Saint Francis Xavier - Principal's Report

Term 4 - Week 7

Dear Parents and Friends of St Francis Xavier,

The important Season of Advent begins on Sunday 30th November.

Advent is a truly special time on the Church's calendar! It signals the start of our collective countdown and preparation for the joyous birth of Jesus at Christmas. It’s a season brimming with hope, excitement, and happiness, and it gently reminds us all to think about how we can make room for Christ in our daily lives. To help our students connect deeply with this sacred season, our classes will participate in weekly prayer gatherings. These services will encourage the children to focus on the powerful weekly themes—Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love—as they prepare their hearts for the wonder of Christmas.

nForma/Operoo

St Francis Xavier Primary is excited to announce a significant enhancement to how we communicate and manage administrative tasks. We will be moving away from the Operoo platform, which will cease to be used by the school from mid-December.

In its place, we will be transitioning to nForma, a centralized administration platform designed to streamline communication and data management for our families.

We recognise the convenience of having critical school functions consolidated in one space. Currently we use nForma for school reports and to mark school attendance. By broadening our use of nForma, we aim to make interacting with the school easier and more efficient for every family.

nForma will serve as the single hub for the following key school functions:

School Reports: Sending and accessing your child's academic reports.
Attendance Marking: Recording student attendance.
Medical Information: Secure access and updating of all student medical details.
Permission Forms: Distributing and collecting digital permission forms for camps and excursions.
Parent/Teacher Meetings: Facilitating bookings for parent/teacher interviews.
Messaging and Alerts: Sending important messages and alerts (future implementation).

A Note on Alerts: For the time being, we will continue to use Audiri for sending immediate messages and alerts to families. However, we anticipate that nForma will replace this function fully during the 2026 school year, creating a single, comprehensive school platform.

To ensure a smooth transition and that we have the most accurate, current data for your children, we ask all parents to complete the following steps as soon as possible:

Download the App: Please download the "nForma for Parents" app from your device's app store if you are yet to do so.

2. Log In: Follow the provided user guides to successfully log in to your family page.

3. Update Medical Details: Navigate to the Medical tab and update the current medical information for all of your children attending St Francis Xavier Primary. This is crucial for their safety and care.

Reminder: Once logged in, please remember that the nForma app can also be used to log student absences (both for the current day and for planned future absences) directly with the school.

Thank you for your cooperation as we implement this exciting change to improve our school operations.

Italian Day

Italian Day is taking place at St Francis Xavier on Monday 24th November! Signora Kelly has spent a huge amount of time organising an amazing day where the students will;

-Play Bocce

-Dress in Italian Flag colours

-Have gelato

-Play Tombola

-Make Fairy Floss

-Decorate biscuits with green, red and white icing

-Complete a variety of other Italian themed in their classrooms

Thank you to all the families who have taken the time to complete the permission forms and organise red/green/white clothing and costumes for the day. If you are yet to complete the Google Form, here is a link to it that you can use.

https://forms.gle/WbRaGJaJDDUj2htx5

Final Assembly

The final whole school assembly for the year will take place on Monday 8th December, commencing at 2:15pm in the Red Centre. At this assembly, the following will take place;

-Presentation of the following awards, Living in Faith, Dunkley Shield, Principal's Award + General Excellence awards

-Running Club awards

-Grade 6, 2026 School Leader announcements

Parents are most welcome to attend.

Running Club

Thursday, December 4th will mark the final session of Running Club for the year. This is the last chance for students to add laps to their personal tallies, which they have been building since the club recommenced in Term 3. Medals will be presented at the final assembly to the two students in each year level who have completed the highest number of laps this year. We hope to see many keen runners for the final two sessions, and we trust the weather will cooperate!

Christmas Carols

We will be holding a Christmas Carols afternoon at 2:00pm on Thursday December 11th. All classes will perform a couple of Christmas carols in front of the school. Students can wear Christmas clothes to school and parents are most welcome to attend.

Last Day of 2025/ First Day of 2026

I would like to confirm that Tuesday 16th December is the last day of the year for students at SFX in 2025.

On this day, we will gather together in the church for an end of year celebration Mass, which will commence at 1:45pm. We will then return to school ready for a 3:15pm dismissal. On the last day of school, it is tradition that all of the Grade P-5 students form a big path across the basketball court and cheer for our Grade 6 students as they are dismissed through the Green Gates for the last time. It is a wonderful memory for them to take away for their time here at school.

The first day of school for students in 2026 will be Wednesday 28th January, starting at 8:45am.

Key dates remaining for 2025

Tuesday 25th November School Assembly at 2:30pm

Thursday 27th November School Disco evening

Wednesday 3rd December St Francis Xavier Feast Day- whole day of activities

Thursday 4th December Student Showcase of Learning 2:00pm - 3:30pm

Monday 8th December Final School Assembly + Awards @ 2:15pm

Tuesday 9th December Year 7 2026 Orientation Days for Grade 6 students

Grade P-5 'Meet your 2026 teacher' activity at 12:00pm.

Thursday 11th December Christmas Carols Afternoon (2:00pm, parents welcome)

Friday 12th December Grade Six Big Day Out

Monday 15th December Grade Six Graduation evening

Tuesday 16th December Whole School End of Year Mass (1:45pm)

Last day for Students, who will be dismissed at 3:15pm.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Steve Peart

School Principal

Community

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