Dear Parents, Guardians, Students, Staff and Friends of St Norbert College,

“Celebrating our Norbertine tradition and the richness of our cultures, we honour the past and move forward with renewed vigour” (College Value – Heritage)

This is the statement of intent from our College value of Heritage and is an appropriate starting point given some significant events since the start of this term. In fact, we celebrated this College value at our assembly on Wednesday this week, the first time we had gathered as a full College for some time due to the COVID restrictions.

Xanten House celebrated their special House day on Wednesday known as Founders Day – to honour the legacies of our Founding Fathers – Fr Peter O’Reilly, Fr John Reynolds and Fr Stephen Cooney, who arrived in WA in 1959 to start a secondary school and nearly 65 years later, we are very proud of our St Norbert College. And whilst our Heritage value calls us to “…move forward with renewed vigour” we must first “honour the past” and we cannot lose sight of the amazing legacies of our founding Fathers.

In our contemporary lives, we too often lose sight of the most important element and defining feature of our College – the Faith dimension. Whilst we regularly expose members of our community to Catholic and faith-based rituals, the real meaning and impact of our Faith is integral to comfortably navigating the challenges of such a contemporary world.

The celebration of Benediction is one such ritual and a Norbertine tradition that has been a faith-based experience in our College for many years. Last Friday was the first experience of Benediction for many of our Year 7 students and they were terrific in their participation and reverence during this time.

The word ‘benediction’ has Latin origins meaning “blessing” and so we see Benediction as an expression of good wishes, happiness, well-being and good fortune. St Norbert is always depicted holding the monstrance and given the connection of Norbert and the Norbertines to the Blessed Eucharist, Benediction is a wonderfully unique way for our College community to celebrate our connection with those traditions.

And as we move forward with renewed vigour, it is with great pleasure that I take this opportunity to welcome new staff members to our College community;

Mrs Tamara Laurito: Mrs Laurito joins our Student Services team having previously worked at Guildford Grammar School as the Enrolment Registrar.

Mrs Corinna Markich: Mrs Markich recently completed 19 years at Dianella Secondary College including a number of years as the Head of English/EALD.

We are really pleased that Mrs Laurito and Mrs Markich have joined our staff and we are already enjoying their expertise and positive contributions. In the coming weeks, we also welcome Mrs Michelle Hoffmann to our English team and Mrs Keiko Gray as our Japanese Language teacher.

Welcome to our new staff and thank you accepting the invitation to join our College community.

As I conclude, I wish all in our community good health as we continue to be challenged through this pandemic.

God bless.

Mr S Harvey

(Principal)

“We pray that as we celebrate this Xanten Founders Day…we acknowledge our Norbertine founders; Fr Peter O’Reilly, Fr John Reynolds and Fr Stephen Cooney. May we continue the work of the Norbertines by cooperating together to build a harmonious community dedicated to service”

[An abbreviated version of a Prayer of the Faithful – Xanten House Liturgy, 11 May}

Rapid Antigen Tests for all students

Free Rapid Antigen Tests (RATs) for each student have now been delivered to the College.

These RATs will support our students to continue to attend school for face-to-face learning and will minimise disruption to their schooling. You will be able to test your child at home if they are feeling unwell. You can also use these RATs if your child is a close contact to enable them to test daily and continue to attend school, as long as they receive a negative result, remain asymptomatic, and wear a mask if they are in Year 7 and above. I have attached a letter below from WA Health which explains how to use the RATs.

Each student will receive a packet of 20 free Rapid Antigen Tests (RATs) next week. Given the sheer volume of RATs requiring distribution we will need to distribute these RATs (over 18,000 in total) in year groups over the five days next week as follows:

Monday 16th May – Year 10 students
Tuesday 17th May – Year 11 and 12 students
Wednesday 18th May – Year 8 and 9 students
Thursday 19th May – Year 7 students

This schedule has been determined based on student numbers and impending events for each year group that impacts distribution. Should students be absent on their scheduled day of collection, surplus RATs can be collected from Student Services after this date.

Our Deputy Principals will communicate with parents of the respective year groups to alert them of the distribution each day. Please collect these from your child and store in a safe place.

Year 9 students and parents, please note that it is a WA Health requirement that students must provide evidence of a negative RAT result on the day that they attend the Year 9 Camp. For our Year 9 students, this will be Monday 27 June – the College does not provide additional RATs for this purpose so this supply may assist.

In the meantime, a reminder that if your child becomes symptomatic, they should stay home and be tested for COVID-19. In addition to notifying the school, if your child tests positive to COVID-19, the result should be reported on the school’s COVID-19 Self-Reporting Portal and positive COVID-19 RAT results must also be reported on the WA Health RAT Register, as is required by the WA Government. Refer to healthywa.wa.gov.au for information on close contact definition, testing and isolation requirements.

Thank you for your continued efforts in keeping our school COVID-19 safe.

Year 7/2024 Enrolments

The College is well under way with our enrolment interviews for Year 5 students for Year 7/2024. If your child is currently in Year 5, and you are contemplating our College but have yet to submit an application, it is imperative that you do so as soon as possible to be considered for enrolment. We expect that our enrolment for this cohort to be finalised by the end of this term at the very latest.

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