St Mary’s Recycling Initiative

The St Mary’s recycling initiative is in its third year and is going very well. Mr Harris and his team of volunteers have recently had an intake of new bins and now have enough specialty recycling bins to cover all areas in the school.

Now all St Mary’s students and staff can live the Catholic message and be "Stewards of creation" very simply by placing any poppers, cans or bottles in the labelled bins. Mr Harris and his recycling team take around 200 bottles a week to the return and earn facility keep them out of landfill.

Make HOMEWORK CENTRE (HWC) part of your after school routine.

Would you like to improve your organisation and help staying on top of your workload?

You might need some guidance making a study plan or help revising?

Maybe you have time before an afternoon activity that you want to make good use of?

When: Monday - Thursday, from end of school to 4:30pm.

Where: St Mary’s College Library

Who: Yr 7 - Yr 12

What: Internet assess, teacher supervision and assistance, afternoon tea

How: One off Registration on QkR

(At the conclusion of HWC students being picked up should be collected from the front of the College no later than 4.30pm.)

Why do students attend HCW?

‘The homework centre is a great place to work in the afternoon because there is a teacher there to help, it is quiet and I find it easy to focus instead of getting distracted by my siblings.’ Year 8 student

‘Homework centre is an excellent opportunity to work productively. It helps you get your homework finished for the day, so you don't worry about any unfinished homework at home. This helps you work independently, and you are given a lot of help from the supervising teacher with the subject or activity you are struggling with.’ Year 9 student

‘Homework centre has helped me so much with finishing my homework and helping me through all of my assignments. I am extremely grateful for the staff there.’ Year 10 student

‘Homework centre is a great place to go and do homework after school as it is quite and also have teachers help you with assessment tasks and homework.’ Year 10 student

‘I have been attending homework centre weekly since I started High School. I highly recommend homework centre for other students at St Marys College, as I have found it extremely beneficial and productive over the past 4 years. This is due to the fact that I still feel that I am in the school and in the class environment compared to home where I am on my phone or tempted to lay in bed. Furthermore, Parents, I majorly recommend homework centre as it relieves the stress from you trying to help with homework. There is always a teacher that is ready to help.” Year 11 student

New Library Study Rooms

In the January holidays the library had a make over with the building of new study rooms being built in the library. These are a great assets for induvial testing and TVET students for phone lessons.

VOCATIONAL EDUCATION TRAINING COURSES

Primary Industries

At the moment St Mary’s has one VET course running at the College, Primary Industries. It is taught by Mr James and gives students an opportunity to achieve a Certificate II in Agriculture by completing a number of competency based assessments in areas such as fencing, animal nutrition, care, welfare and handling, first aid, weather, quad bikes, farm chemicals, sustainability, water infrastructure and WHS.

TVET courses

The year has begun well for students undertaking Vocational Education courses at TAFE. There are eight Year 12 students continuing their TVET courses and seven Year 11 students who have begun their TVET studies. There is one student in Year 12 who has a school based traineeship and three in Year 11. These students will all be required to complete 70 hours work placement or workshops throughout their course.

Congratulations and thank you to all these students who conduct themselves in an exemplary manner in their online or face to face courses.

Year 12 TVET Students

Year 11 TVET Students

School Based Apprentices and Trainees

St Mary’s has one school based trainee in Year 12, Ashlyn Summers who is working at Boggabri Hospital as well as studying Human Services (Nursing) through TAFE.

In Year 11 there are three students who have secured a school based traineeship:

Chloe Sumpter - Nursing at Gunnedah Hospital

Hayley Rankin - Retail Services through McDonalds Narrabri

Taylor Stewart - Business Services with NAB Gunnedah

These students worked hard on applications, attending interviews and undertaking work trials to secure their positions. We wish them all the best as they strive to complete the requirements of school, work and TAFE which is a very challenging undertaking.

In upcoming newsletters we will hear from some of these students about their experiences.

Students in Year 10 who are keen to secure a school based traineeship or apprenticeship (SBAT) should use their work experience time to impress their employer and at the end of their work experience discuss the possibility of an SBAT. If you have any enquiries regarding SBAT or TVET please speak to Mrs Isbester.

Online Students

St Mary’s College offers the opportunity for students to study online courses of their choice that are not offered here but are NESA approved. We have students studying at four different course providers in a range of subjects. We use a range of providers as different schools offer different subjects.

Their online teachers often visit the school for one on one sessions and we have already had the Economics teacher from Lismore visit. The students are also offered intensive days where they can travel to their provider to spend the day with other online students and their teachers.

They have regular study periods in the Library where they work on their subject on different platforms such as canvas, moodle and millennium and some providers, especially the language subjects, require a one on one phone lesson once a week. All the teachers are in contact with the students regularly, as well as with Mrs Long, their Supervisor.

Currently we have the following students studying both Preliminary and HSC courses.

Online Education Diocesan of Lismore

Dubbo School of Distance Education

Camden Haven High School

NSW School of Languages

Rotary Public Speaking District Final

Three of our students, Shania Bekker, Hugh Hunter and Immy Taylor competed in the Rotary Cluster Public Speaking Final on Thursday, 4th February.

The students presented their 5 minute speech on a topic of their choice, so long as they made reference to the Rotary Four-Way Test. Shania spoke of the immense benefits of playing a musical instrument, Hugh on the nature of education and Immy on applying the Four-Way Test to our use of social media.

All of our students spoke with great confidence and passion and were a credit to our school. Ultimately, it was Immy Taylor who emerged victorious on the night. She will now go on to represent this cluster at the Inland Semi Finals in Quirindi on Sunday, 28th February.

Congratulations to all of our students and good luck to Immy!

Boggabri Lions Youth of the Year

On the evening of February, 25th Immy Taylor and Hugh Hunter competed in the Boggabri Lions Youth of the Year Competition.

Students presented their 5 minute prepared speech and then needed to present two 2 minute impromptu speeches. Their impromptu speech topics were: ‘Should the COVID-19 vaccinations be made compulsory?’ and ‘Will the proposed 2032 Brisbane Olympics bring positives or negatives?’.

Both students spoke with great confidence and it was noted by the convenors that it had been some time since competitors spoke for the full 2 minutes.

Congratulations to both of our participants, but a special shout out to Immy who won the Public Speaking Award and the Overall Lions Youth of the Year. Good luck in the next round in March!

St Mary's College Gunnedah Newsletter

Term 1 Newsletter, Issue 1 · 01 Mar 2021

In this issue