Dear Parents and Carers,

Welcome to Week 8. As we get closer to the end of the Term, many things are happening in our school community to be grateful for and excited about coming up!

We continue to keep in our thoughts and prayers the students in Year Four who receive Eucharist for the first time in recent weekend masses.

Book Week 2023 celebrations

Congratulations to students ( and parents at home!) for their enthusiastic participation in our Book Week celebrations. The photos and video of the activities involving our visiting author Felice Arena and the dress-up parade were terrific. Thank you to all the staff for their engagement and preparation in this space, especially our Literacy Leader, Philomena Solari. Click here to find out more.

Our Amazing St. Simon’s Parents’ Association

This Term, the Parents Association have hosted many experiences for all members of our school community that helped with fundraising and building connections within our community. As a school community, we are grateful to our PA volunteers who contribute so much of their precious time to ensure the students have a positive education experience with the school community. This Term, the PA has been responsible for the following events:

Parents Only DJ Bingo Trivia night
Cheese Toastie Food Service Day
Fathers’ Stall
Footy Colours Day and sausage sizzle.
Huey’s Bakehouse Pie Drive

Prep, Year 1 and Year 3 Swimming Program

Next week, the school swimming program commences for Prep and Years One and Three students. All families with students in these year levels should have received and responded to an Operoo eForm regarding consent and information about the program.

During the weeks of the programs, changes to the school timetable are made to ensure that students receive all their specialist classes whilst engaging with the swimming program. This might mean your child's day for sport might have been changed. Please look out for communication regarding any such changes from your child’s level.

Experience tells us that students participating in the programme tend to be a little more tired than usual, so regular early-to-bed sleep patterns can help students get through the last two weeks more smoothly. Please contact your child’s classroom teacher for more information.

Human Sexuality Parent-Child Workshops (Tricky Conversations)

This week, we hosted Parent-Child workshops through our presenting partner Interelate, which focused on human development and sexuality. The attendance at this session was strong and encouraging. Thank you to Hedy Carvalho for overseeing the night.

Father’s Day Celebrations

Families are encouraged to take advantage of two opportunities that celebrate Fathers and Father-like figure relationships in the lives of our students.

Father’s Day Stall, Thursday 31st August, provided by the Parents’ Association.
Father’s Day Liturgy with the whole school, led by our Year Four students.

Last call for Canteen Term 4 volunteers!

The Term 4 Canteen Volunteer Roster will finalised next week. Thank you to the members of the school community who have volunteered their time to assist with our Canteen.

We are very grateful. It is not too late to volunteer for Term 4, so please get in touch with the school office by Wednesday 6th, September to be included in the roster.

The Term 4 roster will be published by Friday 8th September.

Thank you to Jason and Jinny Robe for their continued support of the Canteen Coordinator role.

School Parent Survey MACSSIS

I encourage all families to click here to explore one of the ways we formally seek feedback from our parents about St Simon’s School. All families who complete the survey go into a raffle for a shopping voucher! Thank you for taking the time to give us some feedback.

Parent-Teacher Conversations

During Week Nine of this Term, the school will conduct parent-teacher conversations on Tuesday, 5th September and Thursday, 7th September from 2:30 pm each day. These conversations are offered as face-to-face meetings or online video conferences.

Bookings are available here.

Please note that the school will finish formal classes at 2:15 pm. Formal supervision will be provided for students who can't be picked up from school until 3:15 pm. This week, a separate form to register for this supervision was shared via Operoo Email to the eldest child at St Simon’s. Click here to register your child\ren for supervision on one or both days.

Art Show 2023

Planning and final preparation for our biannual Art Show is well underway. Check out the flyer below for dates and times.

Principals’ Conference Indigenous Immersion

Last week, I joined 18 principal colleagues from the Outer East network of catholic primary schools on an indigenous immersion experience up at Cape York. The immersion aims to develop and reflect on different ways to embed our Australian Indigenous perspectives and understandings within our suburban primary schools. One of the key points that I came away with is the importance of connecting with our local indigenous language group as a community and seeking ways to make that connection for our students. Within our Catholic Church context, there are some fantastic student leadership opportunities that I look forward to exploring with our teachers and students in future.

I want to acknowledge our excellent administration and leadership teams for their work in making our school community the special place it is in my absence.

God bless,

Tom Wursthorn

Principal

Our Secondary Schools

Mazenod College