Introducing New Staff to the College

We extend a warm welcome to the following new teachers and support staff:
Pictured from Left: Tess,  Ayesha,  Lesley,  Laetitia,  Sonia,  Wyn, Razak,  Dino  &  Patricia.
(Adora & Elise absent)

Teachers:
Tess Connell is a beginning teacher in Forest Whanau who teaches Global Studies. Tess studied Psychology and Sociology at the University of Auckland. She loves tramping, painting landscapes and travelling (she once travelled the length of India!)

Wyn Morris is an experienced teacher from Remuera Intermediate School who has joined Mountains Whanau teaching Mathematics and Science. Wyn has  twin girls and loves the outdoors, camping, gardening and horticulture.

Sonia Lovemore is a second year teacher who specialises in Health and Physical Education, joining Mountains Whanau this year. She has a passion for and is an accomplished football and touch rugby player and loves animals.

Dino Gardi brings a wealth of experience in Outdoor Education having run successful programmes at Edgewater College, Alfriston College and Tangaroa College. He is teaching Global Studies and Health and PE in Forest Whanau so he can share his passion for the environment with his students in two learning areas.

Lesley Williamson is teaching Science in Water Whanau as a new career move after starting and developing the very successful “Littlies” company which provided parenting advice to thousands of subscribers. This passion to help others has found expression in teaching, a lifelong dream of hers.

Adora Lindsay teaches Maths and Science in Coast Whanau and has valuable experience of successfully leading a collaborative team of teachers at Alfriston College. She is keen to contribute to the collegial, cross curricular approach we promote at MHJC. 

Patricia Zwarts is relieving for Priscilla Naidoo in term 1 as Ms Naidoo completes her Masters degree. She is an experienced teacher of Domestic Science and loves gardening.

Support Staff:
Laetitia Jansen Van Rensburg is our new Sports Assistant and a qualified fitness instructor. She has a degree in Sports Management and a passion for all sports, particularly netball which she plays at a high level.

Razak Shukor has joined us our IT assistant. He has excellent qualifications and experience in the IT field specialising in systems and operations management.

To cope with the extra volume of work in the library as the two schools grow, a Library Assistant has been employed. Elise de Silva is passionate about books and reading and also is experienced in multi-tasking – a key requirement in this busy role.

Ayesha Kumar joined us in term 4 last year as our Science laboratory Technician. Originally from Singapore she completed her B.Sc in Biological Science at the University of Auckland.

Teachers as lifelong learners

At MHJC we believe that it is important for our teachers to continue to grow as professionals after they have completed their teacher training and two year provisional registration period. Every year all teachers meet with their mentor, a senior leader who helps them to set personal and professional goals that align with the school’s strategic direction, annual goals and achievement targets. Our weekly professional development programme assists teachers to reach their goals by providing time and expertise within these key areas and teachers meet fortnightly again with their mentors to discuss their progress.

One of our key objectives this year is to integrate the opportunities provided by the BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) initiative into our teaching so that our students can attain even higher levels of achievement and engagement. To prepare for this, teachers used the google platform for the first time last year and also experimented with a class set of chromebooks in each whanau. This year all our teachers will be training for and sitting the examination for google accreditation as a Level 1 Certified Educator which will improve our capacity to utilise the potential of the google platform and portable, personally chosen devices.

Please join me in wishing all our teachers everything of the best in this journey. Once again we will experience the challenge, daunting for some, of a three hour examination. I will give the community feedback later in the year of our results without revealing the names of successful/unsuccessful candidates!

Growing greatness – kia mana ake

‘Around the World in 80 Days’ Challenge

As a part of the ‘exploration’ stage of their learning journey, Year 9 students from Water Whanau enjoyed the opportunity to conduct firsthand research with industry experts, Emma Pilkington and Sesh Dayal from Botany Flight Centre today.  Students have been tasked with the challenge of designing an ‘Around the World in 80 Days’ tour on a budget, taking account for real-world requirements such as passports, visas, timezones, currency, insurance, personal safety and travel bans plus a range of ‘What if’ scenarios and travel tips.  We thank Emma and Sesh for their time and valued support of the school.

Jayshant’s Athletic’s Success

Jayshant Kumar (10M1) has recently taken up athletics with the Pakuranga Athletics Club. His events are 100m , 200m, 60m and Long Jump. The Counties Manukau Champs were held last Saturday and Jay did extremely well, bringing back medals for all 4 events in the under 14 boys ;
Gold medal in Long Jump, Silver medal for the 60m sprints and Bronze medals for 200M and 100M sprints. We are extremely proud of Jay and his achievements at MHJC and wish him all the very best for this weekend coming, where he will be competing at the Auckland Athletics Championships.

ERO feedback

As stated before we were extremely pleased with both the report and the productive conversations we had with the review team. We wanted to use the week as an opportunity to hear from experienced educators who visit a large number of schools and can offer positive and insightful perspectives. It is very pleasing to note that they were excited by what we are doing at MHJC. The conclusion sums up their findings:

“Students are well engaged and supported to develop high self-efficacy as learners. They learn through a rich and integrated curriculum that prioritises problem-solving.
Effective governance and widely shared leadership promote educational experiences that draw on middle year’s teaching and research”.
The Board of Trustees also met with the review team and we will be working on some of their suggestions moving forward. There were no areas of concern however we will be reviewing how we can promote ways to connect with our wider community and continuing to develop natural opportunities for all of us to become aware of and practice Te Reo Maori and Maori cultural heritage.
One way to achieve both these stated objectives is for us all to support the Cultural Day scheduled for Saturday 8 April.
This is a fantastic celebration of our culturally diverse community and includes the chance to sample traditional food, dance and music from different nations and New Zealand/Aotearoa.
I look forward to seeing you there and continuing our learning journey together.
Growing greatness – kia mana ake

Welcome to the 2017 school year!

Welcome to the 2017 school year!

This promises to be another year of exciting opportunities for our students. I look forward to welcoming all our new and returning students personally and hope everyone has made suitable resolutions for 2017.

We were very pleased with our National Standards achievement data and wish to congratulate the Year 7 and 8 cohort who managed to exceed the 2016 target in Mathematics and reach the 2017 target of 85% at or above standard a year early! All our results will be placed on the web site in the Principal’s Report once the NCEA data has been received.

We also received the confirmed ERO report which is also extremely positive. The team were extremely impressed by the school and how we are bringing the vision of “providing innovative, constantly evolving, personalised learning” to life. The full report will also be put on the web site after it has been ratified by the Board of Trustees at its first meeting of the year.

A big year lies ahead for our students who will be the first to be able to work at school with their own digital devices. We predict this move will have a very positive effect on teaching and learning and reinforces every aspect of our vision. Please refer to our web site for more information about this important initiative.

Best wishes

The home of Mission Heights Junior College, Auckland, New Zealand