PARED School Melbourne Update - Marina Haines Invitation

Following on from our last update, we would like to invite you to our first information session of 2014.  We are hosting these sessions to give prospective parents of the new Melbourne PARED school the information they need to help them with their decision regarding the enrolment of their children.

We have invited Marina Haines to address parents on the topic: “The practicalities of sending your child to a new small school”.

Marina Haines has recently retired as principal of Montgrove College – a school in Sydney of the PARED (Parents for Education) Foundation. Marina was the first principal of the then called Orchard Hills Preparatory School, which opened in 1999 with 15 children in foundation (prep). Orchard Hills Prep has now grown into Montgrove College for Girls and Wollemi College for boys.

Her presentation will cover how parents and teachers worked together to have a fully functional school with a small number of students. The PARED school in Melbourne will be based on a similar model.  

Details:

Date: Sunday 23 March 2014

Time: 2pm

Place: Damien & Tatiana Burger’s home. 

Note:  Babysitting can be provided, but please advise the ages of children who will be attending.

It would be greatly appreciated if you could please RSVP by 16 March for catering purposes. 

For further enquiries please contact paredschoolmelbourne@gmail.com

Kind regards,

The PARED School Melbourne Steering Committee

PARED School Melbourne - Donations!

We'd like to let you know a few things that have been going on over the last few months with the Melbourne PARED school project.

In short, we're very much on track for the school to open in 2016.  As you know, it will start with a foundation (prep) and grade 1 class.  It will be coeducational until the end of grade 2, at which point it will continue on as a girls school.

Donations
We're really excited to announce that, to date, we've received commitments totalling $205,000 in donations!  We hope to use this money to purchase land in the coming months.

We also have an ongoing commitment of $20,000 per year in donations for the first few years.

Location
We are avidly searching for a suitable piece of land.  We are expanding our sights to include not only Officer, but Beaconsfield, Pakenham, Upper Beaconsfield, Harkaway and Clyde.

Melbourne school principal
The search for a principal has begun!  The PARED board in Sydney is actively looking for a suitable appointment, hopefully by the start of next year.  

Once this appointment has been made, the formal enrolment process for the school can commence.

Support from Sydney
A PARED subcommittee has been formed in Sydney specifically to assist with the Melbourne project.  This committee consists of Frank Monagle, Elizabeth McKeown and Marina Haines.

Frank Monagle was the founding headmaster of both Redfield College, and Wollemi College, where he is currently a member of the Wollemi School Executive. Elizabeth McKeown was a founding parent as well as a teacher and tutor at Tangara School for Girls and has been a member of the PARED board for many years. Marina Haines was the founding principal of Montgrove College and served in that role until the end of 2013.

School registration
We have commenced the formal application process to register our school with the Victorian Registration and Qualifications Authority, and we are on track to make the submission later this year.


The PARED School Melbourne Steering Committee