Principal's Report

Father's Day Footy Match

What a great day we had on Saturday at the annual Dads Footy Match. It was a true community event, with two schools coming together. Children, parents, and staff mingled with the true spirit of our vibrant St Finbar's community fully on show. There were so many people involved in the organisation of this great event - a huge thanks to James Adams, Daniel Kalnins, Tim Marget, Julian Tuohey, Jacob Swierc, Alan Contreras and Kate Blake for their time and effort. Thanks also to Matt Skehill who took some great action shots, which can be viewed below.

Of course we need to acknowledge our sponsors as well - we really appreciate the support of Katie Mactier, Chris O'Brien and Ryan Grace who all made generous contributions on behalf of their respective businesses.

SRC Focus Groups

Over the next few days I will be meeting with the SRC leaders of each year level to have informal conversations with them about life at St Finbar's. Today I met with the Year 5 SRC, and then the Year 4 SRC, and our discussion centred around the students' playground experience: how safe they feel on the playground, issues on the playground that staff may not be aware of etc. The students spoke articulately and openly

There were some issues mentioned that we are confident that we can address pretty quickly:

consistent rules about what constitutes "out" in soccer
some minor repairs to the soccer nets
clearer labelling of classroom sports equipment, especially balls
bringing the table tennis table out occasionally

The overall feeling from these two groups is that overall the playground is a safe place to be. The students like the fact that there are alway teachers and LSOs visible, and they know they can go to an adult for support any time. They acknowledged that there is the occasional squabble, and banter can be an issue if it gets out of hand but generally everything is pretty harmonious. I'll look forward to gettingt he younger students' perspectives soon as well.

Parent/Teacher/Student Conferences

Our Student Led Conferences are fast approaching and will be held Tuesday 17th September and Wednesday 18th September from 2:15pm until 6:15pm.

The students in Years 3 to 6 participate in these conferences as well. Each conference begins with an opportunity for parents to speak privately with teachers. The students are then invited in to join the conference in order to talk about their learning, their goals and how they are working to achieve these goals.

You may click on the link here to book your time https://www.schoolinterviews.com.au/code/mcjb8 or use the QR code

MACSIS surveys

On Monday you should have received a link to the annual MACSIS survey. This is an annual survey that we invite families, staff and Years 4 -6 students to complete. As of today, we've had 24 families respond to the survey.

Book Week

Our St Finbar's Book Week celebrations have been a bit delayed this year, due to our Arts Festival and Swimming programs but we are ready to celebrate everything book related next week.

The parade is happening next Friday 13th September so start preparing your costumes now. We encourage each student to also bring a copy of the book that they are dressed up as, or at least a print-out of the front cover in order to help identify their book character. The staff are ready to dress up as well - the date may provide a clue as to our theme for this year.

Our librarian Narelle has once again organised a Lamont Book Fair, with the details below.

Mayflower Aged Care Home

We received a lovely email from Mayflower Aged Care home thanking us for our recent Year 5 biography project, and also for the invitation for residents to attend our Arts Festival.

You can click below to read the story that Mayflower has written about the biography project; it is really heartwarming.

New psychologist

I'm happy to announce that our new psychologist, Michaela Hughes, has now started at St Finbar's. Michaela will be with us on Wednesdays. She does have some capacity to take on some new students at the moment, so if you feel that your child may benefit from meeting with Michaela, please reach out to either myself or Peggy McDonald and we will talk you through the process.

National AeroSchools Championships

We're excited to announce that all 17 of our Aerobics competitors have taken up the offer to compete in the Nationals on the Gold Coast on the 3rd and 4th October. This was a development that we didn't see coming when we first offered our students the opportunity to participate. To support our teams we are planning the following fundraising events.

Tuesday 10th Sept: Donations day. The participants will collect donations 8.20am onwards at school entrances. Our girls will pre-promote, then on the day, dance at lunchtime in the hall to any keen spectators, plus hold a 20min clinic with anyone that wishes to learn a few Aerobics sequences moves.

Thurs 12th Sept: Cake Stall from 3pm

Fri 13th Sept: Cake Stall from 3pm

2023 Annual Reports

Our 2023 Annual Report has now been finalised and published on our website.

It may be viewed here as well. You may be interested in the MACS Annual Report, which is also attached below.