Principal's Report

Condolences

It is with great sadness that I convey the passing of long term staff member Mrs Penny Crowley. Penny had been a wonderful servant to Catholic education across this Diocese from her innovative work in the primary schools as an itinerant teacher of Indonesian, to her work as a teacher of Languages and Religious Education at both Our Lady of the Rosary College and McCarthy Catholic College. Not only will her work be missed but her infectious positivity and generosity of spirit will forever live in our hearts. Even for me, having only met Penny in recent years, her capacity to ignore her own painful circumstances and change the focus of the conversation from herself to then ask how I was going, is an authentic measure of a wonderful and humble child of Jesus. On behalf of all who knew her, we trust that she is now in the bosom of the Father and that her family and friends can hold her beautiful spirit in their memories forever. May she rest in peace.

St Dominic

Staff and students were treated to a special commemoration of one of our founding charisms at last week’s assembly. Along with a number of staff masquerading as the Dominican Sisters who brought Catholic education to Tamworth more that 100 years ago, St Dominic (aka Mrs Allen) lead us through a decade of the Rosary and explained the four pillars of the Dominican charism. The photos presented in this newsletter do little justice to a wonderful and lively performance that hopefully encouraged our community to remember spiritual origins exemplified by St Dominic and his followers and to work harder together to bring a stronger sense of belonging in the future in a Catholic community devoted to service.

Year 12 2016 Gift to the College

Community members may remember me speaking late last year of the gift to the College from the graduating class of 2016. These Year 12 students decided to enshrine the motto - “Touch the Gate, Switch on to Learning” into a tangible structure here on site. Through the dedicated efforts of the 2016 leaders, especially College Captains Dominic Sills and Olivia Dillon, a brick plinth was constructed near the bus bay with a hand-crafted chiro cross and the hand prints of the outgoing 2016 Captain, Olivia Dillon, and the hand prints of a 2016 Year 7 student, Hayley Grey, as a representative of the future of the College. As you can see from the photos below the plinth and hand prints are in the final stages of assembly. I must highlight the generosity of Shay Brennan Constructions who have donated the construction materials, as well as the persistence of Olivia in bringing the project to completion while still managing her first six months of university! Well done and thank you to all involved for such a beautiful and long lasting memento of our aspiration to enhance learning at the College!

Staffing

We welcome some new staff for Term 3; Mrs Katherine Ackland (Visual Art - contract), Miss Lauren Ryan (HSIE/RE - contract), Mr Patrick Bradbery (Science - contract). Similarly we welcome back Mrs Sharon Stuart after a period of extended leave. It is also a pleasure to announce the appointment of Miss Kathryn O'Sullivan as Acting English Coordinator for the remainder of the year. And finally we wish College Counsellor, Mrs Tamara Shoemark and her husband Brendan, all the best as she takes maternity leave from early August. Current part-time Counsellor Mrs Aimee Cook will move into the full time role until June 2018.

NAPLAN Online

NAPLAN is moving online. This means moving NAPLAN from the current paper-based tests to computer-based assessments. The transition to NAPLAN online will commence from 2018. In May of every year, students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 take part in the National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN). NAPLAN was first introduced in 2008 and has become a routine part of the school calendar in Australia.

NAPLAN, which is a part of the National Assessment Program (NAP), is how governments, education authorities and schools can determine whether young Australians are reaching important educational goals.

States and territories determine when their schools commence NAPLAN Online.

Moving NAPLAN online brings many new opportunities for students and teachers that are limited or not possible with paper-based tests.

The Benefits of Online Assessments

Some of the main benefits of students taking part in NAPLAN Online include:

Better assessment – and more precise results. NAPLAN Online uses a tailored test or adaptive design, where the test automatically adapts to a student's performance and asks questions that match the student achievement level, allowing the student to demonstrate their knowledge. This provides teachers and schools with more targeted and detailed information on students’ performance on the tests. Tailored testing also provides an opportunity to broaden the scope of the assessments.

Faster turnaround of results. Delivery of assessments online significantly reduces the time it takes to provide feedback to schools, students and parents, so teachers can respond more quickly to learning needs.

More engaging. ACARA research into online assessment has shown that students have engaged well with electronic tests.

As technology develops, ACARA aims to further refine the delivery of the tests to best use the available technology to provide increasingly sophisticated assessments and valuable feedback to teachers, parents and education authorities.

NAPLAN Online: Key Messages

- NAPLAN helps parents, carers and educators to see if children are meeting important numeracy and literacy standards. It is used to support school improvement processes by enabling teachers to monitor their students’ progress over time and to identify areas of strength and development.

- NAPLAN provides parents and carers with an individual report, showing their child’s results and a national comparison of their child’s performance against other Australian students in their year level.

- NAPLAN Online will provide better assessment, more precise results and faster turnaround of information.

- NAPLAN Online will use ‘tailored testing’, which gives students questions better suited to their ability, resulting in better assessment and more precise results.

- The precision and improved timing of the results will help teachers tailor their teaching more specifically to student needs.

- An online national assessment platform has been developed by Education Services Australia with funds from the Australian Government.

- Significant planning, development, research and trialling have been ongoing since 2012 to support the move to NAPLAN Online.

- State/territory education authorities will determine the timing of their move to NAPLAN Online and lead implementation for their state/territory.

Preparation for

Welcome

We welcome Matilda (Year  7) and Ella Barton (Year 9), Stephanie Towns (Year 8) and Sophie Barr (Year 11) to the McCarthy community.

Nationally Consistent Collection of Data on School Student with Disability

IMPORTANT: Please follow this link to essential information for Parents and Carers.

May God go with you.

Mr Geoff McManus

Principal