Newsletter

A message from Emily

Principal – St John's Footscray

Dear parents and carers

 

Last Friday was the St John's Trivia Night and it was a huge success thanks to the organisation and planning of Vicky Gazzola and Jacqueline Cassar. Thank you to the many parents who supported this night by attending and bidding on the silent auction. I would also like to thank the Rosmond Bowling Club for the venue; Ben from Motty's Online Trivia, who ran our Trivia Night and for the yummy grazing boxes on our tables, a big thank you to Mili Posterino from Baby Elephant and her team. Vicky and Jacqueline approached many local business to donate prizes for this event and I have listed these below. We also had families within our community donate prizes. We are very thankful to all the businesses who donated prizes for the night and I would like to draw your attention to them so we can support them in return.

 

Silent Auction Items

  • Signed footy from the AFLW Western Bulldogs team
  • 2x $300 vouchers to Poytons - donated by Normark (Danny Ferns and Enny Erawati)

Raffle Door Prizes

  • 5x $20 Vouchers from Dumbo Cafe
  • 1x $20 Voucher from Migrant Coffee
  • 1x $50 Voucher from West Footscray Wine Bar
  • 1x $50 Voucher from West 48
  • 3x $30 Vouchers from Chestnut Tree Bookshop
  • 10 session pass from Athena Gym
  • 5 session pass from Corner Studio
  • 10 day pass from Recovery Lab - donated by Alycia and Mus Mustafa

We are currently busy making plans for next year and celebrating all the achievements of 2024. As the year ends it comes to that time where we say goodbye to much loved staff members. 

  • Erin Schembri is taking 12 months leave to travel overseas and live with her family in Vietnam during 2025. This is a very exciting adventure and we look forward to hearing about it and welcoming Erin, Hunter and Gene back to St John's in 2026. 
  • I am also excited to announced that Melissa Caruana (3/4A Hub on Fridays) will be taking parental leave next year as her little family grows to four with the arrival of baby number 2 early in 2025.
  • We wish Laura Steel (2 Hub) all the best as she returns to Port Melbourne Primary School next year. We have loved that she chose to join our community for Semester 2 this year. She has seamlessly joined our team and we will miss her calm and positive energy she brings to St John's each day.

As we wish these beautiful people all the best for 2025, we also welcome two new people who will join us. I look forward to introducing Charlotte Turner and Melissa Murphy to our school community. We believe both Charlotte and Melissa will be much valued members in 2025 in sharing their talents and passion for learning to St John's. In our next newsletter I will announce the staffing structure for 2025 as well as Hub structures and locations. In the hope that we will be undertaking a building project on our hall, we have planned to move some of the hubs and spaces around to minimise impact when and if this happens in 2025. One of these moves includes the library. If you are able to assist with the movement of books, I will be calling for volunteers in the coming weeks and would love to hear from you.

 

Last term we ran community conversation sessions with a focus on reporting. I also called on educator and leadership input and we are currently documenting a detailed process for this that will be launched in 2025. As a glimpse into the changes that will be happening, I have outlined below briefly the timeline that we will be following for next year for our formal reporting components. Once we have finished mapping out a schedule for open afternoons, SeeSaw posts etc, we will share this with our community. This will most likely be at the beginning of the new school year.

  • Term 1 
    • Week 9 & 10: Parent Support Group Meetings (PSGs) for children with Personalised Learning Plans (PLPs)
    • Week 10: Learning Conversations 
  • Term 2 
    • Week 8 & 9: PSG Meetings
    • Week 11: Semester 1 Student Reports available via PAM
  • Term 3 
    • Week 7/8 & 9: PSGs 
    • Week 8: Learning Conversations
  • Term 4 
    • Week 8 & 9: PSGs 
    • Week 10: Semester 2 Student Reports available via PAM

It's great to see the majority of the children remembering to wear their school hat this term. We have a supply of hats for sale in the office as well available for purchase online though our suppliers (see School Uniforms page). We do ask that every child is wearing a St John's hat and not just a cap from home. We also ask that every child has a St John's School Bag for next year. So if you are using a different backpack this year, please order one from our supplier or reach out to the office as we have some donated ones we can provide from time to time. I would also like to draw attention to a project that Ivy and Violet have been working on as a way of recycling old uniforms. They are currently preparing some information packs and posters to advertise this initiative that I will share with families soon.

 

 

Last week the Most Rev Peter A Comensoli, Archbishop of Melbourne, announced the news of Pope Francis' appointment of two new Auxiliary Bishops for Melbourne with one being our former Parish Priest, Fr Rene Ramirez. We congratulate Fr Rene on this very exciting appointment and wish him all the best as he prepares for the Episcopal Ordination of Bishops-elect in 1 February 2025 at St Patrick's Cathedral, Melbourne.

 

I would also like to share an invitation to Fr Gerald's installation as the New Parish Priest for the Holy Family Parish on Sunday 8 December at 10:30am. Fr Gerald has been a part of our community supporting Fr Rene for the last 8 years and we look forward to continuing to work in partnership with him.

 

Building Update: I have continued to work with MACS to ensure we are able secure funds to make the much needed works to the hall roof and walls. I have continued to monitor changes to this space to ensure the upmost importance of everyone's safety. To support this, we have looked at ways to minimise risk. This has included the use of spaces including the backyard and working in partnership with OSHClub, to ensure we meet the needs of the community and keeping everyone safe. To support this, we have decided that as of 2025 we will no longer be able to open up the backyard for cars to drop off and pick up children. We have had some near misses across the year; the fact that we have fencing narrowing the space for cars to move and an increase in traffic congestion along Essex and Eleanor Streets, we have decided the benefits no longer outweigh the risks. We will continue to advertise this change to ensure families who access this option in the mornings and afternoons have enough time to plan an alternative meeting point for 2025.

I will continue to keep you updated on any news in regards to this building project.

 

Warm wishes,

Emily