Dear Parents and Carers

It’s hard to believe we are already halfway through first term. I hope everyone had a chance to recharge over the long weekend. It is always nice to have the extra day midway through the term to catch our breath.

PRINCIPALS’ RETREAT
As many of you know, I was away at the Catholic Education (CE) Director’s day and Principals’ Retreat last week. It was wonderful to be able to connect with others in our Archdiocese and find out about some of the many things happening in Catholic schools. The main focus for the Director’s day was on the CE Learning Agenda. CE has been working closely with a number of experts and academics to find out what is working well and lessons schools can learn. I was able to talk about the magnificent work with Leonie Anstey that Cameron Johns started a few years ago and the impact this work is having on numeracy across the school. The second two days were devoted to the retreat. Prof. Br. David Hall led the retreat based on the two themes of ‘Hope’ and ‘Trust’, and on how these two big ideas help us to develop the specific character of a Catholic school. When the lessons of these two days were distilled down, we came to the conclusion that a Catholic school is ultimately a place where we teach children to know the person of Jesus Christ and this ‘knowing’ impacts not only on the way we work in the world, but on how we treat one another.

THANK YOU
Last week was a very big week, with Year 5 camp and a visit from Leonie Anstey. It looked like Year 5 had a terrific time away and were able to enjoy all that Cooba had to offer. I was able to follow the final day on facebook, seeing that students became suitably muddy as they made their way through the assault course. I hope it didn’t take the parents of Year 5  too long to wash out your child’s clothes. I would like to thank the Year 5 teachers Kelly Scanlan and Megan Thomas, Carmen Myles, Susan Magyar and Michael Prosper for giving up time with their own families to enable the Year 5 students to have this time away.

MATHEMATICS
Leonie Anstey was at the school for two days to work with all of the teachers and with the leadership team. It is wonderful to see how this work is transforming Mathematics at the school and supporting all children to engage and extend their understanding.

DISABLED CAR PARK
We have a small number of parents and carers who require the disabled car park when picking up and dropping off children. Can I please ask that if you do not have a disability pass that you leave these two parking spaces available for those who do have the pass. I know it can be easy to park there quickly to just duck in, but it often means that those with a genuine disability are having to park much further away when collecting their children.

3-WAYs
Three-way conferences begin today and continue tomorrow. If you haven’t had a chance to book in with teachers, I encourage you to contact your child/ren’s teacher as soon as possible to organise a suitable time. These meetings will be the only compulsory parent-teacher meetings for the year. We felt that by having a goal-setting meeting early, teachers could work closely with you to establish goals for this year.

ST THOMAS AQUINAS DAY
Skye McPadden has been busily organising the belated celebration of our school’s patron’s feast day. The actual feast day for St Thomas Aquinas is just before school starts, so we have to celebrate it as a school community a little later. Once again students will be able to enjoy jumping castles and other activities throughout the day. Families are most welcome to join us for Mass at 9.30.

YEAR 6 CAMP
Year 6 students will travel to Jindabyne next week to take part in an outdoor ed camp. This time is a wonderful opportunity for students to develop and strengthen friendships across the year, to challenge themselves physically and hopefully to get to know themselves, their peers and their teachers a little better. I will be joining the Year 6 teachers this year and am looking forward to getting to know this group a little better.

ONLINE SURVEY
Catholic Education, Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn (Catholic Education), have released an online survey to better understand your opinion of the value Catholic schools like ours provide and what that means for you and your children. The findings of this research will be used by Catholic Education to improve the offering of Catholic schools.

The survey will be sent out to parents via email in the coming week and should take less than 15 minutes to complete. 

Privacy and confidentiality:  Please note that Catholic Education has engaged JWS Research to host the survey, collect the data and analyse the results. JWS Research is an independent, fully accredited, Australian research agency (see www.jwsresearch.com for further information). Survey results will be reported in the aggregate with individual responses remaining completely confidential and treated in accordance with the relevant privacy laws, including the Market and Social Research Privacy Principles and the industry’s code of professional behaviour.

I encourage all parents to respond to the survey.

Yours in Faith

Leah Taylor
Principal

Subway special for the month of March 2020 - Wednesday lunch orders will receive a free cookie.  Please submit this order by Tuesdays 9am.

Issue 2-2020 - Online orders due by 20 March 2020

Scholastic Book Club catalogues have been sent home with your eldest child.

No cash orders will be accepted at the Front Office for Scholastic Book Club.

Please download the INLOOP App on your device or order from the online website.

https://mybookclubs.scholastic.com.au/Parent/Login.aspx

Orders will be delivered to school for collection and STA will receive credits. As you can see from our beautiful growing library, each time you make a purchase it helps put more books back into our school.

Any questions please contact me via email ksligar@bigpond.net.au

Community News is now located on our website.

Jesuit led Canberra First Spiritual Exercises Retreat. 20 April – 16 May 2020. This retreat in daily life is an excellent retreat for busy people. It follows last year’s very well-regarded retreat in Canberra. The retreat links with our experiences. There is one small group session each week to suit your diary. You pray and meditate when and where you like. It’s a retreat for ordinary people leading ordinary lives. For more details and/or to express interest in attending email CLCinCanberra@gmail.com or phone 0407147540.

BOOK NOW - Wizard of Oz

MARCH 2020
Congratulations to the following students who will be celebrating their birthday this month:

Molly; Spencer;  Evamaria;  Chloe;  Jack;  Levi;  Sofia;  Aseem;  Ella;  Aarav;  Aryan;  Krystof;  Maeve;  Samuel;  Ruby;  Layne;  Cameron;  Astrid;  Ryan;  Aidan;  Amboz;  Zara;  Alessandra;  Sofia;  Abigail;  Archie;  Maxine.