Principal

Good afternoon and welcome to Term 1, Week 5 of the academic school year.  It's hard to believe  we are already half way through the term.  That being said, it has been exciting to walk through our learning environments  (K-10) over the past fortnight and experience first hand all the incredible learning experiences being offered to our students by their Leaders of Learning.  High impact learning is definitely alive and well at St Philomena's in 2020.

Over the past couple of days (Tuesday and Wednesday), St Philomena's had the opportunity to host the Western Annual School Improvement Plan Meetings for the diocese.  A number of schools, along with the Senior Leadership Team of the Catholic Schools Office met to discuss what School Improvement looks like within the Catholic Diocese of Armidale.  Congratulations to the Instructional Leadership Team of St Philomena's Catholic School on their highly professional presentation of our School Improvement Plan for 2020.  We are currently preparing a document to share with our school community that will outline our School Improvement Plan (Key Focus Areas) for the 2020 academic school year.  In the spirit of true transparency (while this document is being prepared), I felt that it was important to share with our school community our three key learning areas:

• To Embed the Core Pedagogical Principles of Contemporary Learning Design at St Philomena’s Catholic School K-10
• To Embed Quality Assessment (As Of & For Learning) at St Philomena’s Catholic School K-10
• To Develop and Embed Rigorous Data Literacy Processes & Practices to Inform and Lead Learning at St Philomena’s Catholic School K-10

Following on from the Annual Improvement Plan Meetings, the senior leadership team of the Catholic Schools Office, conducted a number of learning walks throughout our K-10 learning environments observing our Leaders of Learning and students engaged in high impact learning.  The senior leadership team were extremely impressed with what they saw and felt that St Philomena's has set a high standard for 21st century learning in our diocese.  Congratulations to our Leaders of Learning and students for this wonderful feedback.  Keep up the incredible work.

Last night (Wednesday 26th February) we held our Parent Information Evening K-10. Thank you to all our families for their support of this important beginning of year event. The purpose of the evening was to provide parents with an insight into what learning will look, feel, and sound like at St Philomena's throughout the 2020 academic school year. A link to the Parent Information Evening presentation has been provided in this edition of the newsletter for those parents that couldn't attend.

On Friday 14th February we celebrated our Beginning of the Year Mass. Included in this, was the official induction of our Student Leadership group of 2020. Congratulations to :

Secondary Captains - Rachel Jennings and Hannah Bowerman

Primary Captains - William Stevenson and  Stella Madden

Secondary Prefects - Edward Montgomery and Jacinta Davis

Primary Prefects - Thomas Vickery and Rose Kirkby

Finally, a small reminder for parents (and students) entering the school through the bus entrance. It is extremely important (for the safety of our students) that we only use the School Crossing Zone to cross the street. Gwydir Street is an extremely busy road at school drop off and pick up times, therefore, please use the school crossing to ensure our students arrive and depart from school in a safe manner.

Have a wonderful week.

God Bless

Jamie McDowall

Principal