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Dear St. Clare’s Community,
Thank you all for such a great start to 2024! The weeks seem to be going by so very quickly, and everyone has hit the ground running. As always there is so much to squeeze into a term. Mrs Chappel organised a beautiful celebration for our opening Mass, with a lot more in store with Shrove Tuesday, Ash Wednesday and St. Patrick’s Day on the horizon. We have sports galore on offer, with Rugby & Netball coaching sessions, not to mention all the Peninsula tryouts and our Cross Country Carnival on Tuesday 19th March. Mrs Vipiana and a group of volunteers have made sure that Friday Tuckshop is great as always. Mrs Irvine has been busy getting into classrooms and introducing students to our new Lego Robotics Kits. On top of all of this we even managed to engage in our learning, thanks to our amazing teachers and school officers that put so much work into planning, preparing and delivering engaging lessons to our students.
School Annual Improvement Plan (SAIP)
Each year we have key focus areas of improvement and the following are our SMART goals for 2024:
- By the end of 2024, we will have evidence of increased student engagement and achievement, by delivering a contemporary and relevant Religious Education curriculum that includes informed theological understandings of Scripture presented to students, dialogical pedagogies and opportunities for personal encounter through a variety of personal and communal prayer experiences.
- By the end of 2024, 100% of students will have demonstrated growth in the end of year PAT Testing in Reading, Vocabulary, Spelling and SWST (Spelling) for P-2.
Student Absences
We will be working on improving our attendance rates as one of our school wide goals this year. Our attendance goal is to have zero unexplained absences. If your student is away for any reason, please contact the office. If you do forget to let us know, you will receive a SMS notification that your child is absent. Please contact the school upon receiving these messages, as it lets us know your child is indeed safe at home and you are aware of their absence. Cairns Catholic Education has a system wide goal that 90% of our students attend school 90% of the time. Over the last few years this has been quite a difficult goal with the interruptions and restrictions we have been impacted by. Our attendance rate to date for 2024 is 82.5% have attended 90% (or more) of the time.
Prep Enrolments for 2025
It seems early to be discussing enrolments for 2025 BUT if you have a child born between 1/7/2019 and 30/6/2020, your child is eligible to start Prep in 2025. Please go to our website to complete an online enrolment - https://www.stclares.qld.edu.au/enrolling/enrolment-application/. We already have a very high number of enrolment applications for 2025. It is extremely important to us that our existing families do not miss out. If you have a child ready for Prep 2025, please complete an online enrolment application ASAP, if you have not already done so.
Volunteer Training
Have you completed volunteer training? All parents assisting with sport training, tuckshop, sport days, transport, excursions, classroom assistance etc need to complete the training found on the Catholic Education website. Go to: https://www.cns.catholic.edu.au/our-school-communities/parent-engagement/volunteer-training/
Important Safety Reminders
Children must not walk through the car park area unless accompanied by an adult. Parents must meet children at the ramp to walk them to the car. Do not call your children to your car or into the carpark as this is unsafe. Please also note that children need to be accompanied by an adult when crossing Mars Street. Staff will not let children cross Mars St to a parked car on the opposite side of the school.
Parents using the pick-up zone on Mars St. are asked not to leave their cars to assist children. If your child requires assistance to get in the car, please park elsewhere and walk over to collect our child.
The street in front of the two schools in Mars Street has signs that indicate u-turns are prohibited. Please adhere to this as it is for the safety of everyone.
Sent to the Principal's Office
Over the past two weeks I have had a number of visitors to my 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. The students pictured below all blew me away with their work over the past two weeks! Keep an eye out for a ‘Sent to the Principal’s office’ card to see if your child paid me a visit.
I will be taking some Long Service Leave from Thursday 22nd February - Wednesday 28th February. If anything urgent arises during this time that you need to contact me for, please direct your questions to Sharon Chappel (APRE).
Blessings for the weeks ahead,
Karran Burzacott
Principal
Faith Knowledge Community Respect
This week marks the beginning of Lent, the 6 week journey that leads to Easter. This is one of the most important times of the year for Christians where we remember the events leading up to and including the death of Jesus. This morning we marked Shrove Tuesday with a pancake breakfast. Thank you to those who supported this event. This was also our first fundraiser for Project Compassion which will run over Lent. Tomorrow morning we will gather as a parish community to celebrate Ash Wednesday. As always, our families are welcome to join us. After mass, students will be receiving a Project compassion money box to take home this week. This is an opportunity to pop any spare change into and bring back into school each week and add to the class money box.
The Sacramental Program will be held again this year and is generally aimed at students who are in Year 4 or above, have been baptised and are willing to continue their faith journey through Reconciliation, Eucharist (Communion) and Confirmation. The program will be held in Term 2. Information was sent home with eligible students yesterday and there are extra copies available from the office. If you wish for your child to participate in this year’s program, please contact me at schappel@cns.catholic.edu.au to register their name.
The Parish Council is currently seeking new members to join them. There will be a meeting at the Presbytery this Thursday (February 15) at 4pm. All are welcome to attend.
With blessings,
Sharon Chappel
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Week 4 |
Year 6 |
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Week 5 |
Year 2 |
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Week 6 |
Year 1 |
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Week 7 |
Year 3 |
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Week 8 |
Year 4 |
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Week 9 |
Year 5 |
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Week 10 |
Public Holiday Good Friday |
Dear Parents/Guardians/Carers,
Resilience and wellbeing are key factors to ensure a happy and fulfilling future for our young people. This year we have chosen to partner with Resilient Youth Australia who have surveyed more than 350,000 Australian school students aged 8-18 over recent years.
We will administer the 2024 Survey this year. Students typically take 20-25 minutes to complete the survey. The data from the survey will be reported in aggregate descriptive form only, by year level and gender, and no individual student responses can be identified.
The 2024 Survey is completely voluntary and anonymous. The survey collects the self-reported resilience and wellbeing of students and will provide valuable information to assist us create and maintain the best culture of wellbeing and resilience that we can. If you have any questions or concerns regarding your child’s participation in this survey project, please contact Sharon Chappel.
We thank you for your support.
Back Row: Rohan, Rhys, Jaxon, Saxon, Eva, Logan, Billy
Front Row: Isabel, Ashlyn, Suzanna, Christian, Kinsley, Elin, Ella
Friday 9/2/2024
Coordinator: M Vipiana Helpers: R Lizzio N Lizzio
Bakers: G Parsons S Noonan (Cupcakes)
Friday 16/2/2024
Coordinator: M Vipiana Helpers: C Viero C Bowden
Bakers: R Jones T Farrell (Cupcakes)
A reminder that house shirts are due in by Tuesday February 27. We are still needing volunteers to assist with screen printing on Wednesday February 28 at 9am.
Please contact Tracey on 0407 223 358 if you are able to help.
2024 Term 1 fees will be sent out this week
Invoices will be sent by email to all parents this week.
Due date for fees to be paid is Tuesday, 27th February.
Please contact the school office if you do not receive the invoice so we can check your email address, or if you require a hardcopy of fees to make payment.
Please check your junk or spam mail.
Families have the option of paying weekly or fortnightly. Internet banking, or direct debit can be arranged with your bank.
Please note:-
There is NO EFTPOS available at the school office.
- Preferrably no cash but if paying in cash, we appreciate that correct money be given as we do not carry any change in the school office.
- If paying by Bpay or EFT direct debit or internet banking, please use the school bank account details shown on the term one statement.
- IMPORTANT: Please use your Ref: 966000….....(under Biller Code). This number is to be used when paying by Bpay, or EFT -direct debit, internet banking.
- Remittance slip at the bottom of the school account to be returned to the school office with ALL payments. (cash, cheque, direct debit or internet banking).
Thank you.
