Newsletters

Issue 2 | Term 1 2026

Dear Parents and Carers,

Using Everything We Have For Our Students
Our student numbers finalised at 877 with 36 classrooms operating. This is slightly down from last year’s figures. In the coming week, we will be submitting our 2026 budget to the Department and our school staffing plan. Below are some important points of celebration about how we support your students with resources each year:

• Successful spend of 95% of our budget in 2025, exceeding the Department’s expectation of 90%.
• The P&C contributed over $80,000 to our budget last year. Our P&C works very hard at injecting all their funds raised into supporting amazing projects for our students.
• Nearly every dollar received each year is spent on the students enrolled in that year (there is no unnecessary stockpiling of cash in our accounts).
• Every staffing credit we received we used – in fact, we were slightly over last year and finished with a small deficit. This means that your children received the fullest adult support we could muster.
• We used in excess of $300,000 last year on additional staffing and placed this into our Inclusion Model, School Wellbeing Educator and professional mentors for our teachers.
• Our SRS and Book Pack costs to parents, are the lowest of all our local schools.

From a facilities perspective, you would have noticed so many wonderful changes in our school from last year, especially in the Prep area. I wish to thank the following families for their contributions to the building fund to help support these facilities projects -

• Rapisarda
• McIntyre
• Lateef
• Hui
• Wanhua
• Anupam
• Siddharth

Student Leaders
Our student leaders are now all locked in place for 2026 with our Student Council Representatives being inducted last week. They have already begun undertaking their responsibilities with great pride. You would be so proud of the wonderful contributions they make to our school.


This year the Year 6 leaders will continue the legacy work of last year's Year 6 students, in the wellbeing space created between the two demountable classrooms near the top oval and iCentre. Very soon this area will open, and Year 6 students will take full responsibility for overseeing the running of that area, in line with our agreed guidelines for its use. Over the coming year, more artefacts will be added into this area as the Student Council raise funds. Again, I can't say enough about the significant contributions that our students make to this school. What a beautiful place to work. 

Wonderful Staff and the Contributions They Make
Have you seen what is available for your children during their free time at school! Wow! Have a look at this link. Our club program is the largest it has ever been. If your child comes home and says they are bored at lunch, you would be excused for releasing a giggle. There are so many optional programs. I wish to thank the staff who spend time planning and preparing for these activities to be facilitated each week and the students who also help run them.  Very soon, I will be releasing an overview or the broad range of extension, enrichment and extra-curricular programs we offer. This too, will give you an idea of the scope of other programs we offer to support student learning.

Mr Michael Josey
Principal

Reminders and important information

• UNIFORM
  We still have some students who are not wearing all back shoes at school. Families if you could please make sure that only all black shoes are worn at school with Benowa ankle socks.
   
• COLLECTION
  Families are welcome on site to collect their children from 2:50pm (5 minutes before the end of day bell). Please do not enter the school any earlier than this. All high school students are to remain at the two collection points near our gates as instructed by our supervision staff.
  High school students should not be walking into the main body of the school.
   
• STUDENT RESOURCE SCHEME
  Please remember to pay your SRS invoices as soon as you can so that our budgets can be finished for the school year.
   
• BOOST PAYMENT
  Please ensure you check QParents for the $100 Boost Consent Request asking how you would like your Government Back to School Boost allocated. Please complete this as soon as possible.

Upcoming Events
All upcoming events are listed in the calendar on the school website. 

• YEAR 1 SWIMMING - Mon-Thur 23/02 to 26/02 and Mon-Thur  02/03 to 05/03
• Prep Puppet Incursion - Wednesday 04/03
• Prep Information Session - Wednesday 04/03
• NAPLAN - Wednesday 11/03 to Monday 16/03
• Y6 CAMP Parent Information Session - March 10

If your have a child who will be eligible to attend Prep in 2027, come along to our Information Session
on Wednesday 4 March at 9:30am or 5:30pm. Registrations are essential, please click the button below for more information and to register your interest.

Benowa State School will be conducting the National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) online for our Year 3 and 5 students, along with every other school in the nation in March this year. 
The 2026 NAPLAN test window for our school will be Wednesday 11 March to Monday 16 March 2026.

Wednesday 11 March: Writing
Thursday 12 March: Reading, Catch up test for Writing
Friday 13 March: Conventions of Language, Catch up test for Writing/Reading
Monday 16 March: Numeracy, Catch up test for Writing/Reading/Conventions of Language
Tuesday 17 March: Catch up tests for Writing/Reading/Conventions of Language/Numeracy

Year 3 and Year 5 parents, please check your emails for more information or visit the NAPLAN website for frequently asked questions.

The Year 6 camp will be taking place at the very start of Term 2.
We will be communicating with our Year 6 parents in the next few weeks and will be holding a parent information session on Tuesday 10 March in the iCentre. Please see your class teachers for more information.