Principal's Post

Dear Families,

I hope you all enjoyed the day celebrating all our wonderful Mothers and Mother figures yesterday. My even greater hope is that all Mums within our community were totally spoilt and made to feel loved and appreciated.

We had a lovely morning on Friday in the Reynolds Community Centre. Thanks to the Preps for their prayer reflection, the Year Six students for their preparing and serving, and the staff for all of the help they provided to make the morning have such a beautiful "St James" community feel. I must especially mention Anita Dell'Orso, Lisa Morris and Emir Bajcic for their organisation of the event.

The Mothers Day stall was a great success with wonderful array of special gifts for our students to choose from. A huge amount of time and effort goes into preparing the stall, so a massive thank you to Cate and Jess who organised it.

Thank you also to the parents who gave such positive feedback and appreciation via emails and in person. Please see some photos below of the morning.

This weekend was also special with the ability to view Aurora Australis from our own backyards. Here are some photos our staff shared over the weekend.

$400 School Saving Bonus

You will have seen the measures announced last week by the Allan Labor Government in the 2024-25 State budget.

A $400 School Saving Bonus was announced for all government school students. However, only Health Care Card holders will be eligible for the payment in Catholic schools. As you know from your first-hand experience, families are feeling cost of living pressures and for Catholic school families to be discriminated against in this manner is deeply unfair. There should be equality for all school children in Victoria.

Either the payment should apply to all students, or it should be means tested for all students, as has been the case with programs like the Camps, Sports, and Excursions Fund.

The MACS media release on this can be viewed here.

They are putting the views of the Catholic school education sector forward to government in the strongest possible terms, and may ask for your help to communicate to local MPs.

Crossing Supervisor

We have contacted the local council to enquire about the health of Chris, our Centre Rd crossing supervisor but as one might expect they would not give us any personal information. We believe she may have had a slight injury. Hopefully Chris recovers soon.

In the meantime, we are unsure of who, if anyone, will be supervising the crossing, so at times Anita or myself have dashed up there at the last minute.  We are also having an inconsistent attendance at the Frank St crossing and do our best to cover this at the short notice we are often provided with. Please be mindful of this and speak to your child/ren regarding road safety. Please take great care when driving past the school at drop off and pick up times.

Building Update 

We have created a page to keep you informed of our ongoing building progress. Please scroll to the page to see our latest updates.

School Advisory Council Feedback

We held our second SAC meeting for the year last Tuesday evening and here is a list of some of the items on the agenda.

• First Aid Officer - Appointment of Antoinette Moroney to this role - 12pm - 3pm
• Building update - Proposed date of completion - 20 Jan 2025 - fingers crossed
• Whole School Cross Country -  Successful event and looking to enhance this for next year
• After School Care - Increased resourcing to cover demand
• Annual Action Plan - Implications for Term Two, including working on a more tailored St James Acknowledgment of Country.

P&F St James Major Fundraiser - We need your help.

As you know our annual major fundraising event is coming up on Saturday June 15th. Thank you to those of you who have already donated. However, we still need donations for raffle prizes and silent auction items, and bottles of alcohol(hand delivered by parents to the office). We are reaching out to all of you asking that you get in touch with a business you know to ask for support. This widens the net for potential sponsors and donors. 

Parent Education Session Highly Recommended - TONIGHT!

We are excited to shared with you that Psychologist Maria Ruberto, who presented to our staff and some of our parents last year,  will be holding a Parent Workshop: Understanding Resilience.  Please refer to the link to her website for the dates and other information regarding the outline of the two hour session and booking details. 

https://www.salutegenics.com.au/product/parent-workshop-13th-may-2024/

There may be an opportunity for some parents to car-pool given this valuable parent workshop is on the other side of town.

Catholic Secondary College Enrolments for Current Year Five Students

Students must be enrolled when in Year Five. Enrolments close on Friday 16 August. 

St James is a direct feeder school to Emmaus College, Aquinas College, Our Lady of Sion College and Whitefriars College. This means that St James catholic students receive direct entry and St James non -catholic students receive greater consideration of entry into these secondary colleges.

Walk to School Day

Our annual Walk to School Day was a great success with a majority of our students participating! Thank you to families for supporting their child/ren on the day to help raise safety and health awareness. Let's continue to work together to promote this amongst our students.

Nationally Consistent Collection of Data(NCCD) on School Students with Disability

Please see some information below/attached regarding data collection for the NCCD. 

Enjoy a great week ahead! 

Dave