Dear Parents and Caregivers,
We are approaching the midpoint of Term 4, and I hope you and your families are enjoying the warmer weather. This update shares some of our planning for the year ahead, as well as some community highlights and an overview of our performance data in 2025.
Planning for 2026
We have almost finalised our recruitment processes for 2026 classroom teacher roles and expect only a few changes to our teaching teams, providing strong continuity for students. We are also hiring a range of education support staff, including first aid support, intervention tutors and classroom aides.
Enrolments for 2026 are tracking at about 620 students. This is an expected reduction, similar to recent years, as a larger Year 6 cohort moves on and a smaller Prep group starts, in line with local trends. We are forecasting 69 Preps across four classes, which means 17 to 18 students per class. Across the school, our average class size will be around 22 students in 2026.
In Our Community
Our annual Fete is the standout event for Term 4 and an important fundraiser that directly supports programs and facilities. Thank you to the PFA and all parent helpers for the significant work happening behind the scenes. I look forward to seeing many of you there.
The PFA always need plenty of help on the day. If you’re able to lend a hand, it will be greatly appreciated. You can sign up here.
In exciting news, we are scoping a new junior playground between B Block (library) and A Block (administration). We are exploring a pirate ship concept with timber features, and our SRC will help shape the design, ensuring student voice is a part of the process. I look forward to sharing concept images and timelines once they are ready.
Teaching and Learning
Our explicit, evidence-based approach is now embedded across more learning areas. Teams are applying established routines beyond reading into maths, English and other subject areas. As we move into next year, we will continue to build out our novel studies and Core Knowledge units, which deepen engagement and extend learning.
These novel studies will provide students with sustained time with rich texts to strengthen vocabulary, comprehension and writing. We’re also working to link our developing Knowledge-Rich Curriculum with these texts to provide a clear, sequenced base of content in subjects like history and science, so students can connect ideas and think more deeply.
Our aim with this work is to ensure we provide clearly sequenced content that helps students build background knowledge over time, which in turn improves understanding, reasoning and writing. This approach also opens up more options for support and extension, alongside the differentiation by support used in our EDI lessons. I will continue to share more details as this develops.
Performance Update
In Term 4, schools receive the full picture on student outcomes and community sentiment, which I’m pleased to share has been broadly positive this year.
I’ve previously shared highlights from our Attitudes to School Survey and NAPLAN results, both of which improved in 2025.
We’ve received preliminary results from our Staff Opinion Survey for Term 3. These show that our overall School Climate remains steady compared with last year. Given the significant instructional change we’ve implemented this year, it’s encouraging to see that this hasn’t led to a decline in staff sentiment. Thank you to all staff who have embraced and adapted to the evidence-based practices we’re now embedding across the school. Read the Department’s preliminary report. [pdf-embedder url=”https://portmelb.vic.edu.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/School-Performance-Report-2025.pdf” title=”School Performance Report 2025″]
Our Parent Opinion Survey was also conducted last term. This year we made participation a priority, and I’m pleased to share that our response rate increased from around 10–15 per cent in previous years to over 40 per cent. Thank you to everyone who took part. Overall, responses were positive, with the majority of parents and carers endorsing the school’s practices.
That said, overall endorsement rates were lower than in previous years. Because the response rate is so much higher, it’s difficult to make direct comparisons. A larger and more diverse sample can shift averages and broaden the range of perspectives represented. The dip appeared across most areas, which suggests this reflects a participation effect rather than a change in sentiment about any specific issue. We’ll treat this as a new baseline moving forward and, as always, examine the themes carefully to inform our ongoing improvement work.
At this stage, the data is preliminary, with final reports to be released later in the year. We’ll share further details in our Annual Report to the School Community, which will be published next year.
Finally, I’m pleased to share that our 2025 School Performance Report has now been released, and for the second year in a row, Port Melbourne Primary School has been rated “High” – the top rating possible. This is the Department’s key annual performance assessment, and our result is a strong validation of the work underway and a credit to our staff and community. We’re proud of this outcome and excited to continue building on this success in the years ahead. The full report is attached for those who would like to explore the data in more detail.
Thank you for your ongoing support as we finish off a great 2025.
Warm regards,
Tom Cain
Principal