Dear Families,

Welcome to Term 4!

We have hit the ground running here at John Paul II Catholic School. We have had a very positive start to the term and want to thank our students for their excellent behaviour and attitude towards their schooling. Our Athletics Carnival on Wednesday was a great success. Thank you to Susan Andrews, our PE teacher and resident athletics expert for organising the carnival, and also to our staff for all of their hard work throughout the day. It was great to see so many parents, carers and relatives there cheering on the students! We also celebrated the Feast of John Paul II on Friday where we had a whole school liturgy, shared lunch and an afternoon of activities. A special thanks to Jane Davies for organising the day and Sarah ‘Coach’ Fitzgerald for her support with setting up the activities. It was a huge success!

It has been suggested through the School Advisory Board that we investigate a Grade 6 Canberra trip in the coming years. We would like to invite you to give your input into this decision. There is a significant cost associated with an interstate trip, around $1650 per student. We would like suggestions on fundraising opportunities to bring down costs. This will not be possible in 2025, but we would like to discuss the possibilities for 2026 and beyond. Feedback can be given in this survey which will close on Friday 8th November.

A well-written letter was recently delivered to the school leadership team from one of our Grade 6 students. It was a persuasive letter about wearing socks according to our Uniform Policy. The letter highlighted many challenges with finding white socks every day since the uniform has changed, and suggested we offer students the flexibility of wearing black or white socks. We are passionate about student voice, and brought this to the school board who were overwhelmingly supportive of a change to the Uniform Policy. Students are welcome to wear plain black or white socks from now on. Thank you to Hollie in Grade 6 for creating change in a very positive way.

With many people in our community affected by childhood heart conditions we would like to use the platform to share information about this worthwhile fundraiser. Students are welcome to sign up and raise funds to support kids with child-onset heart disease.

https://www.hopforheartkids.org.au/

Ben Morgan

PRINCIPAL

Chinese