Dear parents, carers staff and students

The seasons seem to blend into each other, from beautiful Autumn to the cold and wintery weather. We are certainly well and truly into the winter season and the days are much windier and colder. I encourage parents to ensure that the students have their school jumpers in their bags. Some students inform me that they are not cold, however the students need to have these on especially in the playgrounds. It is winter and it gets very cold out in our playgrounds, as you would know. 

Last Sunday, we the church celebrated the feast of the Ascension. What does this feast day mean for us?

The Ascension

Where we remember and celebrate just as Jesus was welcomed to God’s right hand, so to, shall we be welcomed to the right hand of Jesus. Being on someone’s right is a place of honour.

This is God’s promise to us, this is our faith and hope that we are called to proclaim to the world.

The feast of the Ascension announces that Jesus will faithfully accompany us no matter how far we lose our way (paraphrased from a Reflection by Richard Leonard SJ)

Let us pray
God our Father,
Make us joyful in the ascension of your Son Jesus Christ.
May we follow him into the new creation, for his ascension is our glory and our hope.
We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Pentecost

This coming weekend we will celebrate the feast of Pentecost, the coming of the Holy Spirit on the apostles. It is the birthday of the Catholic Church.

Most of our year 6 and older students in our diocesan parishes have already witnessed the calling down of the Holy Spirit on them in the sacrament of Confirmation. Others will experience the sacrament sometime during the year. They are all invited to live out the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit by the fruits of LOVE, JOY, PEACE, PATIENCE, KINDNESS, GOODNESS, FAITHFULNESS and SELF CONTROL.

For the Spirit of Peace that calms our mind and stills our life;
We give you thanks.
For the Spirit of Love, that touches hearts and reaches out;
We give you thanks.
For the Spirit of Joy, that lifts our soul and gives us faith;
We give you thanks.
For the Spirit of Power, that gift of grace, for this your church;
We give you thanks.

 

I wish all of you a happy week and ask you in your charity to pray for all those families and friends, staff and students who are experiencing illness and sadness in their lives at present.

I pray that you and your families may know the love of our good and gracious God as you go through this week.

Blessings 

Colleen Easton, Principal

The following grades will attend the Parish Mass on Friday mornings at 9:30 am in Term 2:

• Friday 7 June 2019 - Week 6 - Year 5
• Friday 14 June 2019 - Week 7 - Year 4
• Friday 21 June 2019 - Week 8 - Year 2
• Friday 5 July 2019 - Week 10 - Year 6

These dates and classes are subject to change.

Principal's Awards

Congratulations to the following students who will receive a Principal’s Award at our next Assembly on Friday 7 June 2019:

Lachlan Whitfield, Austin Nixon, Aden Nixon, Kirsti Hobbin

Mary MacKillop Awards

Congratulations to Breanna Cresswell who received a Mary MacKillop Award at our last Assembly on 24 May 2019.

Congratulations to the following student who will receive a Mary MacKillop Award at our next Assembly on Friday 7 June 2019:

Kiara Shelton

Our next Assembly will be held this Friday 7 June 2019 commencing at 2:20 pm in the hall.  Year 1 students will be presenting this Assembly. Parents and Carers are asked to use the Parish side entrance to the hall.

Other Assembly Dates for the remainder of Term 2 are:

• Friday 21 June - Kindergarten

Please note that these dates and grades are subject to change.

Our Week 4, Term 2 Waste Free Warrior Winners are:

• Timothy Bloomfield - Year 5 Red
• Max Sutton - Year 6 Blue
• Matthew Parker - Year 3 Red
• Gabrielle O'Shea - Year 2 Red
• Ruby Whitehead - Year 2 Red

Our Week 5, Term 2 Waste Free Warrior Winners are:

• Connor Alaban - Year 2 Red
• Matthew Shepherd - Year 6 Red
• Shontel Ristevski - Kinder Red
• Matthew Parker - Year 3 Red
• Samuel Shepherd - Year 5 Blue

This year the first semester report for your child will be electronically provided using the Compass portal. You should receive this on Thursday 4 July 2019.

Please contact the office if you require your login details for the Parent Portal on Compass to be updated / verified - ie., reset your password.

All parents will have an opportunity to meet with their child’s teacher to discuss the report.

For our Year One parents, this will be the first time you will receive your child’s report using the graded scale and information about the report will be shared at your meeting today at 3:30 pm in the Year 1 Classroom.

Parents and carers are asked to make a suitable time to meet with your child’s teacher after receiving your child’s first semester report.

The meetings are scheduled for Weeks 1 and 2. More information about the times will be sent home later.

I wish to inform all parents and carers that I will be undergoing an appraisal at the end of the year. A panel from Catholic Education Office appraises every four years principals in our diocese. After the appraisal that is to be held in October, the panel makes a recommendation to the director of schools.

The purpose of the appraisal is to ascertain the principal’s leadership in the school.

Below is a letter from Carolyn Hadley, Head of Human Resources, Catholic Education Diocese of Wollongong, regarding the parent survey.  This letter contains a link to the online survey.

Unfortuantely hard copies of the survey are not available as the survey needs to be completed online. 

If you cannot access the survey at home, please come to the school office and the office staff will provide you with a device to complete this survey online.

Could I ask that all surveys be completed by the 28 June. Thank you.

Last Friday the students from St Paul’s joined with other primary schools in our diocese to have a day that focused on their knowledge and skills using Coding.

The following report is from Mr Edwards and Mrs Evans describing their day.

On Friday 31 May, 2019 Mr Ben Woods from the Catholic Education Office came to St Paul’s to host our very first Diocesan CEODoW VEX Robotics Scrimmage.

We had 8 of our students participate in the Robotics Meet as well as other Stage 3 students from St Therese, West Wollongong and St Paul’s, Moss Vale. The students were involved in many new learning opportunities as well as various challenges to test their programming and coding skills, engineering designs and team strategies. It was a day for the students to work collaboratively in teams and program VEX robots to solve problems with their peers. Well done to Ewan Hatfield, Jayden Holt, Riley Hayes, Matthew Shepherd, Janae Robertson, Sophie Parker, April Gray and Kalani Smith for representing St Paul’s in the VEX Scrimmage, as well as their ongoing commitment to lunch time robotics as well.

These students have given up many of their lunchtimes to build the robots, as well as collaborate and code to be ready for this Scrimmage. We are looking forward to participating at the next VEX Scrimmage later in the year!

Parents are invited to visit their child’s classroom on Wednesday 7 August 2019 from 2:30 pm to 4:30 pm in Week 3, Term 3.

Your child will take you on their learning journey. We ask all parents and carers to take this opportunity to sit with your child as they explain their learning. We will have feedback questionnaires for the students and parents after this celebration.

Seven of our Year 5 students elected to resit the NAPLAN Writing assessment due to technical issues that were experienced state-wide.

POSTPONED

Due to the forecasted inclement weather we will be postponing the Year 2 Excursion - A Guided Walk of the Albion Park township. 

This excursion was scheduled to be held tomorrow - Wednesday 5 June 2019.   

Parents and carers will be informed of the new date once it has been set.

Wendy Carter, Tracy Whalan and Janet McDonald-Cook, Year 2 Teachers

I sincerely thank all those parents who strictly monitor their child’s use of technology at home I ask all parents and carers to take more care and supervise their children while they are using their IT devices and the times that they on their devices. Students who bring their phones to school must hand these into the office at the start of the day and collect them in the afternoon.

Could I remind all students that if you need to contact your family, please come to the office and we will do this for you. No technology to be used to contact parents or friends with student ipads or phones during school hours.

I remind all students about the use of social media. Please be mindful of the sites you access and how you respond to others’ opinions and comments.

Parents are asked to supervise these, as we would not want to encourage disrespect for others and uphold the school’s expectations of being safe, responsible and respectful.

We will celebrate Grandparent’s Day in Week 1 of Term 3 on Friday 26 July 2019.

I invite all our grandparents and family members to our special celebration commencing with a liturgy in the church, a picnic lunch and then the Dance Spectacular in the front playground. I ask all students to extend this invitation to their grandparents to join us on Friday 26 July 2019.

More information about this day will be advertised in my next Newsletter.

On Monday 27 May 2019, several students accompanied by Miss Potts, represented St Paul’s at the Shellharbour City Council's Reconciliation School Flag Walk at Harrison Park Shellharbour.

Many local schools and community members proudly walked in unity as part of National Reconciliation Week celebrations. The students participated in a fun filled day of cultural ceremonies and activities such as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander story telling, art and language.

Book Club Orders are due by Monday 17 June 2019 - please note that all orders are done online and no late orders can be processed.

We will be distributing Book Club Orders in a reusable bag.  We ask that once your child receive's their order that the bag is returned to the Library so that it can be reused for the next order.  We would like to create a boomerang bag process within the school community, as we try to minimise our wastage and therefore in a small way help sustain our environment.

Robyn Warton and Louise Frendo, School Support Officers, Library

Please keep sending in your stickers for the Woolworths Earn and Learn campaign.  The last day for collection is Tuesday 25 June 2019.

To date we have collected 320 sheets of stickers (19,200 individual stickers) - thank you!!!

Robyn Warton and Louise Frendo, School Support Officers, Library

Diocese of Wollongong & MacKillop Representatives

Good luck to Declan McCann, Janae Robertson and Zane Stroemer who will  travel to Eastern Creek on Friday 14 June 2019 to compete in the MacKillop Cross Country Championships, as part of the Diocese of Wollongong team.

We look forward to hearing how Angus & Sean Bancroft, Samuel Shepherd and Holly Czornobej fared at the Touch Football trials held last Friday 31 May 2019.

NSWPSSA Athletics Selection Trials

A further reminder that in 2019, the School Sport Australia Track and Field Championships will be held in the Northern Territory. Due to the extreme heat conditions in Darwin during November/December (when the event is traditionally held), it has been moved forward to mid-September. Therefore, in order to select a NSW representative track & field team for this event, the NSWPSSA will be holding a special selection trial in early August.

Participation at these trials will be via a formal application to NSWPSSA. If you believe your child is a talented athlete, capable of competing at this high level, please contact the school ASAP to discuss the selection criteria and application process with Mr Dutaillis or Mr McCann.

Applications close: 5pm Wednesday 26 June, 2019.

Calendar Dates:

• Monday 25 June (Week 9) South Coast Netball Gala Day
• Friday 28 June (Week 9) ST PAUL’S ATHLETICS CARNIVAL
• Friday 2 August (Term 3, Week 2) South Coast Soccer Gala Day
• Saturday 26 & Sunday 27 October (Term 4) NSW CPS Basketball Challenge

Brian McCann & Shaun Dutaillis, Sports Coordinators

Some Dates for your diary:

Term 2

Monday 10 June: Long Weekend NO SCHOOL

Friday 14 June: Parish Mass Year 4

Wednesday 19 June: School Photos

Friday 21 June: Parish Mass Year 2

Tuesday 25 June: Netball gala Day

Friday 28 June: All Principal’s Appraisal survey due

                                Athletics Carnival at Croome Road

Friday 5 July: NAIDOC Week Assembly – Year 6

Term 3

Monday 22 July: Staff Development Day on Sustainability – NO SCHOOL FOR STUDENTS

Friday 26 July: Grandparents Day and Dance Spectacular

Monday 29 July: Parents and Friends Meeting – Guest Speaker from the Catholic Education Office presents the new Social Media Policy

As part of the P & F Committee’s ongoing efforts to raise money for the children at St Paul’s, we will be holding a Cadbury Fundraiser. 

On Friday 7 June 2019 boxes of Cadbury Chocolates will be distributed to each family within the School, with individual Chocolates priced at $1.00 each.  When you have sold the chocolates, please return the correct money in the provided envelope to the School Office.  A full box totals $60.00

If you have sold all chocolates in your initial box and would like to buy (or sell) more, please see the Office staff and they will allocate you another box.  As a bonus the family that sells the most boxes this year will win a $50 Myer voucher. There are limited extra boxes and once they are gone they are gone!

Please note that Due Date to return ALL monies is Friday 26 July 2019.

If you do not wish to participate, please return your sealed box, complete with all chocolates, to the School Office ASAP and a staff member will mark off your child’s name.

If you would only like to purchase some of the chocolates in your allocated box, please ensure that the money returned matches the chocolates sold / chocolates returned.  Any chocolates unaccounted for will be charged to the allocated family of that box, and the outstanding money will have to be paid.

Cadbury will supply us with a free giant box of Favourites with our chocolate order.  Every family will receive a raffle ticket for returning their money, and 2 bonus tickets for returning their money in the first 2 weeks.  At the end of the fundraiser we will draw out 1 winner for the giant box of Favourites.

We thank you in advance for your support of this delicious fundraiser!                                                           Kellie Mundt, Cadbury Chocolates Drive Coordinator