Tena koutou katoa. Nga mihi atawhai nui.

And the slowed return to normality begins. We are now in L3 here in Auckland – at long last.  It hasn’t made too much difference to our online learning except for the handful of students who require onsite supervision. From my office today, I hear the gentle putt putt of the ride on mower as the groundsman delightedly returns the grass height to pre-Covid levels so the students can see a ball on the ground.

On the radio on my way into my office this morning, it was all about Aucklanders queuing for their first takeaway in 5 weeks – and some had been queuing for several hours, sleeping in their cars to get their first bite of Maccers or KFC.  I just don’t get that.  Queues for a large mocha?  Now that I can understand!!

As we navigate through the last 8 days of Term 3, our staff are still working incredibly hard to ensure our students stay motivated and engaged online.  In talking to other colleagues around the isthmus, the engagement levels with many of their students have dropped to 20%, some even as low as 5%. We’re not seeing anything like that in our online classes.  Anecdotally, staff are still reporting 100% attendance in most of their classes, so thank you for continuing to support your daughters and their learning.

We are still focused on ensuring our senior students who have external exams have all the necessary preparation.  We continue to modify and adapt our programmes of learning as NZQA continue to make changes to how these external examinations are going to be run.

So, as we look forward to a little more freedom this week, focus on the upcoming Term break and, hopefully, a return to face to face teaching in Term 4.