LAUDATO SI

The Encyclical, Laudato Si, revolutionised the Catholic perspective on how we perceive the environment. As stewards of God’s creation, we are called to reflect on what we have done, what we are doing, and what we can change to show the love and care our world needs. What we do impacts our environment. The impact we have is a choice we can make for the betterment of ourselves, our environment, and others. Everything God created; everything is a demonstration of his love; everything is in our care.

In PACC groups, we have analysed our carbon footprint and considered ways in which we can reduce our negative impact, and shared ideas of what we can be doing to have a positive impact on our environment.

At briefing, I asked our students to:

Use the bins. We have both general waste and recycling bins available in multiple locations around the school. The impact the rubbish left unattended is having on our community is extensive. The work of our contractors is added to by the need to clean up the rubbish left by our students. The rubbish is being left jammed into tables, seats, drains, and the gardens.
Bring a reusable water bottle. The school has had our plumber install an extra 3 stand-alone chilled filtered water stands around the school, along with a chilled filtered water bottle filling station with 4 outlets next to the tuckshop. Plenty of chilled water and no need to leave classes for a drink.
Think about the way in which we bring our lunch. Can we reduce the plastic wrapping around our lunches? Can we consider becoming ‘nude food’ people - no wrappings at all? Reusable lunch containers that are able to be recycled (such as tupperware, beeswax wrappings, sinches) or wrap our food in brown paper or aluminium foil?

This challenge ought not to be for a week. Perhaps this can be a long-term challenge where we become mindful of our impact.

We pray that we make small changes that will add up to large positive changes to our environment.

Each year we set goals to reflect the direction of Catholic Schools Office Armidale and the context of our community. This year we are working across Professional Learning Teams to build our teachers' impact on learning through pedagogy. We are working with The Resilience Project Team to impact our students’ and our own wellbeing. We are working on our curriculum for consistency and challenge for our students’ learning growth.

Data plays an important part in our planning process and we appreciate the feedback we have received from families, students, and staff in 2021 to inform our goals for 2022. The My School Survey results indicate that we are on the right track, with room for improvement.

Over the year we will be unpacking the goals and seeking feedback to understand our progress.

UNIFORM

St Mary’s College has a wonderful uniform that brings us pride and strengthens our commitment to our community. It is a pleasure to see our students in their uniform. For a number of years, it has been a goal of the community to have an alternative to dresses and skirts for female students. Many factors influence who we are, what we wear, and how that makes us feel. It is critical that all students are considered in the design and functionality of the uniform. I thank those staff who have pursued this on behalf of our students.

We have approved a shirt/trouser option for girls to begin wearing in as short a turnaround as a month to six weeks. The shirt/trouser option is available for all girls, years 7-12. The navy trouser has a slight stretch, a high waist, and a zip button front closure. There is a safe zip pocket and SMC embroidered just below the waistband on the back left. The shirt is a traditional button-up, collared, long sleeve design to be worn with a navy tie and has the crest embroidered on the pocket. The winter jumper and tracksuit top will work with the ensemble. The uniform is to be worn with the correct black leather shoes and navy socks. Summer will bring a shorts/short sleeve shirt option which will be in stock ready for the summer season.

We are very excited that this option will soon be available. It is not compulsory; it is an option for the winter formal uniform instead of or as well as the dress on different days, depending on how your daughter feels.

We know that the timing is not ideal as the winter uniforms have been purchased and understand that some families may wish to wait until 2023 to access the option. Suppliers do not work on the same calendars as schools and we thank the provider for their work with us.

To get a sense of order numbers to ensure our first order does not fall short, we ask that if you are interested in purchasing this option for your daughter that you complete the form indicating what size (sizing appears to be true to size in the samples) and how many. This will be just an indication and will ensure we order more than what has been indicated so that families have the freedom to change their minds when they wish.

Girls Winter Uniform Survey

Our goal for our Uniform Policy was to be as gender-neutral as possible for inclusivity, consistency, and safety. We thank you for your support of the Uniform Policy and have appreciated the feedback thus far. We will be updating our policy in the near future to include this new option and further detail in areas of confusion.

COVID SYMPTOMS

COVID communication was sent to all families early this term, outlining the changes to close contact restrictions. The communication reiterated the ongoing restriction to not come to school if exhibiting any COVID-like symptoms until they have stopped. We have had a number of students coming to school with symptoms including temperatures, vomiting, running nose, and sore throats. Even if testing negative, these are contagious symptoms and we are required to meet the regulations.

If your child is at school and is exhibiting COVID symptoms you will be contacted to collect them asap and take them home. Your child will be required to remain at home until the symptoms have gone. Staff have been reminded to send any students with symptoms to the sickbay.

ATTENDANCE

One of the biggest influences on a student’s success at school is attendance. The data shows that we as a school community are currently attending school 87% of the time. The goal is to attend school 90% of the time. As a community, only 55% of students have achieved 90% or <. 80% attendance means that students are missing one day every week of school.

The research shows that less than 90% attendance, and success in social, emotional, academic, sporting, cultural and religious growth can be negatively impacted.

If your child is away, we must be notified. Please use the Compass app to inform us as the school can assist in supporting your child in their ongoing learning.

It would be wonderful to see our attendance improve this term. I will keep you updated with the data.

OUR FIRST GATHERING WITH PARENTS

Last week we were able to gather with our school leaders for 2022 along with their parents and relatives to celebrate their success and to wish them well on their leadership journey. This was the first celebratory gathering with families for over a year. It was a gorgeous day, catered brilliantly and so heartwarming to see our families together.

We look forward to offering more opportunities for our families to come together to celebrate and see the great work of our students and staff.

We would like to thank KandK Catering for supplying a wonderful morning tea.

VAPING & PHONES

We have a number of students engaging in vaping at school. This unhealthy, antisocial practice has begun to be regularly participated in by our students in the toilets. This is unhygienic. This is antisocial behaviour and is occurring during classes, between classes and breaks. We have found a number of vapes hidden in the toilets’ cisterns.

We treat smoking as the same as smoking. The law and the rules for our grounds are the same. We ask that you follow up with your child and ensure you and your child are fully aware of the dangers and health concerns that can arise from this practice.

Phones are also an ongoing concern. Students are spending up to 7 to 10 hours a night on their devices. This can range from gaming, to viewing streams of TikTok videos, communicating with others through apps such as SnapChat, bullying and harassing online and creating content. Sleep deprivation is not conducive to being open to learning. Late nights and excessive dopamine does not induce sleep. We have students who have fallen asleep in classes.

We ask that families have a plan in place to support good practices with electronic devices. A centralised charging station, time allocations, responsibilities and time off devices. If you are unsure or need help, there are many sites which can assist. I recommend starting with SchoolTV on our website.

Your child’s phone is an important tool for communication for you. We respect that this is essential and accept that our students have phones. However, we ask that you reiterate the importance of not using their phone during school hours and the impact this has on their learning, and on them socially and emotionally. We also ask that you discuss the importance of not photographing others, not using phones during lessons and maintaining a level of respect when staff ask them not to. The reactions range from complaints to arguments and crying when we ask students to not engage on their phones when teaching and learning is occurring.

Many of our most concerning behaviours and interactions from students come out of the negative interactions on the app SnapChat and the videos on TikTok. These apps are popular and can be fun; but they are used to bully, intimidate, impersonate and offend.

When we ask students about the negative interactions online, most are occurring through the night and on weekends, but the impact of this is seen fully in the emotional and stressful interactions here at school. We have also been told that some students have a phone that is their ‘visible phone’ and a secret phone that they keep hidden and use for such activity.

We are in partnership with our families to ensure that our students are Living Well and Learning Well and we appreciate your support in achieving the best learning outcomes for our students.

God Bless

Bernadette Feldman

Gunnedah Catholic Schools Combined P&F