Principal's News

Dear Families,

It is hard to believe our year is rapidly coming to a close, and yet we still have many events and activities along with lots of learning to be undertaken.

The F - 2 Athletics and Cross Country Carnival was a wonderful event. We had perfect weather and the children competed and cheered so well.

 The Year 6 Champions race was also a highlight of the day. Congratulations to Max in first place, Gabriel who came second and Riley who came third for the boys race. Our girl champions were Rhiannon in first place, Asmitha in second place and Carla in third place.

Our overall house athletics champions were Brigid House. Our Cross Country Champions were Francis House and the Spirit Award went to Clare House. Congratulations to all!!!

 Thanks to all those who were able to come along and support the day and to Grace and the St Mark's staff for arriving early to do set up and organise the days event.

We have our Carols Night on Tuesday 2nd December from 7.00 - 8.00 p.m.

You are very welcome to come along from 6.30 p.m. and have a picnic on the grass area near the basketball courts prior to the Carols Night commencing at 7.00 p.m. We would love to see all families and children in attendance to perform their class Christmas song. Your class needs you to make their performance great!!!

We also have our school helpers thank-you morning tea on Tuesday 2nd December at 11.00 - 11.40 in the hall. We want to say an enormous thank-you to all those parents and grandparents who come along throughout the year and volunteer their time at school events. An Operoo notice was sent home this week and we ask that you please reply if you are able to attend, for catering purposes.

Our F - 4 swimming program also starts next week. Please ensure you have responded to the permission form and your child has all their gear ready to bring to school for swimming on Monday.

Enormous thanks must also go out to Leanne and her hardworking committee who have organised the Year 6 disco amidst a very changing landscape of system expectations.

The Year 6 disco will take place on Monday 8th December in the school hall and I am sure will be a wonderful occasion. The year 6 children can have a sleep in the following morning as they are not required to be at school until 11.40 a.m. They are more than welcome to come in at the usual time if needed.

End of Year Mass and Father Joseph's Farewell

Our end of year Mass will take place on Monday 15th December at 9.30 a.m. followed by our end of year assembly where we will farewell Father Joseph and present him with a gift from the community. We are still asking families to make a donation to Father Joseph's gift so that we can provide him with a travel voucher to use to fly back to Melbourne to visit his mother as often as he can. Please put donations in an envelope and drop them at the office as soon as possible please.

Congratulations

Congratulations also to the 12 children who represented our school at the Maths Games Day this week. They did an amazing job and we are very proud of them. Please see the article on the Mathematical Achievement page for all the wonderful details and photos - I don't want to steal their thunder.

Congratulations also must go to Georgia in Year 6 who has represented Victoria as a member of the state softball team and won a silver medal at the recent national competition. What a fantastic achievement - well done Georgia.

Staffing News:

In 2026 we have a couple of changes to our staffing that I will outline below. 

Mrs Jo Selby will be taking 12 months of long service leave to undertake some travel. We wish her all the very best on her exciting adventure and hope that she will send us lots of wonderful pictures and anecdotes of her trip.  

Mrs Emilie L'Eveille will also be taking 12 months leave to accompany her husband to Queensland where he is opening his own business - a lovely new restaurant. We wish both Emilie and her husband all the very best with their exciting new venture.

We have employed Liana Francese as a classroom teacher,  and Michaela Kim as a specialist Art teacher, F- 6 for 2026. Liana has completed her teaching degree at Australian Catholic University and worked as an OSCH educator and co-ordinator whilst doing her teacher training. Michaela has an Arts Degree and Primary teaching qualification and has worked in New Zealand as a classroom teacher for 6 years where she also held a leadership role in the area of explicit teaching, before moving to Australia.

Liana will be at school to meet the children on our transition day on December 9th and Michaela will join us in the new year. I am sure you will make them both very welcome into our St Mark's Dingley community, with the friendliness and warmth we are renowned for.

Operoo

Our whole school communication system - Operoo is ceasing business in Australia as of the end of the year. As such we have had to migrate quickly to a new platform. As of December 4th we will no longer be able to use Operoo and will be transitioning to a new platform for the start of 2026. We will be communicating with you via SeeSaw and paper notices until the end of the year. Please watch out for the set up processes that will be shared with you after the 4th December to migrate to our new platform Nforma. We already use Nforma for our reporting process and to mark the roll and they now have a wonderful new feature that allows parents to notify student absences via an app that links directly to the class roll that teachers can see when the open it up to complete it each morning and afternoon. This is a much better way for you to communicate your child's absence as the teachers can see it as soon as they go to mark the roll. Teachers do not always see emails in the morning as they are preparing for the day's learning, but if you record your child's absence through the Nforma App then they will see it in a more timely way.

2026 Classes:

We are in the process of  finalising class groupings and staff for the 2026 school year. All children will have a transition session in their new class on Tuesday 9th December where they will meet their new teacher and classmates. 

We kindly ask that parents refrain from making requests for particular teachers or classmates, as this makes the process of creating balanced classes very difficult. Our teachers and leaders spend a significant amount of time creating the classes based on relevant information that is not accessible to families and we always consider many aspects of school life beyond friendships and personal preferences. Whilst creating classes is not a perfect science, initial feelings of discomfort or worry at being with new people is the window to a whole new group of friends, when viewed with a positive outlook. Please support your children to view a new class, new classmates and a new teacher with a positive outlook and growth mindset. 

Handcrafted Products by Tiffany Murray

One of our parents, Tiffany Murray, has beautifully displayed a selection of handmade products in the glass cabinet located in the office area. These items are available for purchase.

If you're interested in viewing or buying any of her creations, please feel free to take one of her business cards, which can be found in front of the products inside the cabinet.