Dear Parents,

A very exciting welcome to our 2020 school year. It was wonderful to see 79 smiling faces return to school last Wednesday and all enjoying a lovely settled start to the school year.

 A special welcome to our new students, Corby and Essie in Year 2, Tahlira in Year 4 and Nicholas in Year 5. We also welcomed 7 beautiful little Kindergarten students, Zoe Morgan, Zoe Paton, Maeve Ryan, Leila Gaskin, Mackenzie Little, Lane Johnson and Lele Rui. Welcome also to our new families, the Little, Rose and Rui families. We are very excited to welcome you as part of our St Patrick’s school community.

A busy start to this week with our St Patrick’s School swimming carnival this Thursday followed by our Opening School Mass on Friday at 12pm. On Friday evening the Community Council are holding a welcome gathering at Lott’s Family Hotel to welcome our new families and to welcome back all our other families. Please come along at 6pm to enjoy each others company. Children are welcome.

We have all been touched or impacted by the devastating bushfires that tore through our local and surrounding communities over the school holidays. Our Tumblong and Snowy Valley’s Mountain Highway families were evacuated during that time as well. Many family members have been involved in the emergency response services such as RFS, SES etc. Thank you to all those who have fought so hard to keep our communities safe. We are extremely grateful for the hard work of all involved.

A very grateful thank you to Sue Holstein and her team of volunteers who set up the donation centre at St Patrick’s Hall and worked continuously to provide food, water and other items to emergency personal as well as families that were evacuated in the local regions. A huge thank you to the very generous donations from all our local shops and individuals as well. As one of the evacuees, I can tell you first-hand how much everyone’s generosity meant to our families and communities.

Catholic Education have also responded very generously to the effected communities by offering extra support services including counselling services for our students. Our school counsellor Mel, will be at school for 5 visits during Term 1 to help provide additional support for any students effected by the events of January. We will offer some whole class visits from Mel as well as parents being able to ask for individual sessions if required. Please contact our front office if you wish to access this support.

We look forward to a wonderful term of teaching and learning and inspiring the minds of the young people in our care.

Enjoy your week

Regards

Christine Baron

Principal