Welcome back to Term 3, it has been a wonderful first week with lots of smiles as our children arrived. You will notice that we have changed our Newsletter week to even weeks this term. This is change allows the additional Office staff to be supporting students in classrooms. We have welcomed several new families to our school community this term, our new students have been made feel very welcome by their classmates. If you see some new faces at parent pick up please introduce yourselves at a social distance, of course. 

I can hardly believe that the bushfires happened six months ago, the impact will last a very long time in our community. The emotional stress on our children cannot be under-estimated, providing adult support to talk and develop strategies, emotional regulation and ways of expressing emotions assists children to develop the ability to self regulate and become resilient for their futures. This term we are offering special support to our students after the stress of the bushfires and now COVID. The ‘Stormbirds’ program will be offered to all of our students in small groups of no more than 7 students, it will be run by a facilitator from Catholic Care and Anneliese Robinson (Pastoral Support). Whilst the program supports children who have been affected by natural disasters, the program does not ask children to share their experiences of past trauma. The aim of the program is to help children develop a greater understanding of adversity and to develop a positive narrative around their experiences. If you would like your child to be involved in the program or you would like more information, please contact the school office as soon as possible. 

A big thank you to our parents for supporting the everchanging COVID restrictions. With the current situation, it is clear that we cannot afford to become complacent. A reminder that if your child is unwell in any way please do not send them to school, the same conditions have been placed on our staff who require medical clearance before returning to work. We understand that this can be inconvenient but unfortunately is necessary, please refer to the Compass alert sent on Friday regarding which symptoms require a Medical Certificate/ COVID test. 

Auditions were held and roles allocated for our school musical “Dragon Days’ this week. It is wonderful to see so many children stepping up to be involved, over 50 children have been allocated roles and in addition each class will have their group segment. School productions are always a wonderful celebration in our school as so many students get an opportunity to shine in the Arts. We are hoping that by Week 9 we will be able to have a real audience to watch, if this is not possible we will certainly be recording for home cinemas. Thank you to Mrs Cooper, Mr Kinch, Mrs Wilson and Mrs Johnston who are our dynamic drama team. 

It has been my pleasure to walk many of our new families around our school in the past few weeks. Visitors comment on the beautiful manners of our students, the joy and industry that are so evident in our classrooms. Our school uniform is also a feature of our school that many people notice, the way each child presents shows respect and pride in our school community instilling a sense of belonging. In light of this please ensure that your child comes to school in correct uniform each day, I am asking that in particular, all students wear black polishable school shoes and school ties. Thank you for your help with keeping our 

school spirit strong. 

I hope everyone has a great week and stay safe. 

Yours in partnership,

Laurinda Nelson 

Principal