IMPORTANT- PLEASE NOTE Upcoming Pupil Free Days

Thursday 1 April is a Pupil Free Day.

Term 1 will finish on Wednesday 31 March.

Monday 19 April is a Pupil Free Day.

Term 2 will commence on Tuesday 20 April.

Winter Uniform

All students must be in their full winter uniform on Monday 17 May (Week 5).

Students may choose to wear their summer or winter uniform (depending on the weather) before this date. However, students must wear full summer OR full winter, not a mixture of both.

Young Leaders Day

By Willow Garnham and Sam Swain

On Thursday the 26th of March the leaders travelled to Sydney to attend the Halogen National Young Leaders Day at the International Convention Center (the ICC)! We met up at 8am outside The ICC and we’re ready to go in! The atmosphere inside the ICC was amazing.

Our first speaker for the day was Lachie Smart. He is the youngest person to fly around the world solo! He retold his adventure while showing us pictures of his plane and the storms he had to go through! At school, Lachie’s friends came up with big dreams that they wanted to accomplish when they were older, but they always said it was too hard and they didn’t believe in themselves. Lachie knew he had to change their minds, so he came up with the dream of being the youngest person to fly around the world solo. Lachie tried to get sponsors but for a whole year he didn’t get any! Without giving up, he finally got sponsors! Then Lachie had to learn how to fly. His message was that If you work hard you can achieve anything and do amazing things, even when you're young!

Our next speaker was Anastasia Woolmore. At school Anastasia wasn’t bright and was a slow learner. In university, Anastasia would study for hours at home and barely get any sleep. When the teacher was busy, people would come up to Anastasia and ask her for help because they thought she was a quick learner. The truth was she just put in the effort to have a deeper understanding. When the test scores came in, Anastasia was at the top of the class! She holds a number of records for memory and taught us how to train your brain to remember and recall numbers. Anastasia was a great speaker to listen to and her methods were intriguing! Her main message was to work smarter not harder!

We were really excited for our next speaker, Jimmy Ree’s AKA Jimmy Giggle. He is the star of a very-much loved TV show, Giggle and Hoot! Jimmy was super funny and made everyone crack up! During his journey to be on tv, people always told him that he should do something else in his life. That didn’t stop Jimmy! He fulfilled his dream and Giggle and Hoot went on for 12 years! Patrick Waterford was lucky enough to ask a question about a potential stand up comedy career. It turns out that this could be a distinct possibility. He told his life story and told us all to be who you are, not what other people want you to be!

Our last speaker Was David Campbell! He was really inspirational to listen to. When he was young he lived with his Grandma and didn't know who his Dad was! As he got older David found out his dad was Jimmy Barnes! David always loved singing but feared he would always be in the shadow of his Dad! He started to sing and realized no one compared him to his Father! David's message was again to be who you want to be and don’t compare yourself to others!

The leadership team would like to thank Mrs Honner and all the parents that came and helped the group! We loved the experience and feel so privileged to have the opportunity to listen to all the speakers!

2021 WII GAAY LEARNING HUB 1

After a long, two year wait due to the November 2019 bushfires and last year’s COVID-19, we were finally able to gather at Echidna Gully , Armidale for the first of our two 2021 Wii Gaay Learning Hubs.

Monday night we gathered for some ‘getting to know each other’ time and to share an overview of the planned activities. With no time to waste, the students also began the first of their numeracy activities!

The Literacy and I.T facilitators had planned the student’s work around this year’s NAIDOC theme ‘Heal Country’. Throughout Tuesday and Wednesday the students enthusiastically rotated between Literacy, Numeracy and I.T activities. Lots of budding news reporters and journalists were writing newspaper reports / TV news reports with Mrs Cochrane in Literacy. They were reporting on the ways in which we can ‘Heal Country’ and the consequences if we don’t begin this practice.

Mrs Walters guided the students during their I.T rotations to create ‘Heal Country’ Instagram posts. The posts sent out a very strong message, once again highlighting how to, and why it is imperative that we understand what ‘Heal Country’ means to the First Nations people and why we must all work together to make it happen.

The activities during the Numeracy rotations were centered on weight and measurement. The students hefted, estimated, weighed and measured a plethora of objects, then were presented with the task of constructing an equal arm balance. The true meaning of persistence and not giving up when things become challenging was continually evident during this particular activity. The students’ efforts were rewarded when they moved onto the less challenging task of making Rocky Road.

We heard from our voices of the future as the students presented their work Wednesday night. We feel reassured from their Instagram messages and news reports that the future of ‘Healing Country’ is in very good hands.

Compass School Manager App

Over the Easter Holidays, you may notice Compass will get a new look. The following will change for all users:

A new login page
A new header across all modules
A new look homepage

Please note that none of these changes will impact the functionality that you are using within Compass. They are updates to the design that we hope will make your use of Compass easier.

To open your compass portal on your mobile phone, you will need to open this in browser. When opening your Compass app, 3 bars in the top left-hand corner will appear. Choose 'open in browser' from the drop-down list and you will then be able to view your dashboard as you would on a computer device.

General Compass School Manager App Information

If you want to receive instant app push notifications from the school you have to have notifications turned on for Compass School Manager in your settings on your smartphone. See attachment for instructions.

Canteen Help Needed

Volunteers are desperately needed for the following:

1st, 3rd or 5th Thursdays of the month

1st or 3rd Fridays of the month.

If you can't spare the whole time, Sue is happy to have some people just come in for the mad, lunchtime rush between 12.00 - 1.30pm (especially on Fridays).

Please contact the office if you would like to help.

URGENT- Kiss and Drop

It is so fantastic to see so many parents using Kiss and Drop in the afternoons. But please DO NOT let the queue flow into Bloomfield Street. If you arrive in the queue and you are forced to flow into Bloomfield St, you may need to drive around the block, find a park for a few minutes or leave home a few minutes later.

We have had numerous complaints about the queue backing up into Bloomfield St. Not only is this illegal, it is also extremely dangerous with large trucks and buses being forced to go around you.

Thank you so much for your cooperation.

School Fees

Payment for Term 1 fees are now overdue.

Please contact Jeni Muller in the office should you have any queries or concerns.

St Xavier's Newsletter

Issue 5 · 01 Apr 2021

In this issue