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| From the Principal's Desk |
 Welcome to the 2012 school year. I hope you have all had a restful summer break and are looking forward to the opportunities of the New Year. School recommences for:
• Welcome Morning for new Year 3 - 12 students and all students entering Year 7 on Monday 30 January.
The morning for all students and parents will commence with a service and welcome at 8.45 am in the Hugh Baird Sports Centre. The orientation part of the day will conclude for students at approximately 12.30 pm. Parking for Welcome Morning will be available on the School oval, entry off McNeil Street.
• Middle and Senior School students on Tuesday 1 February at 8.30 am. Students will assemble at the Hugh Baird Sports Centre.
• Parents of students in the Junior School have been advised of their child’s start date.
I am looking forward to welcoming all students and seeing parents at welcoming events such as Welcome Morning and the Parents’ Committee Sundowner on Friday 10 February before taking long service leave. I will have the pleasure of sharing the Year 12 Ball with the Class of 2012 before I depart.
This is my fifteenth year at PLC and so I am ready for time out to recharge the batteries, spend time with family and combine travel with my interests in history, cultures and hiking. My plans include trekking in Patagonia and exploring Chile, Argentina and Sri Lanka. I leave the School in the experienced hands of the Senior Leadership team, with Keith Anderson as Acting Principal in my absence.
By the time I return at the commencement of Term 2 the School year will be well and truly underway with new students established and Years 11 and 12 looking towards their first set of examinations!
This newsletter reports on the pleasing academic results achieved by our Class of 2011. However, as our guest speaker at Speech Night 2011, Rosalind Dixon (Head Prefect 1996) so eloquently reminded us, academic excellence is only part of what we seek to offer at PLC. We want to encourage the ‘all well-rounded PLC girl’ by supporting all to engage in a wide range of human endeavors including sport, cultural arts and social responsibility. Our co-curricular programme is designed to give breadth to the PLC experience, to allow students to discover their strengths and interests, to forge friendships and to ‘take the risk’ or challenge of trying new activities. As Rosalind mentioned, such engagement brings a knowledge of self and confidence; time management and organisation skills that stand you in good stead beyond PLC; and a sense of belonging to a community. PLC is not about learning for a living but learning for an enriched life. Heads of School and tutors will be encouraging all students as they return to School to give thought to the activities and challenges with which they would like to engage across 2012.
Personal Goals (PGs)
Year 8 Ferguson and Summer House Tutor groups will be engaging this year in a trial initiative whereby students will be supported, on an individual basis, to set goals that will be monitored on a termly basis in collaboration with their Tutor. We are working towards being able to share these goals and their achievement with parents through electronic means. The benefits we seek to trial include:
• A co-ordinated approach to goal setting that will ultimately be available and familiar to all students across the School.
• Improvement of student learning outcomes and/or personal goals as a result of focused goal setting.
• Further development of girls’ sense of independence and responsibility for their own learning.
• Ensuring all girls have a sense of being known, cared for and valued.
• Building relationships between tutors and students.
Further information will be provided at the Year 8 Support Your Daughter Evening and through communication from Sharon Anderson, Head of Middle School who is leading the trial project. Our ultimate goal is to support all students to achieve to their potential. This trial will gather valuable research data on whether or not the time, planned process, training and resources invested in such formal goal setting programme will achieve the benefits we seek. We will keep you informed of outcomes.
–Beth Blackwood, Principal
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| Pre-Kindergarten to Year 12 |
Student Contact Lists
Student Contact Lists will be emailed to parents on Friday 3 February. Hard copies of the lists will also be available from Junior, Middle and Senior School receptions. The list, unless otherwise advised, provides parents’ names, home telephone number, suburb and email. Also, unless otherwise requested, the primary carer is named for parents who are separated.
We ask that families who require parent contact information to be updated to notify the Registrar’s Office of these changes by email mseubert@plc.wa.edu.au or in writing by Friday 27 January. Any updates received after this date will not be included in the contact lists.
Medical Updates
I’m sure you understand how important it is that the School has accurate and up-to-date information regarding students’ medical requirements. Should any details regarding your child’s medical requirements change, please notify the Health Centre at healthcentre@plc.wa.edu.au so that the School’s records can be updated. Our priority is the health and safety of your son or daughter.
Parents’ Committee Sundowner
New parents are invited to come and meet existing parents and staff at the annual Parents’ Committee Sundowner on Friday 10 February. For details and to book, go to http://www.trybooking.com/BCID Invitation to Join School Support Groups
PLC offers many opportunities for parents to be involved in the life of the School while your children are students. Please consider where you feel you can contribute and nominate the area/s on the form attached.
Annual Review
Please find attached PLC’s Annual Review for 2011. It is our aim to keep families informed about the School, its achievements, its academic and co-curricular programmes, events, functions and plans for the future. The Review also outlines the primary objectives for the School across the 2012 year. I hope that you will find the information contained of interest.
Academic Entrance Scholarships
Scholarship examinations for students entering Year 7 and Year 8 in 2013 will be held on Saturday 25 February 2012 and are conducted as part of the Australian Co-operative Entry Programme (ACEP) administered by the Australian Council for Education Research (ACER). Application forms are now available online by accessing the PLC website – www.plc.wa.edu.au Please note that scholarship testing takes place much earlier in 2012 than in past years.
Links Newsletter
A reminder that our regular e-newsletter, Links, is our primary means of communication and is emailed to parents weekly, commencing Friday 3 February. The aim of Links is to have one central repository for keeping parents informed of events, activities and School news. As such it is important that parents access and read the information contained.
PLC Community Handbook 2012
The electronic version of the PLC Community Handbook with its relevant updates can be accessed here. Semester 1 Calendar
The cyclic calendar for Semester 1 is available here.
Secondary Assistance Scheme and Abstudy Supplement Allowance
Parents or guardians who hold a Centrelink Family Health Care Card, Centrelink Pensioner Concession Care or Veterans’ Affairs Pensioner Concession Card and who have students in Years 8 to 12 can claim assistance up to and including the year the student turns 18 years of age. Applications close Friday 9 March. To apply for the scheme or to obtain more information, please contact PLC Accounts at 08 9424 6417.
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| 2011 WACE Results |
Congratulations to our Year 12 students, 100% of whom successfully completed their Western Australian Certificate of Education (WACE) examinations last year. Our leavers maintained PLC’s reputation for academic excellence by achieving well above the State averages. These results are testimony to excellence of teaching given the School’s non-selective entrance policy and diverse range of student talents, abilities and interests.
In 2011, 100% of Year 12 PLC students achieved secondary graduation through WACE. In the WACE examinations:
• 3.4% achieved an Australian Tertiary Admission Rank (ATAR) of 99.00 or above, which means they were in the top 1% of candidates in the State.
• 29.9% had an ATAR above 95.00 – the top 5% in the State.
• 50.3% had an ATAR above 90.00 – the top 10% of the State.
 Course Exhibitions were awarded to School Runner-up to Dux, Sarah Ransom, for Biology, and to Head Girl,
Dinu Kumarasinghe, for Drama. Course Exhibitions are awarded to the top eligible student obtaining the highest combined mark in a WACE course.
Certificates of Distinction were awarded to Sarah Ransom for Biology, Natasha Graham for Dance, Dinu Kumarasinghe for Drama, Elizabeth Alderson for Geography, Alice Garbutt-Wilkins for Human Biology, and Dux of School, Emily Warton, for Human Biology. Certificates of Distinction are awarded to eligible students who are in the top 0.5 per cent of candidates based on the WACE course score or the top two candidates (whichever is greater) in a WACE course.
 Certificates of Excellence went to Elizabeth Alderson, Jessica Armstrong, Mia Carlton, Jia-Ying Choong, Dinu Kumarasinghe, Katie Lloyd, Siobhan Mews, Abigail Pearson, Sarah Ransom, Patricia Soegiantho and Emily Warton.
A Certificate of Excellence is awarded to each eligible student who obtains at least 18 grades of ‘A’ in course units or equivalents and achieved the WACE.
PLC also was listed among the top 15 schools in 17 WACE subjects/courses of study: Biological Sciences, Dance, Drama, Economics, Geography, Human Biological Science, Literature, Materials Design and Technology, Mathematics 3AB, 3CB and Specialist, Media Production and Analysis, Physics, Psychology, Visual Arts, Applied Information Technology, and Food Science and Technology. The list is compiled from the percentage of students at each school who achieved a WACE course score of 75 or more.
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| Junior School |
 New teaching staff to the Junior School have been introduced to parents through communication at the end of 2011 of class allocations.
The preparation, planning and organisation for the commencement of the 2012 school year is well in hand. It will be a pleasure to meet new Year 3, 4, 5 and 6 students at the Welcome Morning on Monday 30 January 2012. The staff are also looking forward to greeting returning Year 3, 4, 5 and 6 students in the afternoon from 1.30 pm when they are welcome to call in to locate their new class and teacher.
For those students from Pre-Kindergarten, Kindergarten, Pre-Primary, Year 1 and 2, a staggered commencement programme has been scheduled from Tuesday 31 January. This will allow parents and their son/daughter an opportunity to meet with the class teacher in a small group as well as to ease into the school year. Please refer to the Junior School Handbook for details here.
As a school, we appreciate the importance of working in partnership with our community and we have endeavoured to provide a number of opportunities where staff and parents can meet. The first of these is the Welcome Morning/Welcome Back, the second is our Coffee on Campus meetings and lastly, teachers will hold an open class on Friday 10 February from 5.00 pm to 6.00 pm preceding the Parents’ Committee Sundowner. This is an event hosted by the Parents’ Committee for all parents to attend. We do hope you can join us on at least one of these occasions.
At the commencement of the school year, teachers’ core business is to build a relationship with students and together with information and data provided by the previous year’s teacher, move them on in their learning. Parents are respectfully requested to allow them time to do this. Parent interviews have been scheduled for the week commencing 12 March. By this time, teachers will be able to share learning goals, areas of strength and areas needing specific teaching.
The building programme at school over the break has seen the transformation of the old Junior School Hall into a 21st Century Library space. We are anticipating that this new library will be central to all learning in the School. At present we are still ‘living’ with 20th century furnishings but the space will transform across the year as we become more familiar with student movement, acoustics, light and teaching preferences that will help determine the most desirable furniture and positioning.
The commencement of the school year will be one of excitement coupled with that of frustration as we once again encounter traffic issues. To assist us to move traffic along effectively and courteously, please place the nametag provided for you in a visible position in the front window of your motor vehicle. Only those parents with a green fluorescent priority parking tag are permitted to park in the Junior School carpark. All other Early Years parents are welcome to park on the Junior School tennis courts. We do hope that these measures, along with the staggered start, will alleviate some of the issues I encountered in my first year at the School.
Please note the following amendments to the Junior School Handbook: Page 15 Class Finish Times should read 2.50 pm Kindergarten, 3.05 pm Pre-Primary, Year 1 and Year 2. Page 27 Out of School Hours Care paragraph 3 should read “After school care located in Summers House is offered for students in Kindergarten to Year 6.”
There is much on the agenda as we move into 2012. A number of initiatives arising from the Strategic Plan will be shared with you once the School has settled into the learning and teaching programme. I extend to you all an invitation to become part of this vibrant community. The staff and I look forward to working with you.
–Heather Pope, Head of Junior School
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| Middle and Senior School |
Staff Matters
We welcome the following new members of staff to Middle and Senior School:
• Sarah Combes as teacher of Drama. Sarah has just returned from four years teaching in London prior to which she was Drama Subject Co-ordinator at St Stephen’s School, Carramar.
• Gemma Freel as a Media teacher. Gemma is a recent graduate with experience teaching at Sacred Heart College.
• Ainsley Harvey as Middle School Counsellor/Psychologist. Ainsley is transferring from Ursula Frayne College where she held a similar position for 10 years.
• Elizabeth Lagrange as teacher of Textiles. Elizabeth brings a wealth of experience in this field, teaching the subject more recently at St Hilda’s.
• Dr Christine Madill as a teacher of English. Christine has a doctorate in English Literature and is making the transition from university lecturing (UWA) to secondary teaching.
• Francesca Nelson returns as Registrar having acted in this position last year while Rosemary Lukin was on leave. We welcome her to the role and know that, as an Old Collegian, she looks forward to supporting entry of continuing generations of PLC students.
• Annette Pearce as Head of Sport. Annette recently held a like position at Nga Tawa Girls School in New Zealand.
• Liam Sullivan as Director of Outdoor Education, supported by team members Jay Freap and Ellen Barker. Liam spent 2011 in Queensland as Co-ordinator of Outdoor Education, Head of Personal Development and Head of House at Pacific Lutheran College. He was previously a member of the outdoor education team at Scotch College, Perth. He accompanied the PLC/Scotch Service Tour to Tanzania in 2010.
• Tracey Walker as Indigenous Scholarship Programme Co-ordinator. A former teacher, with experience teaching and living in the Kimberley, Tracey has more recently been employed by Centrelink with ABSTUDY. We welcome her commitment and experience.
Welcome Morning Programme
We look forward to seeing all Year 7 students and new students in Years 8 to 12 and parents at Welcome Morning on Monday 30 January. See invitation and schedule attached.
Inter-House Swimming Carnival
 Our Inter-House Swimming Carnival is held shortly after the commencement of School as it provides a wonderful opportunity for new students to identify with their School House, experience the School’s culture of participation and get to know fellow House members across all years. All students are expected to attend and parents are welcome as spectators. The Carnival, for all students in Years 7 to 12, will be held at Challenge Stadium on Monday 6 February 2012. The details for the day are attached in order for you to make any necessary arrangements for your daughter. The procedure behind the selection for this carnival and how the results are used to select the swimming squad is also included for your information.
Co-Curricular Timetable
Included in this mailout is the Middle and Senior School co-curricular timetable for Semester 1. The aim of this information is to support students in balancing the many demands placed on their time; to encourage them to give thought to the commitment required of each activity they wish to undertake and to keep tutors informed of individual student’s engagement in school and community life.
Smartrider Information
See attached information and non-disclosure form for the Student SmartRider Card, which allows Middle and Senior School students to concession travel on public transport services.
Middle School Support Your Daughter Evenings
All parents are invited to attend the following Support Your Daughter Evenings to discuss information and issues of importance to girls in these Year groups and to help prepare for the year ahead.
Year 7 Support Your Daughter Evening
Year 8 Support Your Daughter Evening
Year 9 Support Your Daughter Evening
Service Projects for 2012
Please find attached a list of Service projects for the coming year. PLC has a strong tradition of service and we encourage all students and families to join us in volunteer activities.
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