15 October 2020

Newsletter Articles

PRINCIPAL’S REPORT

Hello Swan Reach,

It is vital for students, staff and families to apply the 5 keys to successful life-long learning (organisation, confidence, getting along, persistence and resilience) every term, however it is important that we ‘dig in’ this term to finish with the best possible outcomes. Our ability to persist and be resilient to finish strongly will significantly affect students’ academic endeavours and results. SRAS encourages our seniors to apply these skills as they hone in on completing their well-deserved SACE accreditation. Together We Can Do It!

TERM 4

Staff are looking forward to a dynamic and busy term, full of learning engagement and opportunities for our students. Some of the main learning events are outlined below:

• Term 4 learning overviews going home this Friday
• PAT–R and PAT-M testing to be completed
• School photos
• RAGE, Storm Birds and Drumbeat sessions
• Pink Stumps and Book Week
• World Teacher Day
• Mid Murray Our Town visit
• School Magazine
• Life Ed Van and Create-A-Playground
• Student Free Day – 2021 planning
• Whole School Transition and Principal Tours
• Primary School Swimming Lessons
• Self Esteem Course
• End of Year Activity Week
• Reports
• Presentation Night – outdoor event this year

We look forward to continuing to re-connect with families at a number of these events as COVID restrictions permit. Social distancing measures and safe hygiene practices continue to apply at these events as well as COVID sign in protocols.

WHOLE SCHOOL TRANSITION & PRINCIPAL TOURS

SRAS believes that transition for students and their families is important for learning continuity and sense of belonging. We will facilitate 3 transition sessions for our students, including 2 with principal tours and morning tea for parents and carers. Mrs Trish Horstmann will also conduct a pre-school enrolment meeting for parents and carers at one of the transitions, with the exact day and date to be confirmed through her Early Learning Centre overview. Below are the dates for the transitions:

1. Thursday 12th November – morning lessons including principal tour and morning tea
2. Thursday 19th November – lessons 3 and 4
3. Thursday 26th - morning lessons including principal tour and morning tea

2021 CLASS STRUCTURES AND STAFFING

SRAS is endeavouring to finalise class structures and staffing for 2021. This process is done with the key priorities of:

• what is best for the students
• alignment with our site learning goals and targets
• 2021 funding and budget

The process is guided by the Personnel Advisory Committee with ALL staff consulted and informed. SRAS has had quite a number of changes over recent years as we apply innovations to provide the optimal learning conditions for students and families.

SRAS is blessed with being able to sustain low numbers in classes (many neighbouring schools and preschools consistently have 20-25 in their Junior Primary classes, 25-30 in Middle and Upper Primary classes and above 20 in Secondary classes). It is predicted that ALL SRAS classes will be no greater than 15 in 2021 and we’ll be able to inform the community of class structures and most staffing by the end of week 5.

WE CAN’T IGNORE MENTAL ILLNESS PREVENTION IN A COVID-19 WORLD

By Stephen Carbone, University of Melbourne:

Despite the incremental easing of Victoria’s restrictions, it’s clear the journey towards COVID-normal is far slower than many people had hoped.

Australians – particularly Victorians – have shown remarkable resilience, but many are suffering emotionally.

The mental health impacts of COVID-19

During the early days of the pandemic, surveys showed a sharp increase in symptoms of anxiety and depression across Australia. These difficulties continued into mid-August. More than 40% of Australians aged 18 years and older feel high levels of anxiety, and around one in six report depressive symptoms.

To target this, federal and state governments have increased telephone, online and face-to-face mental health supports. While this is vital, more needs to be done to prevent people suffering severe mental health problems in the first place.

Over 40% of Australians aged 18 years and older feel high levels of anxiety, and around 1 in 6 report depressive symptoms.

Prevention is better than cure

There’s good evidence we can prevent many cases of depression, anxiety and substance abuse. But Australia doesn’t have a mental health prevention plan or policy, and government funding for prevention is just 1% of the total mental health budget.

The Fifth National Mental Health and Suicide Prevention Plan, the government’s key mental health blueprint, focuses on improving mental health-care services and suicide prevention, but not on preventing the mental health conditions that are a major risk factor for suicide.

What about illness prevention?

Last month the federal government released a consultation paper on its proposed National Preventive Health Strategy, setting out what the strategy will aim to achieve and how it might be done.

The document’s exciting because it focuses on health promotion and illness prevention, acknowledging we can’t improve the health of the Australian community through health-care measures alone.

But unfortunately, the proposed strategy’s fundamentally focused on physical health issues. In its 20 pages, the consultation paper only mentions mental health three times.

Government funding for prevention is just 1% of the total mental health budget. The National Preventive Health Strategy provides an opportunity to shed light on prevention measures for mental health conditions.

The same principles outlined in the strategy to prevent conditions such as diabetes also apply to preventing mental health conditions such as depression. To prevent either, we need to minimise risk factors and increase protective factors linked to the condition, before it occurs. But some adaptation would be needed for the plan to address both physical and mental health.

What prevention measures should be added?

A focus on physical activity, healthy eating, and non-smoking will help to promote good mental health as well as physical health.

Unemployment, a risk factor for a number of mental health conditions, is on the rise due to COVID-19.

To prevent mental health issues we should focus on building people’s health literacy and self-care skills through public information campaigns and online learning programs. Supportive social environments can be encouraged by parenting programs, and school and workplace mental health promotion initiatives.

Local communities could also be mobilised to take positive action on local issues that contribute to poor health and mental health through place-based strategies. Place-based strategies aim to tackle issues existing at a neighbourhood level, such as social isolation and poor housing.

Services could be reoriented towards prevention. Primary care professionals might provide advice on self-care and use social prescribing to address stress and enhance social supports. Social prescribing involves medical professionals linking patients to non-medical supports. For example, they may provide an “exercise prescription” or “art prescription”.

Finally, appropriate public policy solutions, such as JobSeeker and JobKeeper, that tackle the social and economic determinants of ill-health are needed.

Social factors matter too

Research also points to a strong link between mental health conditions and experience of childhood adversity, family violence, loneliness, racism, homophobia and transphobia. Workplace stressors, financial stress, unemployment and homelessness are also risk factors.

Many of these issues are on the increase because of COVID-19, so to safeguard mental health we need to tackle them and their impact. This will require the use of evidence-based preventive programs outlined above – many of which already exist but are not being implemented well or to sufficient scale. It will also require public policies to soften the economic blow and ease financial stress.

Targeting these issues will not only help to prevent mental health conditions, but physical health conditions as well.

While better access to mental health-care services is important, it can’t solve all the mental health challenges posed by COVID-19. We also need to strengthen the factors that buffer people against stress, and tackle the underlying factors that contribute to poor mental health.

Whether we create a National Preventive Mental Health Plan, or embed mental health in the current National Preventive Health Strategy, one thing’s for sure: continuing to ignore the prevention of mental health conditions is not an option in a COVID-19 world.

Mr John Robertson
Principal

SACE STUDY & EXAMS

Term 4 brings around what can be a stressful time for year 12 students, with SACE exams contributing 30% of a student’s final grade. This year we have students partaking in Mathematical Methods and General Mathematics exams. With the right preparation exams are a great way to revisit and consolidate what you have learnt throughout the year. Follow these 6 simple tips and remember to remain persistent and consistent.

Mr Troy Cowland
Deputy Principal

BADMINTON TOURNAMENT/PINK STUMPS

As part of their SACE assessment the year 11/12 Sport Studies class planned, conducted and participated in a badminton tournament. The assessment required the students to organise a 1-day excursion where they had opportunities to demonstrate their initiative, leadership and collaboration skills. The tournament was held at Tintinara Area School (TAS) where we competed in a Round Robin style tournament against TAS and Karoonda Area School (KAS). The format consisted of teams of four with each play competing in a singles, doubles and reverse doubles matches. We got off to a flier against KAS winning all four singles games and consolidated with some crafty doubles performances winning comfortably by 4 sets. TAS proved a more experienced opponent, however we were able to come out of the contest with a 7 set to 5 victory. The event was well ran and provided a good base for the upcoming Pink Stumps Day – Friday week 2 (23rd October). We would love to see as many community members come out to support this great cause – See attached poster for details. Due to COVI 19 restrictions we thank community members for signing in through the front office for tracking purposes.

Mr Troy Cowland
Deputy Principal

SCHOOL/COMMUNITY LIBRARY NEWS

BOOK FAIR

This year’s book fair will be held in the Silver Vale ‘Pop up Shop’ beginning Monday 26th October to 3rd November, 2020. This is a great opportunity to stock up for Christmas. Students will be able to purchase books during lunch time, 1:00pm-1:25pm, parents and carers are welcome during the day just visit the library to arrange a visit.

SCHOOL LUNCH ORDERS

We thank the Swan Reach General Store for supplying lunch orders for the school. The menu and ordering details are below. Please note there are no lunch orders available on Wednesdays.

SRAS WEBSITE

The Swan Reach Area School website is where you can find all the school information including the newsletter, forms and policies. Please visit the website below.

NEWSLETTER INFORMATION

Due date for the next Newsletter is 10:00am, Tuesday 20 October, 2020. The newsletter is distributed via the SZApp and school website. Printed copies are still available upon request.

Articles can be emailed to dl.0423.info@schools.sa.edu.au clearly marked in the subject box as Newsletter, faxed to 8570 2325 or delivered to the library/front office. Due to the way the Newsletter is now being set up, not all photos are included in the print copy, however there are several photo galleries included online and via the SZApp. We now have approximately 80% of families accessing the newsletter via the app or the website and are hoping for 100% strike rate as we head into Term 4.

PLAYGROUP

Swan Reach Playgroup at SRAS Early Learning Centre. Every Tuesday during term time 10am-12pm. All children birth to school age are welcome for indoor and outdoor play. Please wear sun-smart clothing, bring a hat, water bottle and fruit/veg to share for healthy snack time. $2 per session, per family.

For more information contact the school on 8570 2053.

P-CMG/Playgroup

Parent Mother Goose sessions have returned to Swan Reach in the Early Learning Centre. These are being held fortnightly on odd weeks of term, Wednesdays at 10 am. PCMG is a chance to get out of the house for babies and toddlers and carers. Bond with your children and have fun using the power of songs, rhymes and stories. Trained facilitators lead a relaxed session for parents and children with a play and coffee and chat after. Sessions are free and there is no booking involved!

Sessions will begin in Week 2, 21st October, 2020.

Coming Events 2020

Community Notices

School\Community Library

Opening Hours

Recess time- 10:40-11.00am
Lunch time-12:40-1:25pm
Phone 8570 2298

Kid’s Club

FRIDAY 30th October 2020
3:15 to 4:30 pm
At the Swan Reach Lutheran Hall
For Reception to Year 7
Cost $1
Enquiries Phone Taryn 0427702377 or Kristy 0438857721

LIGHT THE NIGHT

BOOKWEEK/PINK STUMPS DAY