Principal's Message

Good afternoon St Philomena's Community,

We have now passed the time where we no longer occupy the Ryan building. I want to thank the community for your patience as we navigate through this transition phase. The Administration Office is now located in the demountable building near the hall. Access to the office is now through the gate on Gwydir street. We still maintain access to Boston street for pick up and drop offs but you will need to come through the Gwydir street gate to access the office. I also want to publicly acknowledge the efforts of staff to relocate all the resources that were contained in the Ryan Building. The builders and project team leaders have inspected the building and will be gradually building their site over the next two weeks. Construction is expected to begin on the 18th March. Whilst this is later than expected I did press that it remains our expectation that as of day 1 next year we will be using the new facilities and I was assured that this would be the case.

On my walks around the school I continue to be impressed with our young people and their approach to learning. We now have a relatively clean run to Easter apart from the cultural and sporting opportunities that are available as well as the Year 7 excursion. It is important that all children and young people from all Year levels are producing evidence of learning. Teachers and EA’s will be assessing students against standards and performance indicators. 

Congratulations to our swimming team who performed so well to win the McKechnie Shield. We also wish the team all the best at the Diocesan trials. It is also worth noting that we have up to 30 students involved in the Aboriginal dance initiative that takes place every Tuesday Afternoon. This Friday we will be hosting students from Walgett, Wee Waa and St. Francis Xaviers Narrabri who will be participating in the Student Engagement Dance Workshop in preparation for the state conference later in the year.

Over the next two weeks we will be having a P&F meeting and a SAC meeting. I look forward to meeting with the parent representative organisations in the hope of building positive connections between the school and our community.

Kind Regards

Simon Fleming

Principal