Year 12 Exam Block – Monday 19 to Wednesday 21 February

Year 12 students will participate in an exam block from Monday 19 – Wednesday 21 February. The Exam Timetable for this exam block is attached below. Students participating in this exam block will undergo Unit 3 assessment. This assessment is summative and as such will contribute towards the ATAR score. Students need only attend school for the exams that they are sitting in this period.

During the exam block, students not involved in exams are expected to be involved in home study. Students who are behind in their schoolwork may also be required to attend school to complete outstanding work. If this is required, these arrangements will be communicated by individual class teachers.

Please remember that normal school rules regarding uniform and behaviour continue through the exam block. These expectations are outlined in the attached documents.

We wish our students all the best with their studies.

New Feedback Method-  Learner Attributes

In 2024, Shalom College is excited to announce we are changing the way we give feedback on ‘learning attributes’ of our students to parents. In previous years, Shalom has issued an Interim Report card at the beginning of Term 2 as well as the normal End-of-Semester Report cards. Our new method of feedback will replace the Interim Report card. Additionally, the End-of-Semester Report cards will no longer show Application and Behaviour.

Instead, teachers will give feedback through Sia on the learning behaviours of students in each of their classes, as well as PC classes. This will be published to parents at the end of Week 5 in Term 1 & 3 for all Year 7-12 subjects and PC classes, and at the end of Week 5 in Term 2 & 4 for the Year 7/8 rotation subjects that occur in those terms.

Each student will be awarded either a Consistently (4), Mostly (3), Sometimes (2), Rarely (1) or Never (0) in the following criteria:

• Organisation - punctual to class, correct equipment in good working order, laptop charged, record book present
• Application - actively engaged in learning, appropriate use of technology (laptop, phone etc), homework complete
• Presentation - uniform worn appropriately, follows school guidelines for hair, make-up, jewellery etc
• College Values - treats others with dignity and respect, displays a positive attitude

This will appear on Sia Parent Dashboard under ‘Grades’.

and will appear as a mark out of 16.

More detailed information can be found by clicking on the ‘Learning Attributes’ link on the above screen.

After the initial feedback is published, teachers are able to update these criteria and re-publish them to parents at any time throughout the year and add a comment if necessary. Parents are advised of updates via Notifications in Sia. In this way, reporting on your child’s application in class is ‘live’, improving the quality of feedback for parents. We believe this is a significant improvement in our communication with parents, compared with the previous ‘point-in-time’ reporting.

Please note that end-of semester reports will still be issued as normal, however there will be no grade for Application and Behaviour on these reports.

Feel free to contact me if you have any questions/concerns about our new method of providing feedback.

2024 Student Residential Address and Other Information Collection Notice

The 2024 Student Residential Address and Other Information collection notice distributed by the Australian Government Department of Education, Skills and Employment. This data is routinely used to inform Commonwealth school education policy, and to help ensure that Commonwealth funding arrangements for non-government schools are based on need, and are fair and transparent.

Could you please ensure that your address and contact details are up-to-date through the Parent Details tab in Parent Lounge to ensure accurate collection of this data?

PLEASE UPDATE YOUR SHALOM COLLEGE PHONE APP

Recently, Shalom has had some important updates to the phone app. Most notably, there is now a new button called ‘Clipboard’.

Clipboard is the application our sporting coaches use currently to record results and attendance at school sporting events. This year, we are allowing access for parents and students. This will allow students and parents to see:

• the schedule for upcoming sporting events for you/your/child both through the phone app as well as in the Sia Calendar
• the teams you/your child has signed up for
• any changes to the draw/venue etc which will be communicated via notifications on the phone app

Some of these functions are currently available while others will be rolled out over coming weeks. In the future, Clipboard may also be used for music groups, community groups etc and we may unlock other features through Clipboard – watch this space!

To enable these features to occur, could all members of the Shalom community update their Shalom phone app as soon as possible? Those who have automatic updates should have this installed automatically. If your screen looks like the picture below, with the ‘Clipboard’ button showing, then your phone is updated.

If you do not have automatic updates, you will need to go to your App Store, search for the Shalom College phone app, and press update. The update only takes seconds to do.

Please complete this update as soon as possible to gain the benefits that Clipboard offers.

SIA – LOG ON NOW! GET THE PHONE APP!

‘Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.’ -Warren Buffet

A parent’s role in the education of their child is vital. Student outcomes will be maximised when parents and teachers are both involved in their child’s education and have positive interactions. Sia is a fantastic way for parents to be fully informed about student progress, assessment due dates, news items, upcoming events, assessment results etc.

Sia, and the Shalom phone app, have been available to parents since the beginning of 2022. Currently, our parent login rate is slightly lower than the end of last year. We would like all our parents to be successfully logged into Sia as soon as possible. Attached in the link below is a Parent “Everything You Need To Know About Sia’ Guide which includes how to log in for the first time. The phone app is super-convenient – a must-have for parents!

Our IT team will have sent the login details for Sia to all new parents to the school at the beginning of the year. If you have misplaced these details, or are having technical difficulties, please contact our Shalom IT department via email at shalomit@shalomcollege.com or phone 41558131 during office hours 8am - 3.30pm Monday to Friday, Tuesdays are 8.30am - 3.30 pm.

Mr Brendan Maher
Assistant Principal - Administration
maherb@shalomcollege.com