From the Principal

Reception Christmas Concert

Thank you so much to all families who were able to attend our Reception Christmas Concert today. What a wonderful performance from our children, and a great way to celebrate moving into the Christmas season. Blessings to you all!

Retirement Announcement

Along with the flurry of end-of-year activity leading to the Christmas break, I’d like to take a moment to share some significant staffing news for our community. This year, we farewell two long-serving staff members from St Paul Lutheran School.

Mrs Sue Helps will be retiring from her position after taking some leave entitlements after the end of the year. Sue has been working with us since 2010, and has been a parent of the school for quite a bit longer than that. Sue has worked with many of our Reception children, as well as with other children in learning support and inclusive education over her time at St Paul.

Ms Joyleen Mead will also be retiring after some leave, and her last day at St Paul will be at the end of this year. It’s quite likely we will continue to see Joyleen around as she will still be working regularly in SPLASH to support them. Joyleen has been working at St Paul since 2005, and also has been a parent of the school for much longer than that. Joyleen has supported children and teachers across many year levels and we have been fortunate to be able to utilise her teaching qualifications with children requiring extra care and support.

We thank both Sue and Joyleen for their respective service to St Paul Lutheran School and to Lutheran Education SA, NT and WA. We will formally farewell them at our closing worship on Wednesday 11 December and invite any current and former families to join us.

Staffing News

Next year, Mrs Karly Voigt will be taking a year of leave – we wish her a wonderful change of pace with family and other occasional teaching roles. Mrs Emma Brokate will return from parenting leave in a part time capacity, joining Mrs Nicole Tew.

I am pleased to share with the community that we have appointed Miss Scarlett Gawkowski to a classroom teaching role for 2025. Scarlett is known to most children at St Paul through her work as a relief teacher and in various short-term roles with us.

Mrs Jo Wilson has recently resigned her LSO position at St Paul Lutheran School. Thank you to Jo for her work supporting staff and children at St Paul. We celebrate with Jo on her new appointment as a classroom SSO at St Mary’s, which will make travel and other arrangements simpler for the family, and brings a new professional challenge for Jo. Please join me in congratulating Jo on her new appointment and thanking her for her service to St Paul.

Following that information, I can announce that Mrs Sharon Church has been appointed to a classroom LSO position for the full year and ongoing, and we are currently advertising for other classroom LSO positions on teachers.on.net and on Seek. Families can expect some announcements about this in the new year.

In addition to these announcements, I can also share with you that Mrs Marlise Janetzki will not yet be returning to work at St Paul. She will be taking some additional parenting leave and we wish her every blessing as she spends more time with her young family. Mr Josh Huxtable will continue to work additional time in 2025 to teach Performing Arts across the school.

Finally, this week is the final week of work in 2024 for our Business Leader, Mike Kroon. He is heading overseas next week to spend Christmas with family. With Rajni Kalra also visiting family internationally, please note that finance queries will be addressed in the new year when both Mike and Rajni return for 2025 after their much-deserved breaks.