Learning Conferences

Thank you to all families who booked an interview time to meet with your child's teacher to share progress over the past term. I hope you found the opportunity worthwhile and were able to come to a common understanding of goals moving forward.

Please take the time over the holidays to view your child's Portfolio in detail. We ask that these are returned by the start of the new term.

Thank you to all families In Years Prep L and Year 3/4 R for your understanding of the need to reschedule your Learning Conferences to Wednesday 5th October. Booking details have been forwarded to affected families via email.

Hopefully, the new link works.

Last Day of Term

As we approach the end of Term I would like to thank everyone for their resilience and flexibility in navigating through our now COVID-Normal world and for the understanding and support we have provided to each other as we have dealt with staff shortages and additional workloads.

Friday 16th September will be our last day of term and all students will finish at 1:00pm.

At Least Our Paddock Can Be Used For Something

Our paddock may be far too wet for our children to frolic about but for a small colony of ibises, it made the perfect pit stop.

School Improvement: MACSSIS Parent Surveys

In 2022, our school is participating in Melbourne Archdiocese Catholic Schools – School Improvement Surveys (MACSSIS). MACSSIS is an annual process whereby schools listen to the thoughts and feelings students, families and staff have about how their school can improve. These surveys help inform the ongoing improvement of schools across the Archdiocese of Melbourne.

One of the main goals of the family survey is to identify the strengths and areas for improvement in our school. MACSSIS data benefits everyone within our school and provides valuable community insights on areas that each school can focus on. Our school believes it is important to encourage families to have a voice and contribute to shaping the ongoing improvement of the school.

Each family would have received an email detailing how to access the survey which can be completed up until Friday 16th September 2022. This survey may only be completed once.

For families with more than one child attending our school, we ask that you focus on the eldest child attending the school when completing the survey. The school has invited many families to respond via this survey and participation is completely voluntary. There are no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ answers – all responses are completely anonymous and at no point are any of the responses from students, families or staff identifiable by the school.

The survey is available in English, Arabic, Assyrian, Chaldean, simplified and traditional Chinese, Dinka, Falam, Hakha Chin, Karen, Tagalog, Vietnamese and Zomi.

The last time we did this survey in 2021 we only had 18 families respond which is not a large enough number from which to draw accurate data. We would love to attain a much larger cross-section of our community response this time around.

School Disco

I hope you have all marked in your diaries the date of this year’s School Disco as Friday 14th October from 6:30 - 8:00 pm. (second Friday of Term 4). This is the social event of the year for our children and should prove a huge hit!

THIS WILL BE A MOBILE PHONE-FREE EVENT

Mobile phones will not be permitted to be brought into the hall.

We have had so many people volunteer to assist so we will be contacting those we require on the night. If you miss out this time, never fear... there will be plenty more opportunities for you in the future.

Our parent volunteers will be assigned to the various supervision tasks throughout the evening so we ask parents to just drop their children off at 6:30 pm and return to collect them at 8:00 pm sharp.

Our Disco is open only to children in Years Prep-6 and the cost is $10.00 per child ($15 per family), payable at the door on the night. Once inside, children will not be permitted to leave the hall until the conclusion when they are collected by their parents.

Our always popular Candy Corner will operate, where children can purchase goodies such as drinks and snacks as well as glow sticks!

Our school disco is always a popular event on the calendar and this year will be no exception!

Trivia Night

Attention all brainiacs and trivia buffs! Please check out the Parents and Friends Association (PFA) page of the Newsletter for details of our much anticipated (adults only) Trivia Night scheduled for Friday 11th November commencing at 7:30 pm.

School Operations

Please note the following adjustments from the Department of Health which have been put in place for the beginning of Term 4:

If a child tests positive to COVOD-19 they must isolate at home or in private accommodation for five days (inclusive of weekends) and do not attend school during this period. Inform the school, that they have tested positive to COVID-19.
As an additional risk mitigation, students who leave isolation after 5 days are strongly recommended to undertake rapid antigen testing in the days following their isolation and test negative before attending school and to wear a mask in indoor settings and outdoors where they cannot physically distance.
Household contacts are no longer required to quarantine as long as they take additional safety measures, but are required to:
- notify the school if returning during their 7-day period;
- undertake daily rapid antigen testing five times within the 7 days;
- wear a face covering when indoors (if aged 8 years and above or unless they have a valid exemption)

As we are now out of winter the wearing of masks while indoors at school is now (although recommended) purely voluntary.

Summer Uniform and Hats

Next term children will transition into their summer uniform by the end of Week Two. However, as per our SunSmart Policy, the children will need to be wearing their school hats during recess, lunch and PE lessons from the first day of Term 4. Children who do not have a hat will need to play under the shaded areas of the school.

Have a wonderful holiday

God bless

Anthony Hyde

(Principal)

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