Principal's News

This last issue of our school newsletter for 2020 acknowledges all the success that our little school has achieved despite the disruption and uncertainties of the COVID-19 pandemic. During Term 4 we have carefully and slowly reengaged with the community and count our attendance at the Remembrance Day ceremony, our primary students' excursion to the Myall Creek Heritage Site, our NAIDOC Week celebrations, our Grandparents Mass, End of Year / Year 6 Graduation Mass and End Of Year Prize Giving and Performance amongst this success.

Adhering to the COVID-19 restrictions has been challenging for us as we could receive parents in the front office and greet parents on the footpath but not invite them to our liturgies or school events. We look forward with great anticipation to inviting parents, grandparents and friends to our school in 2021.

We thank our families and invited guests for attending our Awards and End of Year Performance Night and although it wasn't on the same scale as our annual Presentation Night, we nevertheless publicly acknowledged our students' success and showcased our students' creativity. We thank our sponsors who have supported our book prizes through their generous donations.   

I would again like to thank our families for placing their trust in us and we look forward to great things in 2021.   

2020 in Review

To say that 2020 has been a difficult year is an understatement. Our strong team of teachers and support staff saw us ride through the disruption of COVID 19 and our response to remote learning resulted in improved reading levels with no child falling behind. 

An unexpected outcome from remote learning was the upskilling of the staff in using technology to deliver explicit teaching. We all mastered Zoom Meetings, Google Classroom and our students learned to use the green screen to make videos, use QR codes well before they became the "in thing", experienced Guided Reading with online texts, and accessed eBooks and audiobooks on their iPads.

Another positive outcome was maintaining our connection with our families through constant communication and twice-daily Zoom meetings with the children.

Learning Growth 

Our Term 4 student data was outstanding. Our System Performance Coach, Justin Matthews, gave the staff a sneak peek at the soon to be released CSO Data Dashboard. This one-stop-shop will allow us and the CSO to enter student assessment data and track their progress in real-time. It will enable us to map this against daily attendance rates and COMPASS Chronicles (the office administration software that stores student behaviour, medical and wellbeing data).

We have cause to celebrate our students' achievement in reading. Not only did all students successfully complete this year's NSW Premier's Reading Challenge ...   

40 % of our Year 2 to 6 students are in 

the top 10% of Australian students 

for reading in their grade group in the

Progressive Achievement Test for Reading

(ACER's PAT-R assessment).

I would like to acknowledge the great achievement of Matilda McCudden (Year 4) for 

working at the top 1%  of Australian students 

for reading in her grade group.

Matilda is one of twenty students in our diocese who scored a scale score of 164.3  which is the maximum score that could be achieved in the test.  

"2020 has undoubtedly thrown some challenges our way as educators; however, we have managed to work together to ensure quality Literacy and Numeracy Instruction for all students across the diocese. There have been some great results for this assessment which demonstrate improved outcomes in all Percentiles as a system compared to the Australian Norm Samples."

Claire Ryan

(Subject Matter Expert Literacy K-6, English as an Additional Language or Dialect and Data)

Our positive school survey results align with the CSO's Living Well, Learning Well framework.

Wellbeing Response

Wellbeing has been a major focus for 2020. Our students have a voice and experience many leadership opportunities. The staff provide timely feedback and construct learning goals with our students. Our Friday assemblies recap learning from the week that's passed and include prayer, hygiene, and safety messages as well as awards and singing our national anthem. 

St Joseph's students demonstrate our school values of faith, hope, love, patience, justice, gentleness,and trust on a daily basis.They are happy learners and all have a positive growth mindset.

Dedicated Staff Who Know and Care 

For Every Child

A special thank you to our hard-working teachers and support staff who know each and every child. Our strong team approach allows us to make daily adjustments to learning and provide support programs like PreLit, MiniLit, and MacqLit as well as provide 1:1 support. Our culture of success is driven by collecting evidence of improvement and working as a team to create opportunities for every child to reach their full potential.

Leadership and Support

We thank Fr Thaddeus for his ongoing spiritual guidance through 2020 and his deep commitment to building parish-school partnerships. Although COVID-19 prevented our 

School Advisory Council from meeting formally, we have kept in touch with other informally throughout the year.  The COVID-19 restrictions prevented us from forming a P&F committee. We look forward to new possibilities for fundraising and community engagement in 2021.

Our students were led by our school captains Sydnei and Zinnia who have done an amazing job. We wish them every success in high school.

Captains’ Speech 2020

Someone has rightly said ‘the two hardest things to say in life are hello for the first time and goodbye for the last’. We have had the honour of representing our school as school captains for 2020. We would like to thank our wonderful teachers and staff members for being encouraging mentors and molding us to be the people we are today.

We would like to especially thank Mr Dimech for his continued support and guidance. Your hardwork is a foundation of our achievements. We can only imagine how difficult the job of school principal is, but you handle it with grace and enthusiasm.

2020 has definitely not been easy, but we have learnt a lot about ourselves. 2020 has not been easy, it definitely has not been comfortable, but great things never come from comfort zones. Life is like a Rubix cube or a puzzle, at first it's all mixed up and you have no idea how you’re going to get through but then you start to move things around, fit them into place and your life starts to unfold right in front of you, with all of our resilience and strength soon this problem will be solved. Of course COVID-19 and all the other complications 2020 has thrown at us will not be the only problems we will encounter but just like them we will get through and become stronger by defeating them.

Even though our time here at St Joseph’s has been short we have had some great experiences and made memories that we will take with us into the unknown and hold onto them forever. Now I’m not going to bore you with the long list of amazing stuff we’ve done here, but what I am going to do is thank all the people who made it possible for us to do that amazing stuff. I remember in 2019 we went to Lake Keepit. The mud run was challenging but a lot of fun and the giant swing was of course scary but made us feel good after we did it. Pirate day was crazy, with all the scary looking pirates walking around with scars on their faces and hooks on their hands and the rice bubble treasure chests were delicious. This year we also had Pancake Day where some very generous volunteers offered to help make the yummy pancakes.

Due to COVID-19 we weren't able to compete against other schools for the sports carnival but we had a great time with our at school carnival complete with high jumps, long jump and relays.  We are sad that our time here at St Joseph’s is ending but endings are inevitable. Today we part and embrace new changes in our lives although the thought of starting high school, a footstep in a new direction, is exciting-  St Joseph’s will always be the school we treasure. Endings are just the start of new beginnings and not just for us but for all the students at this school that we will always call home.

Our challenge to the class of 2021? To make a difference. There are some problems big and small that need to be solved and we can’t and shouldn’t wait for someone else to solve them. It’s up to us to shape and influence the society and culture around us. In the words of Mother Teresa ‘Yesterday is gone, tomorrow has not yet come, we have only today so let us begin.’ 

2021 Annual Improvement Plan 

What are our challenges for 2021?

• strengthening our strong team approach that includes all staff
• implementing a tight focus on continual school improvement
• great learning and teaching

What is our evidence of impact?

• all teachers to use the CSO's data dashboard
• in-house support through planning and mentoring from Kerrie Priddis (Education Officer Curriculum and Policy), Claire Ryan (Subject Matter Expert: EALD - Literacy English and Additional Language or Dialect), and Alicia Pringle (Subject Matter Expert: Literacy and Learning Innovation).
• incorporating Clickview video streaming into our literacy block
• STEAM, coding and robotics
• support for parents in how children learn at St Joseph's
• support for parents in engaging with the curriculum (how do children learn to read and write).

Thank You and Farewell

Mrs McDonald's temporary contract ends at the end of the term. We thank her for joining us in Term 1 and for her great work in Science and the Creative Arts.  This year's remote learning experience was a challenge for us all and Joy rose to the occasion with enthusiasm and creativity. We wish her all the best for her future endeavours and we thanked her formally at our School Prizegiving and Performance.

2021 Staffing

The Catholic School's Office Armidale advertised for a full time and permanent Leader of Pedagogy and Classroom teacher for 2021. This teacher will take on this role that I have been carrying for the last three years and together we will form the leadership team at      St Joseph's Warialda. I will retain my Religious Education Co-ordinator and Librarian roles and take on Student Support.  

The CSO's Human Resources Team handled the recruitment process and interviews were held this week. I am pleased to announce that Natasha Cooper has accepted this permanent position.  Natasha is a mother of four. She has taught in a number of schools in southwestern Brisbane before her family relocated to the Gwydir Shire. Natasha is looking forward to meeting the children and creating strong connections with our families and the community.

Permanent Staff ... Strong and Stable Leadership

Our School Performance Leaders and Kate Kenny (head of Human Resources at CSO Armidale) and I have been working closely in creating a strong team at St Joseph's Warialda. I am happy to announce that all our staff will have permanent appointments from 2021 which is great news, guaranteeing stability and the foundations for growth based upon our success in 2020.

Maintenance and Work To Be Done

The following maintenance jobs will take place over the summer holidays ...

• Replacement of the shade cloth
• Installation of a VOIP Telephone and PA System
• Erection of three flagpoles
• Annual Maintenance: carpet cleaning and pest control.

Christmas is a wonderful time to celebrate with our families. For some, it carries mixed emotions. For my father and me, it will be our first Christmas without mum. Others will carry the pain of separation or illness. No matter where we are in life, let us be present to each other and not caught up in the external commercialism of the season.

I wish all our families a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.  May the peace of Christ be with you during the Christmas season and may God bless you and keep you safe over the coming holidays. 

Joe Dimech

Principal