Principal's News

Dear Parents and Carers,

Well after 29 years of writing a newsletter for up to 40 weeks a year this is my last one. We had a lovely assembly last Friday where we were able to acknowledge the staff members who are leaving our school this year, but if you will indulge me I would like to acknowledge each of them here; both of our Reading Recovery teachers, Carolyn Fraser and Sandra Ennor have retired this year after many years of dedicated service to helping individual students to learn to read in what was a very specialised field. We thank both Caro & Sandra and wish them all the best for their retirement.

Richelle Seuren has worked in our administration area for six years primarily looking after the growing area of compliance but most parents will have met Richelle’s welcoming smile when they are buying school uniforms particularly when their children are just starting at our school - such an important role. We thank Richelle very much and wish her all the best as she takes on a new position at Trinity College.

Jo Hutchinson has worked at Sacred Heart as a Learning Support Officer since 2013. She has always been the right mixture of patience and fun when working with the kids and been a most valuable contributor to our team as a staff member. We thank Jo for her service and wish her all the very best for her future. 

For the last four years Julie Leonard has been our school’s Religious Education Leader, a class teacher and more recently our Wellbeing Leader so she has become a very important point of contact for both children and parents when they may have some very serious and important concerns. Our school, along with St Mary’s and St Brendan’s were selected for a Statewide award by the Victorian Association of Catholic Primary School Principals for our work in Faith Leadership and I want to acknowledge Julie’s role in us winning this award. Julie is heading to St Mary’s school in Warracknabeal as Principal and we certainly wish her well for this new challenge.

Lesley Pearce was appointed as a Learning Support Officer at Sacred Heart by Mick McCrickard in 1995. Thirty years in a position such as this is quite an achievement. Lesley has not only been a fantastic support to teachers and to hundreds of individual students throughout the years, (One of whom made sure to visit her this week - aged 33) she has also taken on countless thankless tasks around the school that need to be done from supervising our hotdog days, organising creative and culinary projects with children, keeping our kids safe when they leave via gym gate to being queen of all things photocopying and laminating. Again we wish Lesley all the very best for her retirement and thank her for everything.

I’m sure all parents and friends would agree that Fr Michael O’Toole has meant a great deal to our school and parish community but I would venture to say that his positive impact has been much broader than that. He is spoken about so highly right across the district. I have been particularly lucky to have worked closely and become such a good friend of a man who lives the Gospel everyday. Thank you to Fr Michael for your inspiration, your wisdom, support and friendship. We wish him all the very best for his new posting at Apollo Bay and Lorne. 

Our community looks forward to welcoming our new Parish Priest, Fr Andrew Hayes when he arrives in January.

Jane Daffy has been a teacher at Sacred Heart for the past 38 years. She has been a class teacher, librarian, principal and for my entire 23 years here my Deputy Principal. When I meet former students who were taught by Mrs Daffy I congratulate them and tell them that they were taught by the very best - not one of them has ever disagreed. As curriculum leader Jane has played a pivotal role in ensuring that  

Sacred Heart continues to be a high performing school, where students consistently achieve higher scores than students at schools with similar levels of socio-educational advantage. 

(where the) NAPLAN results for 2024 place your school in the upper echelon, yet again,  for "value add" in the Ballarat Diocese. 

Stephen Russell, Russell Education, Dec 11 2024

But more than that, as you know I have always maintained that we come to school to “have fun and learn stuff”. Jane has brought that vision to life every day she has been here. She has made school fun for both the students and the staff - she has been the driving/organising force behind our many dress up days, book parades, cultural days and so much more.

Jane has been a great friend to all and she certainly deserves to absolutely enjoy a long and healthy retirement full of adventures and the love of her family and many friends.

Sacred Heart will always mean a great deal to me. My own life has changed so much during my time here it will always be part of who I am.

I’ve loved working with your kids. I loved teasing them and joking with them more though. Hopefully I’ve taught them something, I’ve tried my best and am conscious that it is not always good enough, but that’s probably true for all of us…. Hopefully I’ve taught the kids that?

Finally I would like to thank all parents for their support over the years and wish all of our community a very happy Christmas and a safe and prosperous new year(s).

NEW STAFF APPOINTMENTS With all of those departures, I’d like to let you know that we do have some additional new staff beginning in 2025. Next year the school looks forward to welcoming Emily Dwyer on to staff in the Physical Education role vacated by the marvellous Nicole Lynch. Emily has 20 years of teaching experience across four different Catholic Primary schools and has six years experience teaching and leading Physical Education at St Patrick’s school in Port Fairy.

We are also welcoming back Melissa Callahan who will be teaching a Grade 5 class and also leading our Religious Education Program.

We have also invited Hannah Lehmann and Ty Woods on to our staff as Learning Support Officers.

The fantastic Emmalie Cain will be working in a full time capacity from 2025 and will be assuming Richelle’s responsibilities in these increased hours.

PERFORMING ARTS SHOWCASE Congratulations to Ms Ingles and to every child that performed in yesterday’s musical showcase in what were very difficult conditions in our Multipurpose room and courtyard. Alana has been a fantastic addition to Sacred Heart’s teaching team this year. The children clearly love going to Music each fortnight and their enjoyment of participating yesterday was obvious to all of us in the audience.

Thank you so much to the many parents and grandparents who came along in the heat to make up that audience. It certainly means a lot to the kids.

END OF YEAR MASS Our End Of Year Mass will be held at St Mary’s Church at

10:00 am this morning. All parents and friends have been invited to join us. This will be our community’s opportunity to be with Fr Michael as our Spiritual Leader for the final time before he semi-retires over the summer.

GRADUATION Congratulations to our Grade 6 class  on their Graduation held last Thursday evening. We certainly wish all of them the very best for the future.

END OF YEAR ARRANGEMENTS The last day for our students this year will be tomorrow, Wednesday December 18th, school will conclude at 3:15pm.

The start of the new school year will begin for our staff on Tuesday January 28th with training and preparation. The children will begin class on Wednesday, January 29th. Please note Wednesday the 29th will be the first day for our new Foundation students as well. Foundation students will attend school until 1:00pm for this first week and a half.

Jack Lenaghan - Principal