Dear Families,

Welcome to the season of Advent where we start preparing for the coming of Jesus at Christmas. We kicked off the advent celebrations as a St James community with a lovely prayer service this morning led by our Year Five students. Following this parents visited classrooms and observed or participated in advent activities that the students were completing.

We have two main initiatives over the next few weeks to remind us to be "Christ Like" and put others first like Jesus did. The first is our St Vincent de Paul grocery drive collection (thanks to families who have already donated to the classroom baskets) and the second is our student KK. The idea of the student KK is to look after another student within the class by using kind words, doing kind deeds and then providing a small gift ($5.00 max) to be given out in the final week of school. Please support your children by chatting about what they might do rather than giving lollies or chocolates.

Thank You Morning Tea

This was well attended by many parents this morning too. It's always hard to choose a time that suits parents, classes and the general school timetable. I apologise if this year's time did not suit you. At St James we are very grateful for the time, effort, energy and dedication our parents and extended family members who give of their time in so many ways to enhance the experience we provide the students within our "village."

Swimming Program

Our two-week Prep–Grade 4 swimming program is over and went really well — lots of tired kids, tired staff and very happy parents! A huge thank you to Anita, whose organisation ensured everything ran seamlessly. Swimming certificates should be available later this week, and teachers will hand these out for students to bring home.

School Advisory Council

Our final meeting was held last Tuesday 25 November 6.15 - 8.30pm. James Wingate, our Chair of the SAC for the past two years , is the only retiring member. and given our healthy numbers, we do not need to recruit any new members. We will, however definitely be asking for new members for the 2027 school year.

James has been a wonderful leader of our SAC over the past two years. I know he is open to members of our community expressing their views and regularly brought this feedback to our meetings.

One of the items we looked at and discussed as a SAC was the MACSSIS survey data feedback.

Here are a few interesting items to note:

This year we had 81 families complete the survey compared with 125 in 2024
Staff rated our school climate at 98% positive, staff leadership relationships at 96% positive and collective efficacy at 95% positive. These scores are very high and well above MACS averages, indicating that the staff see great benefit in working at St James.
Parents rated school climate at 90% positive and school fit at 85% positive, both well above MACS averages and an indication of their satisfaction of St James being a very suitable school for their children.
Parents rated Barriers to Engagement at only 60% positive which is a slight drop from 2024 and slightly below the MACS average. This is an area we can explore further to see how we can break down some of these barriers and support families to become more involved with their child's learning within our St James community.
Overall, our staff, students and parents results were very affirming.
We also had the opportunity to compare our NAPLAN results with six other schools who have a very similar socio economic status and enrolments. The comparisons were both positive and reflective of the strengths of our St James students.
Our Year Three students maths results were better than most of the other six schools and reading results, on average were broadly comparable.
Our Year Five students performed exceptionally well in both reading and maths compared to the other six schools.

Staffing News

With Jo Matarazzo retiring from the library, we have employed Louisa Norwell in this role for 2026. Louisa is familiar to all staff and students due to the many casual relief roles she has taken on at St James over the past few years. It's wonderful to welcome Louisa as an official part of our St James team.

We have also employed another Learning Support Officer, Eileen Dalton. Eileen joins our St James team with experience in this role at another school.

As previously announced, Louise Matthews will retire from the Literacy Leader Role and move to some Casual Relief Teaching work. Katie Schroder will take on the Literacy Leadership role part time and teach in the classroom part time as well.

School Closure Day:This Friday 5th December - (MACSEYE day care available)

School Fees

Please see the attached 2026 Schedule, noting there was an omission from the Yr 5 & 6 Chromebook levy.

Operoo to nForma

Operoo will be winding up their activity in Australia at the end of this year. We will be transitioning over to the nForma platform as our key communication tool. More information to follow.

Marathon Club 2026

A heartfelt thank you to Belinda Bele and Katrina van Vuuren for their early starts, warm smiles and the joy they brought to our students each Marathon Club morning. Your cheerful presence and the care you showed as you served breakfast made such a positive start to the day for so many children. As you finish up in your roles, please know how deeply appreciative we are of the time, energy and commitment you have given to our school community. Thank you also to our dedicated staff who are on the roster. We are pleased to say that the number of participants have increased this year.

We have three volunteers to take over the coordination of our Marathon Club breakfast each Wednesday morning next year. Thank you to the team of: Megan Talevski, David Boal and Elyssa Pipertzis.

Thanksgiving Mass

Tuesday 9 December at 7pm here in our Community Centre. Please come along and celebrate our year together and farewell our departing families.

Netball - Year 1 Students

Any Year 1 Students interested in starting Netball in 2026?

Out of Hours School Care -

Please register your children here if you require this service.

Please note - you must walk your children to the door of Before School Care and sign them in.

If you have any questions you can email MACSEYE

directly at enrolments@macseye.vic.edu.au

Movember

The St James lads (Mr Crowe, Mr Egan, Mr Flintoff, Mr Mutimer, Mr Sweatman and Mr Young) have wrapped up their Movember mission with mo-tivation like no other! From whisper-thin wisps to full-blown face foliage, our moustaches have gone full throttle.

But it wasn’t just about the mo’s. We stepped up our fitness game too. Together, we smashed past our target of 140km in walking, running and swimming and clocked an incredible 205km! One mo-stride at a time, we went the distance.

Thanks to the incredible generosity of our community, we’ve raised $1,200. Every dollar went towards vital men’s mental health initiatives, suicide prevention and cancer research. Your support kept our spirits high when we got strange looks at school and in public, our mo’s proudly growing and our mission thriving.

If you’d still like to contribute, you can donate here:

From all of us: Thank You! Your support makes a real difference and we couldn’t have done it without you!

Farm volunteers needed over the holidays

If your family might be available to lend a hand, please keep it in mind. We’ll be sending out more details and a volunteer roster closer to the end of term, but early expressions of interest are always appreciated. It’s a great opportunity for families to spend some time outdoors together and to support this special part of our school community.

Thank you, as always, for your ongoing support and enthusiasm for our farm. The children (and the animals!) truly benefit from your involvement.

Below are the dates:

Thurs 18th, Fri 19th, Sat 20th & Sun 21st Dec

Mon 22nd, Tues 23rd, Wed 24th & Thurs 25th Dec

Fri 26th , Sat 27th, Sun 28th & Mon 29th Dec

Tues 30th, Wed 31st, Thurs 1st & Fri 2nd Jan

Sat 3rd, Sun 4th, Mon 5th & Tues 6th Jan

Wed 7th, Thur 8th, Fri 9th & Sat 10th Jan

Sun 11th, Mon 12th, Tues 13th & Wed 14th Jan

Thurs 15th, Fri 16th, Sat 17th & Sun 18th Jan

Mon 19th, Tues 20th, Wed 21st & Thur 22nd Jan

Fri 23rd, Sat 24th, Sunday 25th & Mon 26th Jan

Don't forget to post your letters to Santa! There is an express postage box in the reception that will deliver promptly to the North Pole.

Have a great week ahead!

Dave

Spotlight on Learning

Prep

Students of the Week