Dear St. Clare’s Community,

Welcome to Term 2!

I hope all families were able to refresh over the break ready for another wonderful term at school. This term promises to be very busy. Year 5 will be on Camp in Week 2 and both Year 5 & 6 will travel to Cairns next week to enjoy ‘Charlie & the Chocolate Factory’ at CPAC. We will participate in the ANZAC march on Thursday 25th April. I hope to see as many of us there as possible to acknowledge this very special day. We have the Tully 100 celebrations happening with the street parade on June 8th and Read to Me Day on June 11th. This term also has many sporting events, in particular the Athletics Carnival in Week 9. This year the Carnival days will be Monday 10th June and Thursday 13th June. Good luck to all students going to Cassowary Coast or Peninsula trials for different sporting events this term.

School Photo Day is Tuesday 7th May.
We need all students to come to school in their full Academic Uniforms please, this includes white ankle socks and black shoes. We will send out reminders between now and photo day as this is usually a Sports Uniform Day.

Unwell Students

While we want to see all students attend school everyday there are times when students are too unwell to do so. If your child is unwell or has flu-like or gastrointestinal symptoms, they must not come to school. Students staying home when sick are likely to have a positive impact on attendance levels, as a reduced incidence of an illness in the school translates into a reduced likelihood of other students and staff being away sick. Please help us to keep the spread of coughs, colds, viruses & flu to minimum and keep students at home when needed.

Eating Time

We have had some parents ask why students are sitting in the Montefalco to eat lunch. This is something we have been doing for a while now after trialling it last year.

We found last year that sitting under the school was causing many issues for a high number of our students. We have grown bigger over the last few years, and it was already a tight fit at the tables. We utilised some picnic tables to create some additional seating, however, we found it was still very crammed. This made it really difficult for students to get in and out of seating and not make contact with the person sitting next to them while eating. In short, there is just not enough room at the tables to seat our whole school.

The other issue is the noise level when we are under the school. We do not expect students to remain silent during eating time, this is their time to socialise and catch up with their friends. Chatting and eating together is something that we value. The problem is that the roof above is very low, and while the students are not being overly loud, the noise has nowhere to go and it becomes very loud, very quickly. The noise is such that we have a large number of students that this impacts on - to the point that these students become very upset, agitated and are unable to eat.

We decided to try using the Montefalco as it is a much bigger space. This larger area is one benefit, as the noise is dispersed and it is a much calmer environment, with plenty of room. The other bonus we have found is that students are able to make some choices about where they sit, rather than sitting in class groups. We see students sitting with siblings, cousins, mixed aged groups or friends in other classes. There is great value to be gained from our students interacting across age groups, so it is something we would like to see continue in our community.

There are a number of tables and a lot of seating in the Montefalco. Students are free to choose where they want to sit. We have found that, with the exception of Tuckshop Friday, that most students will choose not to sit at the tables, and they are often empty.

I hope that this explains the reasons and benefits of the change, if you do have any further questions please do not hesitate to come and see me.

Sent to the Principal's Office

This year I am lucky enough to have students sent to my office to show me some of their outstanding efforts and achievements. It is such a delight for me to share in the success of our students and see some of the wonderful things that our teachers do each and every day.

Blessings for the weeks ahead

Karran Burzacott
Principal