Dear St Anne's Community,

Spring is here!

The Hope of Spring

God, thank you for Spring and the hope of warmer, longer, brighter days.
Thank you for the coming of growth and life and birth.
Thank you that things are coming awake in the world.
This is what our calendar says, and we do see some signs that it is real.
But we also still struggle with the residual layover of winter.
Now we ask that you bring into reality all that belongs in this season.Your word says that we will have provision, and hope, and joy, and health and loving relationships here and now in this life.
We ask that what belongs in this season would become actual in our practical lives.
We hope in you and in your promises. We hope in your gift of Spring.

- Author Unknown

I hope that you are all well and looking forward to what Spring has in store for us. 

Uniform

We have made the difficult decision to move our entire uniform range to be exclusively with Lowes, effective 2023. Millers are currently having a sale on our uniform and I thank them for their many years of support. Lowes have offered us a package that was hard to turn down. How will this look? The uniform is not changing (except maybe the sports tracksuit pants), only the way in which you order and purchase your child's uniform. Lowes will provide us with a complete try on range here at school. Once you are happy with the size, you hop online and order the products through their online store and they are delivered to your door. We are exploring the new uniform for Years 11 and 12 and will have more detailed information for you in the coming months.

Furniture

The Community Council have generously supported us in the purchase of some new tables and chairs for the secondary classrooms. They contributed $10,000, which is greatly appreciated. The majority will go in the Year 10 room and the new room that we have renovated towards the art room. 

Years 11 and 12

Progress continues in our Year 11, 2023 space. Subject selections are being finalised, which will inform staffing for 2023.  We have advertised some teaching positions for 2023 across Secondary classes, as we build our teaching and support team for next year. Our Secondary staff have been visiting Hennessy Catholic College in Young, to shadow their Stage 6 teachers and then return to school and plan for next year. We thank Kathy Holding and the Hennessy staff for their amazing support. Mrs Breust has also been training in the Virtual teacher space in preperation for Advanced English next year. These days have meant that teachers have been away from their normal classes; however, the normal teaching and learning program continues back at school in their absence. 

Year 10 families received a letter recently. We are hoping to negotiate substantial discounts and subsidies on fees, VET courses, laptops and uniforms to add to the attraction of remaining at St Anne's for Senior Schooling. This will immediately provide an attractive option compared to Boarding School Fees, travel and on-costs.  Again please don’t hesitate to contact me if you have questions or suggestions.

Staffing

Mr Christopher Wendt recently announced his resignation and he will finish up with us at the end of Week 7 next term. In the short time that Mr Wendt has been here, he has made some amazing changes to the Wood/Metal workshop space in Secondary and the teaching and learning. We will be able to appropriately farewell Mr Wendt next term. 

I am pleased to announce that Mr Simon Gaynor will be joining us at St Anne's in 2023. Mr Gaynor will replace Mr Wendt in the TAS area. Mr Gaynor brings with him a wealth of experience and knowledge. I look forward to welcoming him at the start of the 2023 school year. 

Attendance

We are experiencing higher than normal absence rates. Understandably, there is still a lot of sickness going around and COVID is still presenting itself at times. However, we encourage maximum student attandence where possible. The following rates of attendance have been extracted from the Catholic Education Attendance Policy. If you are unsure on your child's attendance rate, please log into Compass App and follow this path. More - Open in Browser - Profile - Attendance. This will give you your child's attendance percentage. 

Excellent Attendance- 95% and above (e.g. 2.5 days absence or less in a term or 10 absences over a year)

Regular Attendance- 90%-94.9% (e.g. 2.6 to 5 days absence in a term or 10.1-20 absences in a year)

Emerging Absenteeism- 80%-89.9% (e.g. 5.1 to 10 days absence in a term or 20.1 - 40 absences in a year)

Chronic Absenteeism- Less than 80% (e.g. more than 10 days absence in a term or 40 absences in a year)

NAPLAN

Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 parents should have received their child's NAPLAN results in a white envelope on Tuesday afternoon. There was a delay in the results being published on our portal and therefore, we look forward to analysing these results and the results of other standardised testing in the near future. In the meantime, if you have any questions about the results, please do not hesitate to make contact with your child's classroom teacher. 

Sporting Success

Congratulations to all the students and teams that have recently represented our school. This year has seen many successes in the sporting arena.

Pupil Free Day

We have one more Pupil Free Day this term and that is on Friday 23 September. The last day of Term 3 for students will be Thursday 22 September. The SRC are preparing a Footy Colours Day for that Thursday. Staff and I, greatly appreciate your support with these days and they prove very valuable for planning.

Take care,

Grant Haigh

Principal