Dear St Monica's families and friends,

It is my absolute pleasure and privilege to welcome every single student, mum, dad, grandparent, parishoner and staff member to the St Monica's community for the 2022 school year. Whether you are beginning or continuing your journey at St Monica's, I join you in great excitement as I begin my first year as your Principal. I look forward to finding creative ways to meet as many of you as possible, to listen to your stories and to learn more about you and your families.

I sincerely hope, you had an enjoyable summer break and that it included the perfect balance of rest, relaxation and family time. The highlights of my week was watching the smiles and laughter on the faces of the students as they reconnected with their friends on the first day back and the conversations between parents over a cuppa at the coffee van! 

In 2022 we welcome to St Monica's:   

• a total of 377 students
• 170 families
• 57 Kindergarten children
• 41 staff members 

I have been around to every single classroom and I am in awe of how beautiful the classrooms look (thank you teachers!) and how settled the students are. On my visit this week, I shared some important messages to all students...

• All we ask, is that you try your best
• That is is okay to make mistakes and that we learn from these
• To look after their teachers, their classmates and themselves.

Your child/ren may have also told you the following news and I would like to confirm:

Students are able to wear plain clothes on their birthday!!!

If you child celebrated their birthday in January they are welcome to wear plain clothes any day this week. If you child's birthday falls on a weekend, they may choose to wear plain clothes on the Friday or the Monday. If you child's birthday falls in the school holidays, they may wear plain clothes in either Week 10 of the preceding term or Week 1 of the next term

I want to take this opportunity to publicly thank the St Monica's staff; teaching, support, admin and grounds for their dedication and preparation for a start to the school year like no other. Rest assured the staff are deeply invested in the teaching, learning and nurturing of your children.

Thank you everyone, for your warm welcome of me and for taking the time to reach out and say hello. I can't wait to navigate 2022 and beyond with you all.

Warm wishes,

Lisa 

A few photos of Day 1...

Please keep the Beaven family (Nicola - 5FM) in your prayers as her grandmother recently passed away.

Happy Birthday to the following students  celebrating a Birthday this week 

Ava C, Isabella H, Alaina S, Jett S, Sophia R, Luca C

On Monday, the whole school joined together, via MS Teams, for a special assembly with Mrs Harris! The students reflected on our motto 'Respect' and what that means for themselves, others, the school & the environment. We also talked about how we walk in the footsteps of St Monica.

Mrs Harris presented the students with the following statements and asked each class to post their answers in the Teams chat, these were their answers:

Sacramental Program 2022

If you have a child in Years  3, 4, or 6 in 2022 this will be a Sacramental year.

This also applies if your child is in Year 5 and he/she has previously missed the Sacraments of Reconciliation and/or First Eucharist.

A Parish Sacramental Program Information Evening will be held on Thursday 17 February 2022 at 6pm in St Monica’s Church for the families of students in Years 3-6 in 2022. You are very welcome to attend the information evening where all the relevant information will be available.

First Eucharist will be celebrated in Term 2, 2022.

Confirmation will be celebrated in Term 3, 2022.

Reconciliation will be celebrated in Term 4, 2022.

For further Information – please contact the Sacramental Program Coordinator at sc.belconnennorth@cg.org.au or check the parish website for updates at www.cg.org.au/belconnennorth

COVID Safe measures

You can access a copy of the Back to School plan developed by the ACT Government here. Many of the measures in these Term 1 arrangements are very similar to the measures that were in operation in our school during Term 4 of last year.

Measures include:

• provision of rapid antigen tests
  • two per week for all St Monica's staff and students for the first four weeks of term
• compulsory use of masks indoors for all adults in schools and students in Years 7-12
• masks for Years 3-6 encouraged
• cohorting of children and staff
• maximising outdoor learning and ventilation in classrooms to ensure good circulation of fresh air
• increased cleaning across the school, including high touch surfaces
• restrictions to visitors on site during school hours; parents and carers will only be allowed on school grounds for scheduled essential appointments
• restrictions on school events – events that bring cohorts of students together will not go ahead eg whole school Masses and assemblies
• restrictions on excursions 

Unwell at school

Any student or staff member who is unwell and/or displays symptoms of COVID-19 will be asked to go home and isolate until they can complete a RAT or PCR test.

• If a student or staff member displays even mild COVID-19 symptoms, they must take a RAT or get a PCR test and isolate until they receive a negative test result.
• Students must not come to school until they are symptom free, even if they get a negative RAT result.

Reporting a postive case.

Through the Compass Portal, the school will advise you daily when members of our school community test positive to COVID-19. This report will be attached as a table, to the daily COVID notification, and it will be pushed out by 7am each morning.
In the event your child tests positive, parents are required to notify ACT Health and the school. At all times, positive notifications to the school will be kept private and confidential and names will not be shared. Negative tests do not need to be reported.

RAT kit collection for weeks 3 & 4

The next lot of RAT kits will be delivered to the school next week. This time we will be sending the kits home to families via the eldest child. If you would prefer to collect your kit, please contact the school.

Thanks for your understanding and patience at drop-off and pick up times.

Drop off

Students may be dropped at school no earlier than 8.25am, when a supervising teacher will be out on duty. To minimise cross-cohorting, students are to proceed to their line up areas and will sit down until 8.55am when the bell rings to begin the school day.

Pick-up

In week 1 only: 

• 2.50pm: Kindergarten students and their siblings
• 3.10pm: Years 1 - 6: at 

If your child is not sure of their pickup arrangements, please contact the school and we can help your child.

Please be advised there was some incorrect calculations in the Fee Schedule sent out at the end of last year. It will only affect families with students at a Systemic School. Apologies for this, please find the updated Fee Schedule attached.

School Fees for Term 1 will be sent out at the beginning of Week 3. If you aren’t on a Direct Debit, fees are due by Friday 4 March 2022 (Week 5).

If you would like to set up a Direct Debit please complete the attached form.

Families with children in a Systemic High School who didn’t complete the Systemic form at the end of last year please complete the attached form.

Please return forms by Friday 4 February 2022 to kirralea.thompson@cg.catholic.edu.au

Have a great week!

Sport Days for Term 4 are as follows:

Sport Leaders

This year we welcome 16 new sport leaders who will represent our four houses. If you have any initiatives or ideas for the sport leaders to consider please email me. 

Sporting Achievements

Over the course of the year please feel free to email me about any sporting or extracurricular achievements that your child participates in and I will share them with the community in the newsletter. 

Swimming and Cross Country

In line with current Health directives from the ACT government there will be no Sport Carnivals taking place this term at the very least. This means that our school swimming carnival is cancelled for 2022 and cross country carnival will be postponed until Term 2. In reagrds to swimming we will be asking for student times that they have swam out of school to be considered for the regional carnival. As further information and updates are provided to me I will share them with our community.

As we begin a new school year teachers have been working extremely hard to develop programs to enrich your child's learning in mathematics. As the Mathematics Coordinator, I am here to support all families and children in Maths. Please contact me through email (ryan.matchett@cg.catholic.edu.au or through the front office) if there is anything I can do to assist you or your children.

Please see the document attached with advice for parents on how to support student learning in Maths.