Tēnā Koutou Katoa ngā Whānau,
Ki raro i te hau maru tanga o Garin , He taonga nui a tatou tamariki.
ko te whakapono, ko te mātauranga, ko te ātua, ko te karaiti
Underneath our place of Safety, The greatest treasure is our children.
Faith, Knowledge/Education, God, Christ
The Garin College year is underway! We recognise the joy, and energy of our learners as they arrived on site, reacquainting with each other and making new friends after the long summer break. Our mihi whakatau to welcome all new learners to Garin was an exciting highlight of the week. With year 13 learners greeting and introducing our new students to whānau class and our year 12 peer support leaders engaging with and orienting our new year 9 learners, manaakitanga and whānaunatanga is truly evident. The wairua of Garin is alive and well as caring, happy relationships are built between students and between, staff, teachers and students. Thank you to all parents, caregivers and whānau for your wonderful support in preparing our learners for the start of the College year.
It gives me great pleasure to announce and welcome our new staff to Garin College, Ashleigh Cumming – Religious Education, Elizabeth Trudeau – Digital Technology, Jisha Manoj – Maths, Julian Daly – Technology, Peter Anderson – Visual Art, Angela Thomsen – Social Studies, Tony Etchells – Religious Education, Robyn Prokop – English, Tracy Stock – PE , Bridget Scaife – Office Manager, Joanne Piemontesi – Gateway, Trades and Pathways Teacher and joining our counselling team is 3rd year NMIT student Ben Pointer.
We farewell Kaylene Teariki following 8 years of service to Garin College as our Gateway, Trades Academy and Pathway Coordinator/Teacher since 2014. Kaylene’s leadership of the Trade and Gateway programme and the positive learning relationships she establishes in her teaching has ensured learner success and achievement. We wish Kaylene every success for her new career position as Operations Manager at Kopuawai Te Kohanga Reo. Thank you Kaylene for your gift of service to Garin.
Congratulations to our 2021 NCEA level 1,2&3 students on their success and achievement in NCEA. We are extremely pleased and excited by the NZQA provisional NCEA results for 2021. I look forward to sharing the confirmed results when these become available.
As we begin the year under RED of the Covid Protection Framework (CPF), our staff have been working to plan for various scenarios throughout the term, which, unfortunately, looks likely to be disrupted again this year. The landscape is not clear, and I will be doing my best to communicate about changes, new procedures and alterations to programmes as needed, further information and updates will be provided via email and website.
In addition to the requirement for all students (unless they have an exemption) to be wearing face masks on school transport and at school, we continue to encourage good hygiene practices for all learners including: regular hand washing/sanitising, cough and sneeze etiquette, regular cleaning of high touch surfaces, open doors and windows.
Whilst the weather is very changeable, we are still experiencing the summer sun and heat. To ensure the safety and wellbeing of the students, we recommend students to wear their sunhats, stay within the shade, and wear sunblock. Students are reminded to keep hydrated, we have free cooled and filtered water stations where students can refill their drink bottles.
Mā te Atua koe e tiaki – May God be with you
Ngā manaakitanga,
John Maguire
Take a moment – Whio i te toipoto, kaua i te toiroa Let us keep close together, not wide apart