school community gatherings are something I really miss. End of Year Dates The last day for Y0 to 10 students this year is Wednesday the 15th of December at 12:45pm. If we are in level 1, or see a rule change on gatherings we will have a split prize-giving onsite. If we are in Level 2, 3 or 4, we will not be holding a live prize-giving and I will keep you informed of what we will do instead. Due to our growing size, we will be splitting prize giving into a Junior (Y0-6) and a Middle & Senior prize-giving on two consecutive evenings. Y0-6 Certificate and prize-giving (now combined) will be held on Monday 13th of December at 5:30pm Y7-11 Prize giving will be held on Tuesday the 14th of December at 6:30pm (Y11 to attend) We are awaiting other schools and the Community of Learning to confirm the first day for 2022. Staffing Logan Brown from Rm 6 will be moving to the middle school in Week 3 this term to teach Mathematics and Science. His place will be taken by Cindy Russell, a wonderful, experienced teacher who moved to Blenheim recently from further south. We are also advertising for several positions at the moment and I encourage you to pray for great teachers who love Jesus to join RVS. Grounds It was with huge excitement that the first Y0-2 students climbed the steps of the new playground on Monday. I wish to thank our amazing RVS Support Crew for the amazing effort in making this happen. Also to those who helped along the way, and there were many. Congratulations! Student Elections We are looking forward to having one of our students join us on the BOT late this year. As an area school, we have a position available for a student representative and voting closes on the 27th of October. Only some students are eligible to stand for election and to vote. You can read about it here. Special Character Review We will be reviewing our Special Character delivery this term with the help of Mr Mark Larson. Mark will be visiting us from Christchurch and is very experienced in Christian education and we are privileged to have him. He will work with proprietors, staff, the BOT and there is also be an opportunity for you to input too, via this survey.
We continue to move forward in the amazing grace and protection of our saviour. It is never lost on me the immense privilege and responsibility that is raising young people to not just know but to love Christ. Every day with our children is an important day for them. Together is best by far, keep in touch with your teachers and reach out if you need it.
God bless you all and I will be in touch again soon with an update about buildings amongst other things. Dave Pauling Principal Tēnā koutou RVS, I wish to thank you as a community for your partnership over Term 3 in relation to the ongoing education of our young people. The heightened stressors from current global and regional circumstances are mitigated by our faith in Christ and our family/community. Term 4 is always a busy but fruitful one and I look forward to it. Recently I received the resignation of Mr Ben Russell, he will be finishing with us at the end of Wk2 this coming term. Mr Russell has been teaching in the Middle and Senior school. I wish to thank Mr Russell for his work with RVS and he will be missed. The RVS BOT and I wish him the very best for his next phase. We will keep you informed regarding staffing as we finalise plans. There are a couple of exterior projects happening around the school at the moment. The first is the completion of the RVS Support Crew-funded Jnr playground. We plan for this to be finished in the next 3 weeks. Also, at the end of B Block is the construction of a bottle filling station/garden area. The wall will eventually have a mural, there will be an alpine garden and turf. The addition to the north side of the Science/Tech room will also be beginning soon. This was due to start in early Sept but is now pushed back due to COVID related delays.
Keep praying for our school and each-other, as well as our dear nation. God bless, Dave Pauling Principal Good Morning RVS Community,
We are looking forward to being back on-site again on Thursday Morning. School is closed tomorrow (Wednesday) except for those already registered in our Level 3 Bubbles, they are still welcome to attend. Wednesday (tomorrow) will be the last day of this arrangement. We are at Level 2 again beginning Thursday morning as a community and this means that as a school we will:
There will also be contact tracing app QR codes placed around the school. You must use them or sign in at the office if you enter the school grounds. This includes before and after school. Please refrain from entering the classrooms during Level 2 and practice social distancing during pick up and drop off in the car park. I will continue to keep you updated with developments via this blog but for more information, please see here: covid19.govt.nz 1. On Thursday, we are open to everyone, and all children must attend. At Alert Level 2 the disease is contained but there is still risk of community transmission. It is safe for children and staff to attend school as there will be appropriate measures in place, including for children and staff vulnerable to severe illness. 2. Learning will be onsite with distance learning offered in rare circumstances. Distance learning should be provided for those required to self-isolate, only those individuals who health authorities have asked to stay away while waiting for a test result, or those choosing to remain at home because they are vulnerable to illness. Please inform the RVS office if this is the case. 3. Schools will only close for cleaning and contact tracing if there is a confirmed case who was infectious when at school. Our Director of Education will work closely with us and health authorities should this occur. 4. Face coverings are not mandatory at school or on any school transport. Face coverings are recommended for Middle and Senior school but are not compulsory. Face coverings are optional for junior school students. 5. Sick people must stay at home. They should seek medical advice if they have COVID-like symptoms and get tested if advised to do so. If that person displays relevant symptoms of COVID-19, tests positive for COVID-19, or has been in close contact with someone who tests positive for COVID-19, they must self-isolate. 8. You must use the contact tracing system in place. This includes the QR code posters at RVS's entrance, or signing in at the office. I will continue to keep you updated as more information comes in from the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Education. Look forward to seeing the school come alive again on Thursday. Dave Pauling Principal Kia ora, I pray you are all well and doing ok under the circumstances. RVS staff are working diligently behind the scenes to deliver a solid online program while preparing for a possible Level change. Thank you staff and thank you parents for your ongoing communication and resilience. NCEA You may have seen the announcement yesterday from the Ministry of Education about the changes to the dates of NCEA exams. The examination period will now run from Monday November 22nd to Tuesday December 14th. At this stage we have very little information of the details surrounding this announcement and are waiting for more to come from our Ministry contacts. The biggest impact of this change will be that the last teaching day for Year 11 before departing for study leave will now be Friday 19th November, two weeks after our previously planned date. This change also affects our Year 11 Visual Arts students who will have more time to complete their portfolios of work before the end of the year. Overall this change will give us even more time to be prepared for exams and is a welcome decision from the government. We will update you with other details as they are announced. Preparing for a possible change in alert levels The government will announce any changes to levels this afternoon at 3pm. In preparation for a possible drop to Level 3, I need more information on potential roll numbers for the few who fit the guidelines to attend school onsite at Level 3. The Government guidelines for Level 3 attendees says that schools will be open for those students where BOTH parents need to return to work with no available alternative care. Please note our Year 11 students are old enough to stay at home by themselves, this is only for Year 0 - 10 students who have no parents at home. In the event of a Level change, students are asked to stay at home if they can continue to complete the home learning programme that has been set up by RVS staff. I am needing to know how many Year 0 - 10 students may be attending school so that bubbles for school can start being organised with students and staff. Students and staff will be organised into bubbles of max 20. Bubbles will not be allowed to interact with other bubbles at all. Once we have established who will be at school further information will be sent to these families regarding pick up and drop off times, health and safety procedures and requirements for attending school as more information from the Ministry of Education becomes available. Please fill in the form below to inform us if your child/ren WILL or WILL NOT be attending school in the case of a change to Alert Level 3 so we know how many students will be returning. A reminder all children are asked to stay at home if they can. Schools are significantly limited in the numbers they can take and spaces are intended for children of essential workers. No children are allowed to attend school in Alert Level 3 if they have compromised health or someone in their bubble has compromised health. We do not want to put anyone at risk. We need ALL families to fill this form out please. Thank you for your co-operation. Ngā mihi nui, Dave Pauling Principal This survey has now closed.
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Mr PaulingProud Principal of Richmond View School. Archives
February 2024
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