Dear Parents and Carers,

A very warm welcome to the 2022 school year. 

The students have returned to school well and everyone is happy and ready for another big year. It always astounds us how much children can grow in just 6 weeks; something I am sure you are well aware of when it comes to school uniforms.

Our new Kindergarten students have taken to school ‘like ducks to water’ and the sounds of their excitement  and energy are a joy to hear.  When things settle a bit more, we will host a special welcome lunch for our new Kinder parents. Mrs Jacqui Stephen and our support staff are doing an amazing job with your children, so please be assured they are happy and in very good hands. 

We make a special welcome to our other new students and their families. Charlie, Madelyn, Anikah, Kordel, Ava and Hugo have each settled in well and have already become an integral member of our beautiful St Mary’s family. I am also very proud of the way our students welcome and look after our new children. It comes so naturally to them.

At the end of last year, I sent home a list of staff and their roles for 2022. I have included it again for the benefit of our new families. As usual, our staff spent much of January preparing for the year ahead. Our stage based teams are planning a great year ahead for the students with quality learning experiences, co curricular activities, Peter Pan 2.0 Musical and excursions.

At present, the students are in Cohorts for their school day. Kinder, Year 1 and 2 in Cohort 1, Years 3-4 in Cohort 2 and Years 5-6 in Cohort 3. Each cohort has a separate playground area and students do not mix across cohorts during the school day. Short cohort assemblies will be held each Monday morning for Awards to be given out. 

Over the holidays, several classrooms were renovated to improve ventilation and make them more visually appealing. The upstairs classrooms, middle level room and large room (currently Year 3) look much brighter and welcoming for the students. Thank you to Mr Justin Bateman for overseeing the works during his holidays.

Congratulations 
Congratulations to Mrs Georgia Veneris on her marriage during the summer break. On behalf of the students, staff and families of St Mary’s, I wish Georgia and Zac all the best for their future together.

Communication
Compass
We began phasing in a Student Management system Compass late last year to give parents a ‘One Stop Shop’ for all communication with school. As with all new things, it will take some time to fully utilise Compass and for parents to become very familiar with it. 

At present, we use Compass for attendance, newsletters, parent notes, bookings for PT meetings and Reports. You will see that we have also moved our Parent Calendar over to Compass. For the time being, we will continue to email all important letters to parents, in case some parents are not using Compass yet. We are trying to limit hard copies of notes, but there will be some exceptions when parents need to update or return details. Preferably all payments are to be made via QKR. If you experience difficulties with QKR, please contact the Front Office for assistance. 

School Website and Facebook
We also place our newsletters on the school website link St Mary's School Website. Our Facebook page is used for sharing learning and school experiences and for some simple reminders. Each week you will see posts of one class group’s  learning and activities. This week is clearly Year 1’s turn! Please share our Facebook page with grandparents and friends. 

Weekly Class Memos 
Reading your child's Weekly Class Memo prior to each week, will give you a good insight into the learning taking place in your child's class. Classroom messages are included to keep you up to date. The Weekly Class Memos will continue to be emailed as teachers usually prepare them from home on the weekends and send them directly to parents. Please communicate with your child's teacher via email, understanding that they are teaching all day. Please give staff time to respond, usually within 24 hours. To support their family/work life balance, staff have been asked not to read and reply to parent emails after normal business hours or on the weekends. If anything is urgent, please contact the front office. 

Swimming Program
We believe that all children should be taught to swim, and this is especially the case for us living on the coast. We apologise for the short notice, but we have just found out that we are able to have an Intensive Swimming Program for all students in Years 1-6. Students will be taken in cohorts to the pool for an assessment next week. A special thank you to our wonderful School Community Council for donating $2000 to offset the cost of the program for families. Thank you also to parents for supporting the Community Council fundraising in 2021, thereby enabling this to happen. Unfortunately with current restrictions, parents are unable to attend the pool while the swimming program is on. Thank you to Mrs Megan Grant for organising the program as well as the recent swimming trials.  

Excursions and Camps
This year, we will be able to get our students out and about to extend and enrich their everyday learning at school. Younger students will experience local activities and day excursions and the older students will be taken on overnight excursions. Teachers are currently planning for an overnight excursion to Canberra for students in Years 3 and 4 and a Sport and Recreation Camp for students in Years 5 and 6.  Details will be forthcoming but as there are considerable costs for families, I wanted to give parents early notice.

Drop off and Pick up
Thank you for your support with our Drop off and Pick up procedures. Until parents can come on site again, all students will be walked to the Church Street car park for pick up.  Parents will need to get out of their car so the teachers can sight them before allowing the children to leave. Please be extra cautious as you drive in and out of the church car park.

Please do NOT arrange to pick your children up at the Bus gates. It is dangerous for the students and bus drivers, and it puts our staff in difficult situations. Only bus children are to use those gates. Walkers and bikers are taken across the Church Street crossing after school.

Whole School Events
Unfortunately, we are not permitted to proceed with our Opening Year Mass and Awards night planned for Term 1. At present, we can not mix students across cohorts and parents are not able to be on site. When restrictions ease, we will look into options to celebrate and introduce our Student Leaders. Sacramental celebrations can go ahead because they are parish based and will be held in the Church. Later this term, our Year 3 students will celebrate their First Reconciliation. Our K-12 Opening Year Mass with students from St Bernard’s and Carroll College is planned for the last week of Term. Let’s pray things improve before our Easter and Catholic Schools Week celebrations in May. 

Thank you again for your support with the RATs and COVID related restrictions. We balance our obligations with commonsense and realistic expectations at school because we want our students to be safe but to also enjoy their childhood and not worry excessively.

Thank you for keeping sick children at home and informing us of your circumstances. If your child does need to miss school at any point, and they are well enough to be learning, please direct them to the government's online learning platform. Click here for Online Learning

Wishing you all a wonderful year ahead. Please do not hesitate to contact me with any questions or concerns.