From the Principal

Dear Killester Families, 

Ash Wednesday last week saw every year level attend the theatrette and a liturgy. Ash Wednesday is the beginning of Lent – a season of prayer, fasting and giving. It is a time of preparation for the great celebration of Easter. The forty days are a time of preparation. They remind us of how the Hebrews wandered for forty years in the desert before God led them to the Promised Land. In preparation for his ministry, Jesus spent forty days in the desert fasting and praying. These historical events challenged Jesus and the Hebrew people to trust in God and prepare to live as God intended.    

Could you please discuss with your daughters road safety as we almost had a serious accident last night at our pedestrian crossing.  Several students ignored the crossing guard and put themselves and others at risk by running outside the barriers and into traffic.  No bus is worth catching if an accident occurs.  Safety is our prime concern.

In practical terms we also use this Liturgy as the springboard to launch Caritas’ major Fundraiser - Project Compassion. Caritas is the largest Catholic Aid Agency in Australia and they do incredible work around the world to help make communities self-sufficient. Students were asked to take a fundraising box home and bring it back in the last week of term.  Last year we raised a record amount for Killester - $7000. If you would like to see some of the short videos of the work they do with various communities then click these links for Rosalie’s story or Anatercia’s story.  Make it a family event and discuss how this can be a practical way to live out our school theme of Compassion : Moving to Action. Today I went to my pigeon hole and picked up two boxes that had been returned by  year nine students. They were so heavy and absolutely full - congratulations to those students!

The next two weeks will see the Year Seven camp and the Year 11 and 12 Retreats. We wish the Year Seven students a great time to bond with their new friends and for the senior students to take time to reflect on their futures and the place that God has in their life. We wish them a fun filled and peaceful time away. By the time you get this newsletter I hope the year sevens have! Thank you in particular to Ms Michel Kennedy and the Year seven team of teachers who will be caring for them. Thank you also to the Year 11 and 12 Coordinators, Trelene Luecke and Bronwen Auty and their respective teams who give up their time generously  so that our students can have these wonderful experiences.

Thanks to Loreto Cannon who did an incredible job organising the International Women’s Day breakfast which was a great success.  This year’s theme was  “ Breaking the Bias.”  The Age on Tuesday  8th  published an article on the disparity between men and women on pay. Women earn on average $25,000 less than men and men are twice as likely to be highly paid than women. Boards are still dominated by men. There have been gains in paid parental leave and 4 in 10 employers have narrowed their pay gap since last year. There is much to be gained still in order for women to reach equality. We hope that our students leave here with a determination to be treated with respect and equality and that the world can accommodate that basic idea. I would particularly like to thank the Quinn family, Mum -  Mandy and daughters Acacia and  Sienna (Year 12) who did some wonderful hosting of the morning.

The New Website

Please take the time to look at our new website. Thank you to Mr Kelleher and Ms Cheong-Lan who have updated it. We hope you find it helpful and informative. Just note that the Killester App you may have on your phone is no longer working and you will need to delete it. The new website is very responsive and will work well on phones.

The next newsletter will again be penned by our actual Principal, Sally Buick. Sally has had seven weeks long service leave and we all hope that she has been well rested and recharged for the rest of the year. She has begun her time at Killester with some major obstacles and she always handles them with grace and care for staff, students and families. We are so lucky to have her as our leader. Welcome back Sally!

We are coming up to week seven and a long weekend before it. I wish your families and our staff a peaceful time with family and friends.

Yours Faithfully

Peter O’Neill

Acting Principal