Dear Parents,

Today we celebrated our first whole school mass for 2021. With us being in the Church season of Lent, the theme for our mass today was ‘Prayer’. Prayer is a way to communicate and talk with God. Below is a list of the basic forms of prayer with a brief description of each.

 The mass was a beautiful celebration and I know Father Antony was excited to have us back in the Church. Thank you to the parents that attended the mass, I know that your children greatly appreciate you being there. I look forward to seeing more of you at our fortnightly masses throughout the year.

Tutor Learning Program

As mentioned in the newsletter last week, the Victorian Government has provided funding for schools to implement a Tutor Learning Program. The Tutor Learning Program seeks to support those students whose learning was impacted throughout the periods of remote learning last year. St Mary’s currently has Sue Benc who provides Literacy support to students across the school and I am pleased to announce that Hope Haughie has been employed to provide this extra support through the Tutor Learning Program. Hope will work with a select group of students each Friday, throughout Terms 2, 3 and 4, to provide targeted teaching to meet their individual needs. Having Hope in this role will have a significant impact on the learning of these students. 

School Advisory Committee Annual General Meeting

The St Mary’s School Advisory Committee Annual General Meeting will be held next Tuesday, 16^th March at 5:15pm. At this meeting, a new committee will be elected. If you are interested in being a part of the School Advisory Committee and have not nominated yourself, I encourage you to do so. It would be great to have some new parents involved in the committee to provide a different perspective to the group.

 Clean Up Australia Day

The St Mary’s Clean Up Australia Day is tomorrow, Friday, 12^th March between 11:30am and 1:00pm. All students will help tidy up our school grounds, to make it a safe and enjoyable place to play. All students are required to wear gardening clothes (old clothes) on this day. On this day we will have a BBQ, where students can have a sausage or two in bread for a gold coin donation. The money raised will be donated to CARITAS Australia, who support vulnerable communities, globally. I encourage all parents that are available on this day to come in and be a part of the day.

Kind regards,

Joel