Dear Parents and Carers,

Maths Day 2021

As a school community we are excited to be hosting Maths Day 2021 this Friday 21st May for the whole school. This is a day all about having fun with maths and recognising that we are surrounded by maths in our everyday lives. Please see the Maths News section of the newsletter for more information.

School Administration Computer system change

St Simon’s is currently working through a process of migrating to a centralised school and financial administration system called ICON (Integrated Catholic Online Network).

Rita Petracca and Anna Morgan have been doing a wonderful job working alongside staff from MACS (Melbourne Archdiocese Catholic Schools) to move our current system, data and processes to the new platform.

We are at a stage now with the implementation where we will switch from the legacy system to the new platform. During this time some of the daily finance admin functions will be temporarily unavailable or delayed. Families who wish to pay for school fees in cash are encouraged to do so by Wednesday 19th May. The next available time to pay cash for school fees will be from the beginning of Term 3. All other payment types via card or EFT will still be accepted during this time.

Please contact the school office if you have any further questions.

Education Support Day - (Learning Support Officers and Administration Officers)

Sunday 16th May was International Education Support Staff Day, a time when we stop and acknowledge the amazing people that work alongside teachers and leaders to support students in their learning journey. Education Support staff include our Learning Support Officers who work directly with students and our administration office staff who keep the day to day admin and finance function running smoothly. Both of these roles are important and valued within a school as they are often at the forefront of some of the more unpredictable aspects of the school day.

At St Simon’s, the teachers will be hosting a thank you morning tea for our Education Support colleagues this Wednesday 19th May. I encourage you to reach out to our education support staff and simply thank them for their work.

NAPLAN

NAPLAN 2021 is now complete for another year. Thank you to parents and families for supporting your Year 3 and 5 children during this time. From a school organisational viewpoint, the NAPLAN schedule ran very smoothly. When there was an unexpected challenge, these were managed quickly and sensitively by our school leaders Phil Solari and Monica Rayner.

The results of NAPLAN will be sent to the school in due course which will then be distributed directly to families.

Staffing News

It is with mixed emotions that I share the news with the school community that Rita Petracca has made the decision to retire at the end of 2021 school year. Rita has been an amazing support to the staff and parent community of St Simon’s over the last 28 years! Whilst this is a sad time for our community, we look forward to honouring Rita later in the year acknowledging the work and dedication she has given to St Simon the Apostle Primary School.

Toilet Refurbishment Update

As announced last week, the first of two student toilet refurbishment projects was completed with toilets re-opened to students last Wednesday.

Whilst I am not in the habit of sharing photos of school toilet facilities with the community, I thought I would acknowledge the work of our school maintenance team, Keith and Adam.

The maintenance and care of school buildings and facilities is an important part of providing a safe and inviting learning environment. As a school, we are committed to ensuring we plan and implement resource management for the school’s buildings and facilities.

Works on the South Toilet block (near the basketball courts) have now commenced and we anticipate they will be completed in a 3-4 weeks time.

School Library Update - Call for parent helpers - Thank you!

We are currently awaiting delivery of new furniture and shelving for our newly refurbished library. When this arrives we will need some assistance from parent helpers to begin the process of reshelving the 20,000 books and items we have in our library.

A big thank you to the parents who have responded so far. I will be in touch with you when we have a firmer idea of when the shelving will be in place.

If you would like to offer your help then please do so by clicking on the link below.

Please click here to share availability.

In line with Child Safety Standards, please note that all parents helpers must have a current Working with Children Check and a signed Child Safety Code of Conduct.

God bless

Tom Wursthorn

Principal

Prayers