10 Dec 2025

Kia orana koutou

We have all of our lost property on display along the staff carpark fence today.

We will have every class walk past and take a look, but I suspect it will go better with a parent look, rather than a child look.

2 days to go with kids loving the play trailer today, year 8 leavers assembly tomorrow from 1:30 and Leavers Dinner from 5:30.  Then Friday we have Shoeboc Christmas beofre finishing at 12:30pm.

The School office will reopn from the 29th of Jan and school starts for kids on 2 Feb.  Please make sure you are here ready to start the year in the best possible way for attendance as learnign programmes start straight away as usual.

8 Dec 2025

Newsletter-Wk-10-Term-4-2025.pdf

Newsletter-Wk-10-Term-4-2025-1.pdf

Newsletter-Wk-10-Term-4-2025-2.pdf

3 Dec 2025

3/12/2025

Kia orana community.

You may have heard about a product recall for coloured sand, which may contain asbestos.  Asbestos is a harmful, cancer causing product if it enters the body, especially in the form of dust.

I can confirm there has been none of the sand products purchased by our school.  

However, we have been contacted by an organisation who provide science experiment kits to our school.  One of their kits contained a very small amount (1 teaspoon) of the sand product and was provided to our school in March of 2023.  Only some classes may have used this kit and only some of the activities were used (potentially not this activity).  The product was not in a dust, was contained on plastic sheeting and then returned with the kit.  This could be considered a possible exposure event.

Unrelated to this situation we have had flooring samples taken earlier this year to test for asbestos.  These samples came back with 1 positive result unrelated to the sand and is contained safely in an underfloor glue product.  It poses no risk to learners, but will still be removed in 2026.

Again, unrelated to the sand product, we will also be replacing the carpet in all classes in 2026.

Following discussion with the Board of Trustees, your principal has determined the possible risk to be very low to non-existent.

As a result we intend to: 

Inform our community, then take no further action.  We will rely on sample testing already conducted and the fact all carpet is being replaced in 2026 to remedy any further residual risk.In reaching this decision we explored testing classes.  The Ministry of Education advice was that we would need 3 samples of 3 tablespoons per sample to test which is much more than the possible spill from 1 teaspoon of material.  They also advise that if the use was historical, “Any remaining particles are likely to have been removed through washing.” This means our annual carpet shampooing process will have removed any residual particles. We will again wash the carpets in classes over summer.

More information can be found here: https://www.education.govt.nz/news/asbestos-coloured-sand

Should you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to talk to your principal about these issues.