A message from Emily

Principal – St John's Footscray

Dear parents and carers,

 

Welcome back for Term 3. While we are feeling the cold it is great to be onsite for Term 3 for the first time in two years. It has already been an amazing start to the term with lots of exciting events coming up, especially our Mary MacKillop Feast Day Celebrations. A flyer with all the details around this will be sent home next week. Please check the 100 Years of St John's page of this newsletter for other information about events coming up.

 

To start this term, the staff engaged in a two day Faith Retreat at Mary MacKillop Heritage Centre. This experience allowed us to reconnect with the history of the Sisters of Saint Joseph of the Sacred Heart and their connection to St John's own history. The Heritage Centre gifted the school a cross worn by a Josephite sister from the Heritage Centre. This gift will be displayed in our school as part of our centennial celebrations. Staff also worked with Adrian Lacey from MACS to deepen our knowledge of the pedagogy of encounter to ensure rich learning and experiences at St John's and our Catholic faith. See the diagram below - you can also click on it for the pdf version.

 

Last week we featured on the MACS News and Events website in recognition of what is happening at St John's in relation to our 100 years celebrations. Please click on the link to check it out - 100 Years of St John's, Footscray.

 

Next week we will be asking children from Years 2 to 6 to complete a Social Emotional Wellbeing (SEW) Survey to help us target supports and strategies needed during our 'Ready to Learn' sessions. SEW surveys were designed by Professor Michael E. Bernard from the University of Melbourne's Graduate School of Education, for schools to assess the levels of social-emotional wellbeing. The survey will provide us with extensive data on the social-emotional wellbeing of groups of students (for example year level cohorts and whole of school cohort). The SEW survey will ask children about their feelings and behaviours, personal characteristics and their experiences in different contexts. Over the coming week we will share some of these results. We will also use these results to set priorities for next year including the possibility of engaging with The Resilience Project in 2023.

 

It is with great please that I announce the members of the St John's School Advisory Council (SAC). 

  • Erin Jenkins: mother of Leila and Aisha
  • Tim O'Leary: father of Harry
  • Nick Stephenson: father of Miles and Pearl
  • Ben Jeacocke: father of Alec and Evie
  • Paul Handley: parishioners & former parent of children attending St John's
  • Tina Meddis: parishioners & former parent of children attending St John's
  • Fr Rene: Parish Priest
  • Emily Conroy: Principal

Congratulations to the newly appointed members. We will be meeting again on August 10th at 7pm. I look forward to sharing more information about and from the SAC team.

 

COVIDSafe UPDATE: On Tuesday I sent all families a copy of the letter from the three school bodies of Victoria and their recommendation around children from aged 8 years and older to start wearing masks again when indoors. Yesterday I attended a briefing around this. This is not a mandate but rather a strong recommendation to parents. At school, we will encourage and have available masks for children to access. The reason for this strong recommendation is linked to a risk management response to the current climb in positive COVID-19 cases in Australia. They are trying to ensure schools stay open during these winter months. As you are aware, our community of St John's has seen a number of positive cases this week impacting both children and staff. As a school, we are ensuring the use of air purifiers, hand sanitiser, not meeting in large groups and access to masks and RAT kits.  If your child is unwell, please test and keep them home. There are many other illnesses going around as well as COVID that we are wanting to minimise in our community. We will keep you informed if we need to look at alternative learning arrangements in the event of staff shortages. We are looking for support and understanding as we try to keep everyone safe and healthy during these colder months. 

 

With the return to school, I would like to remind all parents or carers who pick up children at dismissal time to be conscious of following road rules and engaging in safe behaviours that don't impact on others negatively. We need to make sure that traffic can flow freely and that everyone is safe from harm. Last week there was a near miss involving a cyclist and a car waiting to enter the backyard at pickup time. The cyclist made a formal complaint to the school and local council. On Wednesday last week, council workers from the traffic management team came to observed what is happening during this time. They reassured us through questions they asked us and observing our student pick up arrangements that the process was working well. However, we need our community to ensure you are following any requests made by school. As the council is now aware of some of the unsafe practices of drivers during this time, they will be more present during pick up and drop off and this may result in fines being handed out. The school is not responsible for anyone receiving a fine because they have not obeyed the road rules on the streets surrounding the school. I remind parents, if you wait to arrive 6-7 minutes after dismissal, the roads are pretty clear and stress free. No child is left unsupervised and if you haven't arrived by the time staff finish duty, your child will be waiting in the office. 

 

A note in relation to lunch orders, particularly on Fridays. DT Fusionz have advised that due to the number of lunch orders on Fridays that students will most likely be eating later in the break - around 11:15am rather than 10:50am. If your child would like to have their lunch on another day of the week (except Mondays), this may assist with the volume of food preparation and eating times. 

 

Congratulations to Vanessa in 5/6 Hub who came 4th yesterday in a piano recital held in Ballarat. Vanessa was competing against others at more advanced levels so this achievement is very impressive. Well done Vanessa.

 

Finally, on behalf of the whole community, I would like wish Mel Caruana all the very best as she begins her leave and preparation for welcoming her first child. Mel has only been a part of the community for a short time but she has been a great staff member and will be missed while she is on leave. We look forward to hearing of baby Caruana's arrival.

 

Warm wishes 

Emily