Principal's Message

Richard Jacques

Dear OLA Families,

May today and all weekend be a great opportunity to celebrate the great fathers and special people in our lives.  We thank the special Dads, Uncles, Grandads and special people who have such a significant role to play in the lives of our beautiful OLA children.  There is nothing like being surrounded by good people and people who inspire us to live life to the full and encourage us to be our very best!

The Father’s Day Breakfast kicked off early this morning at 7.30am with egg and bacon rolls being made by our OLA Parents and Friends Committee.  Thank you for making this treat happen and for giving our Dads and special people the opportunity to come together. 

Another highlight of the children’s year is bringing in their fiver to buy a special gift for their special someone.  For the last 9 years Kate McGuire has organised the Mother’s, Father’s and Special Person’s Day Stall.  Today Kate has organised her last stall as chief organiser and we are all so grateful for all the extra work she has done behind the scenes.  Thank you Kate.  Thank you also to the many helpers who have supported Kate today and over the years.

Japanese Festival

Next week at OLA we celebrate the Japanese Festival.  Thank you to Sensai for all her preparation and organisation of a week full of fun activities and learning opportunities.  Please look out for the Japanese tab in this newsletter for extra information about the competitions, dress up day and whole school celebration. Everyone is welcome to our Japanese Concert on Thursday 8 September at 9am.  Come and watch the children play music, perform taiko and plays, sing and dance. 

OLA Parish Fete

A big thank you for all the donations of bottles, pre-loved toys and books we received in August.  September is the month for Spinning Wheel donations. 

Book Week Parade

Last Friday 26 August we celebrated the Book Week Parade at OLA. This provided a fantastic opportunity to celebrate authors, illustrators and the wonderful world of books. Thank you to our students P-6 for getting so involved and thank you to all our families for your creativity and support of these memory making moments. We know that Book Week Dress Up Parades can bring both joy and pain to households around the world! It is our hope that the joy outweighs the pain for OLA families… a big thank you to all our OLA families for their commitment and effort in helping dress up our children in their favourite character costumes. James and the Giant Peach is a great example of how mums, dads and children all work together to come up with a whizz bang costume!

Thank you also to our wonderful staff for being the best looking Crayons (from The Day the Crayons Quit!) and for helping make Book Week so much fun. A special mention to Christine Thredgold for taking the lead on organising this special week and thank you to our Library Team Katherine, Sarah A and Di M for their extra efforts. 

Book Week Performance

We also had the privilege of having a Live-in-School ‘Story Quest’ Book Week Performance at OLA. This was a wonderful celebration of CBCA Book Week and it was special to have a selection of the award winning books brought to life. It was wonderful to see theatre bring so much joy to our students - the actors engaged our students and staff with great use of the stage, song and storytelling. 

Wakakirri

Congratulations! We are so proud of our Wakakirri team at OLA. The students danced their hearts out at Frankston Arts Centre last Wednesday night. It was lovely to hear the judge speak about how strongly our students connected the story and dance together and that they also had the ability to connect and share this story with the 800 strong audience! For more positive feedback please check out the Learning & Teaching tab for words from Mrs Taig.  We are grateful to all involved in the choreography, costumes, hair, makeup, lighting, props and all the extras that go together in making a moment like this happen. A special mention to our committed staff Caitlan, Shelby, Tess, Alicia and Sarah D - your passion and dedication have been amazing! Thank you also to our OLA families for your support. 

Building Project

It is certainly hitting the exciting end of the building project with less than two months to go!! each fortnight we do a site visit it is amazing to see the progress. We have garden beds planted, painted walls and ceilings looking amazing, tiles and cabinetry going in, electrical work nearly signed off… We are so grateful for this space being opened up, renovated and improved.

 

Celebrating our different cultures

Thank you to all for your contributions so far.  At OLA we are creating a welcome sign for our new building (Shhh! it's a surprise!!) to celebrate the cultural diversity of OLA. The sign will say welcome in all the different languages that our families are connected to here at OLA. Thank you to all who have shared their heritage so that we can celebrate it in this project. Please email me at principal@olacheltenham.catholic.edu.au with any additions.  This list will be sent to the printers early next week. We currently have noted the following languages spoken by families at OLA:  

Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Danish, First Nations, French, German, Greek, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Maltese, Mauritian, Nepali, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Tagalog, Te Reo Maori, Serbian, Shona, South African, Spanish, Swahili, Tamil, Vietmnamese.

 

OLA Family Feedback

The voice of our students, staff and parent community is so important and it enables us to hear from you all directly, prioritise and then action improvements and future direction of the school.

Thank you to the 58 families who took part in this survey.  

 

MACSSIS Survey

Following on from our OLA Family Feedback Survey, the official MACSSIS Survey for students, parents and staff opened on Monday 29 August. This is a survey conducted every year  in every Catholic School in the Archdiocese of Melbourne.

 

Cheltenham District Athletics

Congratulations to the students who represented OLA at the Cheltenham District Athletics last Thursday 25 August. We are proud of your sportsmanship and for giving your best! Thank you for your patience as the District Coordinators had to rejig the timetable to fit around inclement weather. We even got to host the high jump section in Brigid Hall this Friday 2 September. 

 State Hockey Championships in Canberra

 

Congratulations to Neve, our OLA superstar hockey player and Captain of the Victorian Hockey Team for competing against other states in Canberra this week.      

 

Principal Awards

Thank you to the students at OLA who constantly give their best with their homework and project work.  I was privileged to have proud Grade 6 children sharing their learning with me over the last fortnight and to give out some of the most golden stickers we could find!

So Proud!

What a special moment with our Prep FL class enjoying a Prayer Service in their very own classroom this week. It was so lovely having the children’s families join in this special moment. We were all so very proud of how much our Prep children have grown this year.  PKM its your turn very soon! 

Gratitude from OLA Parish

A big thank you to our Parish school parents for the work they did in enhancing the garden beds around the Church and office. It is very much appreciated.

John Tetteroo, Parish Gardening Coordinator

CONGRATULATIONS - First Holy Communion

Over the last two weekends and at four different Masses our Grade xx children made their First Holy Communion. Together with Fr Alan we extend our best wishes and congratulations to the children, who received the Eucharist for the first time. May the memories of receiving this very special sacrament stay with our children forever. Our deepest gratitude to all our staff, our catechists and parents for their support. It was lovely to join the parish again on Wednesday for a Thanksgiving Mass and to see the children proudly take part in the celebration of the Eucharist and afterwards for a shared meal and celebration.

Enjoy the weekend and thank you for a great couple of weeks at OLA.

 

Richard Jacques

Principal