Principal's Message

Parents/Carers 

Welcome back to Term 3. During the holidays, the P&F organised concreting of a section of the playground, for students to use as a handball court. This is greatly appreciated by students and staff. We are fortunate to have a committed and hard working P&F.

On our return to school we held an assembly for students in Years Five to Ten. We spoke to students about their learning and the need to reflect on their school reports and achievements for Semester One. We acknowledged that learning new concepts is meant to be challenging and that struggling with our learning is a necessary part of the process. When learning is hard we need to apply extra effort in order to facilitate an understanding, to achieve success. We discussed the need for all students to show grit, perseverance and resilience in our learning in order to master concepts and ideas. 

Teacher/parent/student conferencing has been conducted in the first two weeks of this term. This is a valuable forum to share information about achievement, progress and establishing learning goals. 

At a recent meeting of the building project we learnt that certain defects have been noted in the original structure. This has meant that additional steel will be required to reinforce the existing building. The roll on effect is that the final completion date for the building project will be pushed back to some point in Term One, 2025. Whilst this is disappointing, it does mean we are being provided with an even better build.

This term, schools generally have a focus on staffing for 2025. We need to confirm enrolments so that we know what classes we can run and therefore what staff we will require.  The St. Philomena's 2025 enrolment window is closing soon, please return enrolment forms and associated documents as soon as possible. Principal tours are available upon request.

Finally I would like to congratulate Mr Alistair Stewart on his appointment as Principal for 2025. We are working with the Armidale Catholic Schools Office to arrange a time when Mr Stewart can come to St Philomena’s so that he can familiarise himself with our school and meet the students.

Warm regards,

Simon Fleming

Principal