Student Wellbeing

As we head towards the end of Term 1 and the days seem to be getting a little shorter as we move into the season of Autumn, it is an opportunity to celebrate many events that have been part of our first term.

Investiture Assembly – Wednesday 5th March

On the morning of Wednesday 5th March, we gathered as a school community to recognize and acknowledge all of the students from Years 8-12 who have put their hand up and taken on a leadership position in 2025.

Those Leaders recognized included:

• School Lamp Bearers
• Members of the Student Representative Council
• Members of the year level Student Participation Group
• House Captains – Kildare, Iona, Clonard and Tara.
• Marian Social Justice Leaders and Marian Leo’s
• Co-Curricular - Performing Arts Leaders

Over 120 students were part of this celebration and then took a dedication to what they will commit to as a leader in our community.

For our Year 7 cohort they are electing their leaders during their camp which is this week, giving them a little more time to get to know their students and members of the cohort.

Included in this newsletter will be an acknowledgement of all of our Years 8-12 leaders.

We look forward to in future editions of the newsletter to give our community an insight into the work of our leaders and they strive to continue to improve student life at Marian.

Attendance Reminders

A reminder to all our families of the obligation to inform us of any student absence and to explain that absence. Sadly, for our Student Receptionist on many occasions when we begin to follow up absences  at the beginning of the day, many families do not contact the school to explain the absence.

It is a legal obligation from parents to explain student absences. Students should also bring to school Doctor’s Certificates if they have them to explain their absence or a written note from home for years 7-10.

For VCE a Doctor’s Certificate is an expectation to explain absences. Over the course of the term many students may have brought home an Attendance Follow up sheet from their homeroom teacher asking them to explain absences. These need to be returned to homeroom teachers. However, our preference would be for these not to be sent home as parents have explained all of the absences on the day that they occur.

We thank all of our families who support our processes.

Lateness Concerns

We have noticed over the course of this term that an increasing number of students are coming late during period 1. Sometimes this lateness is due to our school buses being caught in traffic and we recognise and understand this. However, the students we are referring to are students who do not travel on school buses but are just late. This impacts on student attendance and at VCE has an impact on the expectation of 90% for each unit.

As we move towards term 2 we will be analysing this data and following up with students who are consistently late and try to address the reasons why. For many of our senior students they would not be consistently late for work so we are unsure as to why it is okay to be late for school?

Uniform Update

As we move towards term 2, a reminder to families that we move towards our winter uniform. This includes the following:

• School pants and white shirt with our school tie or
• Winter skirt and white shirt with our school tie
• With the winter skirt long white socks or blue tights can be worn
• The school tie is compulsory
• School jumper can also be part of the uniform and
• School blazer is compulsory and should be the most outer garment to and from school.

A reminder about grooming expectations:

• Nose piercings need to have a plug during the school day
• Only one pair of earrings should be in each ear
• False eyelashes or nails are not permitted

When our students wear their uniform with pride it reflects who we are as a school community.

Child Safety Sub- Committee

With our ongoing commitment to keep all of our young people safe we established a Parent Child Safety Sub-Committee in 2024, and we hope to resume the work that was started by the committee in 2025. 

With this in mind if you would like to join our Parent Sub-Committee, please contact me at school via SEQTA direct message or by phoning the school and leaving a message. 

Everyone is most welcome to join.

Operoo Reminders

Over the next week all families will be sent a reminder about updating their information that is included on their Operoo profiles.

We are presently contacting all families in relation to medical conditions such as asthma, epilepsy and diabetes that their plans are accurate and up to date and if they have medication at school such as asthma pumps have not expired.

It is vitally important that the day-to-day information such as contact numbers are accurate, particularly when we need to call home due to illness etc.

We have also noticed a trend where information such as Date of Birth changes for students and they suddenly become much older. This causes alarm bells to ring for our office as this information is something that does not usually change over your lifetime.

What we have observed is that in many instances it is because the student and not the parent have control of this account. 

Can we please ensure that it is the parent who is controlling this account so that your information is as accurate as it should be.

Changes to our processes for the Uniform Shop – linked to Child Safety

As part of our review of our Child Safety practices we have made changes to how parents are able to access our uniform shop on Wednesday’s and Friday’s.

Update to Noone onsite Uniform store

As of Wednesday 12th March, any parents/carers wishing to access the onsite Noone Uniform store will be required to pre book a 30 minute time allocation.  This booking system can be accessed from the Noone website.   All attendees will be required to sign in and out at reception.

Please click here for a direct link to this booking system:  Uniform Bookings   

All students onsite will continue to have access to the uniform store during their breaks to purchase or try on items.

We thank our families for our support with these changes to our processes as we work to continue to improve our practices to protect all of the children in our care.

Final thought:

As we head towards the first term holidays and the Easter season may we recognise in the sacrifice that Jesus made for all of us that we have the opportunity to then see the light and hope that is offered to all of us by his resurrection. May all of our community stay safe over the holidays and have the chance to rejuvenate and rest.  Stay Safe.