Principal message
Dear community of St Monica’s,
Today we celebrated our opening school mass with Fr DJ. he asked us all to reflect on how we can bring compassion to others in our day to day lives. It was a beautiful celebration with each class bringing their class prayer cloth to be blessed and a blessed candle being given to each class for use at prayer time in class. All staff were commissioned as were our student leaders.
At this time let us also pray for the peoples of Turkiye and Syria who are suffering greatly after the earthquakes.
Following on from our staff news last week I would like to inform you that Wendy McIntosh will be leaving us on the 3rd March. Wendy has worked at St Monica's for 13 years most recently as School Chaplain and Learning Support Officer. Wendy has built strong links with our families and students and will be greatly missed.
Please take some time to look at all the pages on this newsletter to familiarise yourself with the information you can find here.
TIK TOK Alert
Please check with your children about their use of TIKTOK. I have had reported that there are 3 TIK TOK sites currently using St Monica’s names. They are
St Monica’s gossip
St Monica’s sick and
St Mons
Names of our students are being shared on these sites which is a cause for concern and some of the content is not complimentary. Please ask your children about these and if your child has created these sites have them shut them down. There are many concerns relating to TIK TOK which I will not share here but if you would like further information please see Mr Lamb.
Marong Cup -Volunteers required
Each year the Bendigo Jockey Club hosts the Marong Cup. Please see P&F page for more details on how you can participate either as a volunteer or a participant. We are looking for about 20 people to represent our school. It is a great day out for the whole family. Come and cheer our school (staff /students/parents) in the running relay on the track.
Tickets are available -please see the office.
Enhancing Catholic School Identity (ECSI) Survey
Catholic schools in the Diocese of Sandhurst aim to have a strong Catholic identity.
An essential element of this goal is understanding how students, staff and parents perceive the
Catholic identity of our school currently and what they might like Catholic identity at
St Monica’s to look like in the years ahead.
Responses to the survey will assist us in better understanding how our
Catholic identity is expressed. The results will contribute to a reliable picture of our
school’s Catholic identity, which we will use to inform our school improvement for the
next four years.
In the weeks ahead, each student in Years 5 and 6 will be asked to complete an online survey, access to which is only available through individual user codes and passwords. At no time will students be named or identified in the survey; their responses are guaranteed to be anonymous.
We will also be providing a time for parents to access the survey. More information to follow.
I look forward to the contribution that our community’s responses will make to improve
our school.
Please contact your child’s teacher if you do not wish your child to
participate in the ECSI Survey.
Parent teacher meetings
Next week our parent teacher meetings begin. This is an opportunity for you to meet your child’s teacher and to share with them information that you feel will help them to support your child. This is another component of our process to set up each child up for success. Consider what your goals are for your child this year and share them with their teacher.
Closure Day in March
We have scheduled a professional learning day for all staff on Friday 10th March which means that the school will be closed. Please contact YMCA if you need their services on this day.
Our focus for this day is Catholic Identity.
School Advisory Council meeting
Next Tuesday we have a School Advisory Council meeting in the staff room at 6pm.
Have a lovely weekend.
Fiona
Ms Fiona Dearn
Principal
