Excited to be back learning on the first day of term!

Kia ora koutou

We hope you had a lovely holiday, and some quality family time. We are excited to have all of our students back today and ready to learn for our final term of the year.

During the holidays, I was elected onto the New Zealand Principal Federation. There are 11 Principals from around the country who are a part of this, and I’m proud to say that I am the only small school Principal on the executive, and one of four Principals from Canterbury. It’s a real privilege to have been voted on, to work at a national level, and be a voice for small and rural schools across New Zealand, as well as learn and grow as a leader at the same time. I have been on the Canterbury Primary Principals Association for the last 5 years, so it’s exciting to be able to work on this kaupapa at a national level. We will meet twice a term in Wellington, starting in January 2026. I look forward to updating you on what we are working on.

We are excited for our year 2 students to be moving through to Awaawa today, and our year 5 students who are moving through to Tūpari. It is a great transition for next year, and also allows for smaller class sizes in our junior class. We will be welcoming two new entrants this term - Eddie and Estelle.

Ngā mihi
Maree Lucas
Tumuaki/Principal
principal@omihi.school.nz

School Notices

Principal awards
Congratulations to our Principal award winners from term 3 - Fergus, Ava and Noah.

Sunsmart School
A reminder for students to wear their school hats each day this term. Please can you put sunscreen on your child before they come to school, and they are able to top up at lunchtime as well.

Events this term
We have quite a lot going on this term, please keep an eye on the calendar. We are looking for help with transport for some of the events, so please let Maree know if you are able to help:

• Science Roadshow - whole school trip to Amuri Area School, Monday 13th October, leaving at 11.30am - parent help needed.

• Agri sports/Pet day - Tuesday 21st October

• Athletics - Wednesday 29th October
  Year 0-3 at Waikari School - parent help needed.
  Year 4-8 at Waipara School - we will take the school bus, and parent drop offs.

• Preschooler morning - Thursday 6th November

• Teacher only day - Thursday 13th November

• Whole school trip to the Antarctic Centre - Monday 17th November - parent help needed.

• Year 0-3 Sports Spectacular - Wednesday 19th November at the Sefton Domain - parent help needed

• Rakahuri Blast Mountain Bike race - (optional) year 5/6, year 7/8 - Monday 24th November

• Tūpari farm walk - Friday 5th December

• Whole school Beach Ed - Tuesday 9th December, Waikuku Beach - parent help needed.

• Year 8 day out - Thursday 11th December

• Tūpari library/rest home visit - Friday 12th December

Please let Maree know if you can help with transport to any of these events.

Prize Giving Cups
Can students please return all cups that were received at prize giving and pet day last year.

Agri Sports/Pet Day
This will be on Tuesday 21st October. We will send home a Google Form today for you to enter your pet. Preschoolers are welcome to join us. Agri Sports is in the morning. We ask that parents bring pets along at 12pm, ready for the pet day event to start at 12.30pm. Thanks to George who is organising Agri Sports for us this year.

Inquiry
This term's inquiry is all about investigating and exploring the continent that is Antarctica, looking at Antarctic exploration, ecosystems, food webs and environmental conservation. We are excited to be heading to the Antarctic Centre in week 7 to learn all about life in Antarctica and have some hands-on experiences. 

AI Parent Session
AI is new to us, and we have spent a lot of time this year learning about AI in Education. We would love to bring you on this journey with us, share what we have learnt so far, what’s happening in the classrooms, and what our draft policy looks like. We have an afternoon parent session from 3.15pm - 4pm on Wednesday 22nd October in Kahiwi. Please email Maree to register.

Prize giving
Our final day of school is Tuesday 16th December. We have our prize giving at 9.30am, and we welcome all of our community along to this. It is your choice if you would like to take your children home straight away afterwards, or some families have a play at school before they go. If it’s a nice day and you have a pool key, you might like to stay for a swim.

Attendance Letters
Attendance continues to be a focus for our current government, and they have targets that the Ministry of Education is working with schools on, ours included.  Parents and caregivers are required to have their children attend school, and to develop habits of regular attendance. It is the school’s responsibility to follow this up. We will be sending out attendance letters this week for any children that had less than 90% attendance in term 3. We know there was a lot of sickness in term 3. It’s the unjustified days off that the MOE are really interested in.

International Week of Happiness: 6th - 10th October
This week we are celebrating "International Week of Happiness" . This is an excellent opportunity to strengthen the dialogue around wellbeing education within our community. The children will each pull a name out of a hat within our kura, and throughout the week they try to fill that person's bucket by doing random acts of kindness towards that person. They are not to buy anything for this person, but make them feel loved. This could be by holding the door open for them, writing a positive note and leaving it in their bag, or asking them to do an activity at lunchtime. It is a fantastic way to remind children that small things can make a big difference in someones lives. 

Pool key
If you would like to purchase a pool key for the summer, please email Bryleigh on office@omihi.school.nz. It is $50 for school families, and $70 for our wider community. There is a $20 refund when you return the key.

Teacher only day
We have a teacher only day on Thursday 13th November.

2026
Our dates are in the calendar for term 1. Our first day of school will be on Monday 2nd February. Our whānau swim and picnic will be on Tuesday 3rd February from 3.30-5.30pm. It is a 9 week term, and school holidays start at Easter weekend.

Tipu Māia Kāhui Ako newsletter
You are welcome to read our kāhui newsletter for Term 3 here.

Community Notices

Kia ora koutou,

Playing four square at lunchtime.

We would like to welcome Freya and Amelia who have joined our Paemoana class. It’s lovely to have them and their families as part of our Omihi whānau.

Congratulations to all of our students who performed speeches and poems last week, they did an outstanding job. Well done to Noah, who came 2nd and Ava, who came 3rd in our senior speech competition. Thanks to Mr Green and Mrs Pugh, who were our judges. Also a big congratulations to those students who participated in the kapahaka festival last week. We were so proud of you all. For some, it was out of their comfort zone, but they gave it a go, and put in 100%. It was a real team effort.

A couple of weeks ago, I was fortunate to attend a Principal Conference. As I am on the Canterbury Primary Principal’s executive committee, it meant they funded this professional learning for me. It is one of our priorities at Omihi, to ensure we have professional learning opportunities for all of our staff, and I’m grateful to have staff that want to continue to learn and grow. There is so much happening in the education space at the moment, and it is moving at a rapid rate, so it is crucial for us to keep up with that pace for our students. I’m proud to say we have a board and staff that also value this.

One of the stand out speakers of the conference for me was Justin Coulson. He is a psychologist, a parent of 6 daughters, a parenting expert, a keynote speaker and he talks to thousands of Principals and teachers about emotional intelligence, amongst other things. Three little statements that stuck with me were:

• High emotions = low intelligence 

• Emotions are contagious

• Definition of Connection - feeling seen, heard, valued

To me, these are very powerful statements, and great reminders for us as parents, and as educators, thinking of our students and children every day. We know they can have heightened emotions at times, but they are not adults, and they are not able to regulate these emotions like we can as adults. I attended Justin’s keynote and his workshop, and I think he’s worth looking into more. If you are interested, his website is https://happyfamilies.com.au/about .

Ngā mihi

Maree Lucas
Tumuaki/Principal
principal@omihi.school.nz

School Notices

Prize giving cups
Could those who received cups at prize giving last year please return these to the office by the end of term.

Cultural Day
On Thursday 11th September, Year 5-8 will be attending our Tipu Māia Cultural Day with Miss Fletcher and Mrs Vincent, which is organised by the kāhui. This is at Rangiora New Life. They will be travelling in the school bus, leaving at 9am and returning by 3pm.

Omihi School 125th Jubilee - Friday 12th September
We invite you to our 125th Jubilee. There will be a school tour, decade photos, and an afternoon tea between 12.30pm - 2.30pm. The event will start promptly at 12.30pm at the Omihi Hall. We welcome our parent community to this as well, please email Bryleigh if you would like to come. Join us at the Greta Valley Tavern for a casual drink and a catch up from 3pm. Please call them in advance if you would like to stay for dinner - 03 975 3924.

Scargill Flower Show
Our students have entered artwork into the Scarfill flower show this Saturday 13th September at Tipapa Estate. If you have some time, it’s a lovely event to attend, and Kelly will also be performing there.

Canterbury Country Cricket
On Tuesday 16th September, all classes will have cricket sessions with Canterbury Country Cricket.

Awaawa visit to Lucas farm
On Wednesday 17th September, Awaawa will be visiting the Lucas farm. Maree, Penny and Rachel will be attending this with them. They will have a literacy focus, and will use this trip for their writing once they are back in the classroom.

Assembly
We welcome you to our whole school assembly on Thursday 18th September at 2pm.

School Photos
We have school photos on Thursday 18th September at 9am. There will be an opportunity for individual and sibling photos as well.

Raffle
Each year we have our trail ride as our major fundraiser, and a raffle to supplement that. We ask that every family please donate an item or voucher worth at least $10, and we will put these together as hampers for the raffle. Can you please send these into the office by the end of Term 3. We will then send 20 raffle tickets home in Term 4 for each child to sell, and we will also have them for sale at the trail ride.

Trail ride
Online entries for the trail ride are now available at www.iticket.co.nz. Thanks to all of the helpers who are volunteering on the day.

Term 4 sports team opportunities
Touch - Please contact Bryleigh by 6 October if your child is interested in playing touch at Amberley Domain in Term 4. Games will be on Thursday nights, and the cost is $400 per team which would be split evenly between players.
Miniball - Please contact Bryleigh by 15 September if your Year 3-4 student is interested in playing miniball in Term 4. Games are Monday nights at Mainpower Stadium, and the cost is $49 per student for 7 games.
Hockey - Please contact Bryleigh by 15 September if your Year 3-8 student is interested in playing hockey in Term 4. Year 3-4 have a skills based programme on Fridays at Dudley Park, and Years 5-8 play at Mainpower Hockey Turf in Rangiora on Tuesdays. The cost is $42 per player for 6 weeks.
If we don’t have quite enough players keen to make a full team, we can contact other schools to see if they would like to enter a combined team.

Community Notices

Kia ora koutou

Lots of practise for our jubilee performance.

We are excited to have so many new families enrolling, and lots of preschoolers who will be attending over the next couple of years. The year 2’s and year 5’s are excited to be moving to a new class next term, and we are now starting to look at our numbers for next year. If you know that your child is not going to be here next year, can you please let me know as that will help with our planning. Also, if you know of anyone wanting to enrol, please ask them to get in touch with me if they haven’t already.

It is so lovely to see the passion for music in our school. It’s been rewarding to see the excitement to try new instruments and give it a go. We can’t wait to share the final product with you in a couple of weeks!

Good luck to our 5 boys who are participating in the Canterbury Duathlon next week - Michael, Alex, Harry, Ze’ev and Theo.

Ngā mihi
Maree Lucas
Tumuaki/Principal
principal@omihi.school.nz

School Notices

Kapa Haka festival
Year 4-8 students will be taking part in the annual kapa haka festival run by Te Kura o Tuahiwi. This is held at Ohoka School on the 4th September, and we are in the first session of the day, which starts at 10.15am. We will travel there by bus, and will be leaving school at 9am. Tickets are on sale at www.humanitix.com. Please note there will be no door sales this year. Please let Maree know if your child will meet us there, and not be on the bus.

Top Team Challenge
On Wednesday 3rd September, Year 5-8 students will be going to Amberley for the Top Team Challenge against other local schools. We will leave school just before lunchtime, and will be back by 3.20pm. Children can be picked up from Amberley at 2.45pm or from school at 3.20pm. The children are likely to get wet at the event so please bring a towel and a change of clothes to school on that day.

No Omihi Bus
There will be no Omihi bus on the afternoon of Wednesday 3rd September.

Cultural Day
On Thursday 11th September, Year 5-8 will be attending our Tipu Māia Cultural Day with Miss Fletcher and Mrs Vincent, which is organised by the kāhui. This is at Rangiora New Life. They will be travelling in the school bus, leaving at 9am and returning by 3pm.

Omihi School 125th Jubilee - Friday 12th September
We invite you to our 125th Jubilee. There will be a school tour, decade photos, and an afternoon tea between 12.30pm - 2.30pm. Then drinks, dinner and speakers in the evening at the Omihi Community Hall. You are welcome to come to one or both parts of the day. Registrations are now open on www.iticket.co.nz and close tonight at 5.00pm for the evening portion of the event.

Canterbury Country Cricket
On Tuesday 16th September, all classes will have cricket sessions with Canterbury Country Cricket.

Awaawa visit to Lucas farm
On Wednesday 17th September, Awaawa will be visiting the Lucas farm. Maree, Penny and Rachel will be attending this with them. They will have a literacy focus, and will use this trip for their writing once they are back in the classroom.

Assembly
We welcome you to our whole school assembly on Thursday 18th September at 2pm.

Raffle
Each year we have our trail ride as our major fundraiser, and a raffle to supplement that. We ask that every family please donate an item or voucher worth at least $10, and we will put these together as hampers for the raffle. Can you please send these into the office by the end of Term 3. We will then send 20 raffle tickets home in Term 4 for each child to sell, and we will also have them for sale at the trail ride.

Trail ride
Online entries for the trail ride are available from the 1st September at www.iticket.co.nz. If you haven’t signed up to help on the day, there are a few spaces left. You can sign up here, or email Maree to add your name.

Term 4 sports team opportunities
Miniball - Please contact Bryleigh by 15 September if your Year 3-4 student is interested in playing miniball in Term 4. Games are Monday nights at Mainpower Stadium, and the cost is $49 per student for 7 games.
Hockey - Please contact Bryleigh by 15 September if your Year 3-8 student is interested in playing hockey in Term 4. Year 3-4 have a skills based programme on Fridays at Dudley Park, and Years 5-8 play at Mainpower Hockey Turf in Rangiora on Tuesdays. The cost is $42 per player for 6 weeks.
If we don’t have quite enough players keen to make a full team, we can contact other schools to see if they would like to enter a combined team.

Community Notices

Constable Ken talking with our students about safety on the bus.

Kia ora koutou

You have likely seen or heard that the government is looking at reducing policing numbers in small rural towns, and potentially some stations may end up closing. The other disappointing news we have received is that it is proposed to reduce the current number of School Community Officers within the entire Canterbury District from 11 to 5.  Constable Ken is our School Community Officer, and has been working with our students for a number of years.

In Canterbury rural this will mean the two full time positions in North Canterbury and Selwyn delivering services to 77 schools (Selwyn, Banks Peninsula, Waimakariri and Hurunui Districts) will become one full time position based in either Rangiora or Rolleston.  This proposal would effectively mean that School Community Officers would no longer be able to support and deliver programmes such as Keeping Ourselves Safe - KOS, Kia Kaha, Loves me Not, Cybersafety/Cyberbullying, bus safety, plus school wide problem solving, pastoral care and providing support and interventions when required. 

The focus of the sole School Community Officer would be primarily on Road Safety education and School Traffic Safety Team training, refreshing and monitoring, which is funded separately to Police by the NZTA.

As a board, we have submitted our feedback directly to Constable Ken, as he and his colleagues are gathering voice to send to their District Leadership Team. We have also submitted a letter to Stuart Smith, our local MP. We welcome you to do the same, and let your voices be heard. There is also a community meeting at the Tin Shed in Amberley on Tuesday 12th August at 7.30pm.

Ngā mihi
Maree Lucas
Tumuaki/Principal
principal@omihi.school.nz

School Notices

Middle Leaders Course
Kelly, Penny and Georgie have been part of a Middle Leaders course with a number of leaders from across Canterbury. They had two days earlier in the year, and another two days this term. Their feedback was:
The middle leaders course has given us tools around leadership and critical thinking skills to grow our practice. As a teacher, pedagogy is always changing and it has been great to come away with concrete tools that we can use to structure our thinking around change management. 

3 Way Learning Conferences
On Tuesday 19th and Wednesday 20th August we have our 3 Way Learning Conferences. If you haven’t already, please book in a time on this sign up form.

Grandparents Day - Tuesday 12th August
We welcome all of our grandparents to our Grandparents Day on Tuesday 12th August from 9am - 10.30am. Our students will take them on a tour of the school and into their classes, then we will have a shared morning tea. We ask that each family please bring in a plate of food to share for morning tea.

Kapa Haka festival
Year 4-8 students will be taking part in the annual kapa haka festival run by Te Kura o Tuahiwi. This is held at Ohoka School on the 4th September, and we are in the first session of the day, starting at 10.15am. We will travel there by bus, and will be leaving school at 9am. Tickets are on sale at www.humanitix.com. Please note there will be no door sales this year.

Cultural Day
On Thursday 11th September, Tūpari will be attending our Tipu Māia Cultural Day with Miss Fletcher and Mrs Vincent, which is organised by the kāhui. This is at Rangiora New Life. They will be travelling in the school bus, leaving at 9am and returning by 3pm.

Omihi School 125th Jubilee - Friday 12th September
We invite you to our 125th Jubilee. There will be a school tour, decade photos, and an afternoon tea between 12.30pm - 2.30pm. Then drinks, dinner and speakers in the evening at the Omihi Community Hall. Registrations are now open on www.iticket.co.nz. Please help us spread the word, and let any previous students, staff and community know. If you have any old photos you would like to share for the event, please send them to Fi Williams as soon as possible - fiphil@xtra.co.nz or 027 286 5772.

Term 3/4 sports team opportunities
Basketball - Please contact Bryleigh by 18 August if your Year 5-8 student is interested in playing basketball in Terms 3-4. Years 5-6 have a 3x3 competition held on Thursday nights at Mainpower Stadium in Rangiora. Years 7-8 have a 5x5 competition held on Friday nights at either Mainpower Stadium or Kaiapoi High School.
Miniball - Please contact Bryleigh by 15 September if your Year 3-4 student is interested in playing miniball in Term 4. Games are Monday nights at Mainpower Stadium, and the cost is $49 per student for 7 games.
Hockey - Please contact Bryleigh by 15 September if your Year 3-8 student is interested in playing hockey in Term 4. Year 3-4 have a skills based programme on Fridays at Dudley Park, and Years 5-8 play at Mainpower Hockey Turf in Rangiora on Tuesdays. The cost is $42 per player for 6 weeks.

If we don’t have quite enough players keen to make a full team, we can contact other schools to see if they would like to enter a combined team.

Community Notices