St Francis Catholic School - Hughenden eNewsletter

From the Principal

Dear Parents, Carers and Community Members,

I hope the week has treated you all well as we come to the end of Week 3. This week, we have had a busy week here at St Francis with School Leadership Programs, Visitors from Head Office and more.

I must apologise for not being as available as I normally am on a morning these past few days. I have been engaging in ZOOM meetings with other Principals and Leaders from around Townsville, regarding upcoming events such as NAPLAN and working on projects. I am trying to Opt for as many ZOOM meetings as I can possibly get as this means that I am at school and present, and if it is an urgent matter please feel free to reach out and I will do my best to meet you.

This week, I have enjoyed ducking into the classrooms. They have been a break from working in front of the computer and I have enjoyed seeing the kids all learning and engaging with the material. This year, we have become a part of a program called “The Writing Project”, which is a Townsville Catholic Education program that we are embedding into our learning. As a school, our results for writing are good, but we want to make sure they continue to excel. This is a two year commitment that Mrs Sharn Greenaway has set up for our school over the next coming years, we look forward to working with the team in Townsville and other schools over the coming two years.

Last Week, we also had a productive F.A.C.E. meeting with the community. As a reminder, we will be meeting every month, with the next meeting being on Tuesday, 28th February 2023 at 5:15pm. All are welcome to attend, and it was great to hear and see that we had a number of new members come and join us. F.A.C.E. stands for Family and Community Engagement, so by that definition, all are invited to attend and we hope to see more of you there next time.

At the meeting, we spoke about a number of events that are coming up throughout the year. Coming up soon though we have events that will require assistance and support, such as Canteen Help for upcoming Rugby League trials, Disco’s and more. As our next FACE meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, 28th February 2023, we may need to look at having a meeting one afternoon or at some stage to discuss these events that are either before or just after our next FACE meeting. More information regarding this will come out shortly.

In the Newsletter last week, I mentioned our Yellow Team from Head Office visiting us on Wednesday, 1st February 2023. From this, we worked on our Annual School Improvement Plan, data collected from last year indicated an area to work on is our Catholic Identity as a School. Therefore, we will be looking to construct and form a Catholic Identity Committee. This committee will look at ways in which we can improve our Catholic Identity within the School, and Community. Therefore, we are seeking expressions of interest for people to join the committee. We are looking for Parents and Community members to join this team, you don’t need to be a religious person to join this committee, we are looking for a diverse collection of members for the committee to join us. You may have seen the flyer already being advertised regarding this, however, if you have not and would be interested in joining our committee, please email your interest to me at smurray9@sfsh.catholic.edu.au

This year, we will be going through Verification which leads us into Validation next year. This process happens every five (5) years, and this year, 2023, is preparing us for the Validation process next year. A part of this process is a survey that is sent out to the Hughenden Community as a whole to staff, parents, carers, members of the community and more. This information helps to plan and prepare the school for the years to come, so it is vital we get as many responses as possible from the community, to best shape our school for the future. More information in the coming days will be released about this.

Next Week, I will also be away in Townsville for Professional Development that cannot be done via Zoom. Please note, that I will have my emails to correspond, however, in the event that is urgent please contact the school office on 07 4741 1382.

All the best and God Bless,

Scott Murray,

A/Principal

https://www.sfsh.catholic.edu.au/enrolments/enrolment-enquiries/

Assembly

Friday 8:30 AM - All are welcome!

Year 2/3/4 will be on Spotlight this week. Please come along and see what the children have been up to.

Happy Birthday

12/02 - Chance Tones

13/02 - Sophie McNamara

15/02 - Cora-May Wilson

Student Of The Week

P/1/2 - Lolly Wilson

3/4 - Hayley McClymont

5/6 - Hayley Reddie

Prep/1 Happenings

We have been hitting our numbers hard this week with so many opportunities for hands-on learning. Year 1 students have been delving into place value and played a game of number Ispy. The Prep students have been learning their numbers up to 10 and have been using counters and our koala frames to guide them.

Miss Brown,

ebrown17@sfsh.catholic.edu.au

In Religion, we have had some great discussions about things we are grateful for. We looked at videos of amazing natural wonders of the world, such as the Northern Lights, sunsets and the Great Barrier Reef. We have also started writing prayers for the new Special Intentions jar to be read at this week’s liturgy.

Miss Allison,

sallison1@sfsh.catholic.edu.au

We love our specialist lessons in ⅚ where we get to participate in visual arts, drama, technologies and P.E. In visual arts we have been exploring the elements of art. This week we looked at shapes and forms, using these elements to create artwork pieces with our names.

Miss Eriksen,

leriksen5@sfsh.catholic.edu.au