Dear Parents

Following the communication you have recently received from Dr Priest, Dr Bach and Ms Bourke, please find included in this Newsletter a series of important reminders and information to ensure a smooth transition for you and your daughter/s in 2020.

Melanie Dow
Director of Communications and Marketing

Student safety is the responsibility of every member of our community. 

Additional Crossing Attendant

In 2019, Dr Priest wrote to the Banyule City Council seeking an additional crossing attendant to assist students to cross the increasingly busy Upper Heidelberg Road between the The Centre Ivanhoe and our Performing Arts Centre. I am delighted to report that the Council agreed with our concern about this risk to our students and they have approved and are currently recruiting for an additional crossing attendant to commence helping our students to cross the busy road before and after school. The Council have indicated that the new attendant should commence activities in March after relevant employment checks and training have been completed. The School is most grateful to the Banyule City Council for supporting this important safety initiative.

Parking Reminders

With school resuming next Friday 31 January for Year 7 students and Monday 3 February for all other students, we would like to take the opportunity to remind all families of the importance of adhering to the relevant Road Rules, parking and speed restrictions around the School, especially during the peak drop-off and pick-up times.

Please remember that the two-minute Drop-off/ Pick-up zones operating in Noel Street and Marshall Street are strictly only for two minutes. Please be considerate of other families who also need to get their daughters to/from school, and of our neighbours who need access to their driveways at all times.

If you would like to park and walk into the School grounds before or after school, please park elsewhere to reduce congestion in these zones. The two-minute limit applies from 8.00am until 9.00am and from 3.00pm until 4.00pm on Marshall Street and from 8.00am until 4.00pm on Noel Street. Please note, Banyule City Council has a special vehicle with a dashboard-mounted camera that allows infringement notices to be issued on the basis of photographs taken.

The School thanks all families for your continued compliance with all Road Rules to ensure a safe environment for children and other pedestrians.

Community Safety

To ensure the safety and wellbeing of our students, parents are reminded that there are no staff on duty before 8.00am each morning. Unless students are participating in a supervised activity (for example, sport training), unaccompanied students should not be on the School grounds before this time and the School cannot accept responsibility for their safety and wellbeing. In Prep to Year 5, arrangements must be made for students to be collected before 3.30pm each afternoon. Staff supervision ceases at this time and any unaccompanied students still at school will be escorted to the TeamKids after-care program (if registered) which will incur a fee. In Years 6 to 12, staff supervision also ceases at 3.30pm with the exception of the Senior Area of the Library which closes at 6.00pm each evening. After 6.00pm, if students are not collected, or decline to use the supervised facilities in the Library until 6.00pm, the School cannot accept responsibility for their safety and wellbeing.

If you have any further questions regarding the information contained in the above, please contact School Reception on T: +61 3 9490 6222 or E: enquiries@ivanhoegirls.vic.edu.au.

In order to improve our sustainability, in 2020 we will no longer be providing a printed copy of the School Calendar to parents. Given the amount of changes that occur to the School Calendar in the year, we encourage you to make use of the School Calendar on hive which is the most accurate and up to date version.

The hive Calendar can also be viewed on the Ivanhoe Girls’ App and the App allows you to save school events to your personal calendar on your preferred device. (see further information below regarding the App).

In addition, we are pleased to advise that we have also provided you with the option to download the electronic School Calendar, or specific Early Learning Centre, Junior School or Senior School calendars, which you can import into your own calendar App, including Microsoft Outlook, Google Calendar or Apple Calendar. 

The Calendar is available to download via hive: https://hive.ivanhoegirls.vic.edu.au/homepage/3711

The 2020 Ivanhoe Girls' Student ID card, which is currently used for the School Library and Café (via Flexischools), includes Public Transport Victoria (PTV) approval. Students will be able to use their 2020 Student ID Card to purchase student passes and concession fares in 2020.

2020 Student ID cards will be issued a few weeks after our planned photo days which will take place on Friday 31 January (Year 7), Tuesday 4 February (Prep – Year 6) and Thursday 6 February (Years 8 - 12). We anticipate students will receive their 2020 cards ahead of the 2019 PTV student passes cut-off date of 1 March 2020, allowing you time to purchase a new pass for 2020.

In addition to the above information, PTV strongly encourages all students to register their myki student pass to protect this high-value product and to be eligible for a replacement if it is lost or stolen.

As the new process no longer requires paperwork to be kept at staffed stations, no on-the-spot replacement is possible. Normal myki replacement rules apply. That is, replacement is only available to customers who register their mykis.

The Ivanhoe Girls’ App allows you to stay up to date with news and notices from the School as it happens and access useful information from hive quickly.

Features of the Ivanhoe Girls’ App include:

• Instant, targeted notifications and news from the School (including from your daughter’s specific year level)
• Ivanhoe Girls’ fortnightly Newsletter
• Easy and quick access to the School’s Absence phone lines and email details
• School Map
• Link via hive to Flexischools for ordering your child’s lunch (Junior School and Senior School)
• Student Timetable
• The most up to date School Calendar, including Uniform Shop opening hours and School events, which you can save into your personal calendar on your device
• Links to hive, the Payment Portal, School website and school social media pages.

You can download the Ivanhoe Girls’ App from one of the below locations and enter your hive username and password to log in.

• Apple devices - In the App Store
• Android devices - In Google Play

All parents with a valid email address have been issued with a unique username and password to access hive and the Ivanhoe Girls’ App.

If you have any issues logging into hive or the App, please contact the IT Department on

T: +61 3 9490 6271 or
E: itdept@ivanhoegirls.vic.edu.au.

Information for Parents regarding ordering and purchasing your daughter’s official school photos (Prep - Year 12) will be emailed on Tuesday 28 January 2020. National Photography will be continuing as the Official School Photo Company in 2020.

Information for ELC Photos will be provided to parents later in Term 1.

The following Academic and Music Scholarships are now open until Monday 10 February 2020.

• Academic Scholarships - Year 4 2020 students for Year 5 entry in 2021
• Academic Scholarships - Year 6 2020 students for Year 7 entry in 2021
• Music Scholarships - students who are entering Years 5 through to Year 11 in 2021

Applications Close: Monday 10 February 2020
Examination Date: Saturday 15 February 2020

Further information is available at https://www.ivanhoegirls.vic.edu.au/enrol/scholarships including the Online Applications link.

Year Level Parent Contact Lists will be distributed via email later in Term 1 to those parents who have given the School written permission (either previously or recently) to share contact details. 

Please contact the School as soon as possible if you would like your contact details to be included on this list.

Unfortunately during re-tiling works on the Swimming Pool over the summer break some structural issues were discovered that require attention. Whilst they present no current risk, they need to be attended to now to avoid further disruption in future years and before new tiles are laid. We are in the process of rectifying these issues as soon as possible. It is however most likely that the Swimming Pool will not be available for the duration of Term 1. Therefore at this stage, no Swimming Programs will commence until Term 2.

We apologise for the inconvenience and will return the Swimming Pool to service as soon as possible. Our staff are actively reviewing the impact on all planned Term 1 activities.

Students who are involved in the Swim Team, the Diving Team and Synchronised Swimming will be contacted shortly about alternate arrangements for Term 1.

In Term 4 of 2019 you may remember that we had a fierce storm that brought with it very strong wind gusts. On the day, two medium-sized trees were uprooted near the Martin Troy Rose Garden with some branches falling or being damaged. To ensure the safety of our school community, an arborist was engaged to survey every tree on the School grounds and determine if there was further maintenance work needed. 

On the day following the storm and later following the arborist’s report being received, a number of trees had some branches removed. During the arborist’s inspection, a significant and large oak tree, near the entrance to The Cooerwull Centre, was identified as having a major crack of many metres in the trunk. Despite the arborists already removing a number of branches, the integrity of the tree was compromised and water had begun to seep into the trunk thus increasing the danger of it falling. Hence, earlier this week and with some sadness, the large tree was professionally removed.

Just a reminder that you can follow us on Social Media to get updates as they happen. Click on the icons at the bottom of this Newsletter.