The end of Term 1 is approaching at a rapid speed and like many of you I find it incredulous that we are here already. With so much going on we haven’t had much time to sit back and reflect, but have continued to steer our schools onwards and upwards. The Easter break will give us a chance to slow down and re-charge the batteries.

On a disappointing note, two absolute gems of our system will be leaving us at the end of this Term. Executive Director Mark Grant has taken up a position as CEO of AITSL and Executive Director Geoff Pellizzer is retiring. Both of these senior officers have been enormously supportive of us in our schools, always willing to collaborate, valued our input and looked at issues with a school lens. Both have worked on projects that have tried to bring our system into the 21st century, supporting equity funding and bringing home some of the more complex software solutions for schools. They will be missed enormously by our system, by the primary principalship in general and very much by our Executive.

Following the NSW State elections we were blind-sided by the removal of our Minister Hon Rob Stokes - even after a win for the LNP coalition. He was obviously needed in another portfolio after his strong showing in Education. The Minister was always someone who would listen