Newsletter - 2024 Term 4 Week 2

Calendar

From the Leaders

In Mark’s Gospel this Sunday, he reminds us of the story of the blind man.

This blind man gives us the perfect example of what we should do. When we feel oppressed, discouraged, frustrated or misunderstood, we need to use this as an opportunity to turn to Jesus with even greater passion and courage calling upon His mercy.

Difficulties in life can have one of two effects on us. Either they beat us down or they make us stronger. The way they encourage us to have an even greater trust in and dependence upon God.

Today, let us think about things that make us feel discouraged or situations we find difficult to deal with and ask for God’s help.

Class Representatives 

Congratulations to the Class Representatives voted in by their peers for Term Four. Badges were awarded to these students at Wednesday’s Morning Prayer hosted by Year Three. 

These are our Class representatives for Term Four, 2024.

Welcome New Students

We are always excited to welcome new students to St Agnes’. This week we would like to introduce and welcome:  Miguel, Antonio and Diya

Police safety Competition

Next Wednesday will be the last day to receive entries for the Police Safety Competition advertised for Years 4, 5 and 6 last term. Senior Constable Steve Jefferey will judge them and allocate prizes next week.

YMO's visit

This week we are so grateful to Zac, from the Parish, along with Jaz and Jacob (YMO’s in the parish) who joined Year Six to demonstrate what faith and Religious Education activities will look like next year in high school. Students were engaged in new games and activities that allowed them to promote their faith. Year Six students are invited to join other parish youth for similar experiences.

Our parish community is so wonderfully diverse, with many of us gathering together across schools, chapels, and aged care centres throughout the year. Outside of our regular local gatherings, we sometimes hear about the wider community, but rarely get the chance to come together as One Body. 

On 24 November we will be combining all Sunday Masses so we can celebrate the Solemnity of Christ the King as One Body in a tangible way, with Mass at St Joseph’s Regional College at 10:00am Mass and festivities to follow. After Mass you can enjoy:

• Food
• Music
• Dancing
• Kids’ activities

We encourage everyone to consider registering to attend, getting an act together to perform, or join in by serving on the day. 

Just follow the link below to RSVP or express interest in performing/serving. 

• RSVP: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdVHLs6l4maH1SLraeGfWRLxZfm9XPh-hF8-aJoyE8GFgQ7dQ/viewform?usp=sf_link
• Performances:  https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfLHwDM74MlbsNzsM6lzE8eE-vrNVHZNHerNrD33VKnbWTScw/viewform?usp=sf_link
• Serve:  https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScLIxpbEnuVX6s8sX1f73tbPZAZmDI4jgtcb-tJEREG0aua5Q/viewform?usp=sf_link

Year Five Exuro 

On Tuesday, 15 Year Five students had the opportunity to engage with other students in our Hastings Cluster to share and celebrate their faith in a variety of activities. We look forward to these students presenting their learning and parts of the day with their peers in the coming weeks.

Colour Run

Prev

Showing images 1 - 8 of 26

Next

What a wonderful success our Parent Community Forum Colour Run was last night. Congratulations to the hardworking team of parents who worked behind the scenes in packing powder, organising pizzas, showbags and those who set up the course to transform our bottom oval into a fun park for our students. More importantly thanks to Allison Ritchie and her team for their optimism and glass half full attitude in forging ahead with the event despite negative weather forecasts. Everyone was colourful and enjoyed gathering as a community for this event.

Grandparents Day and Aggies Art Exhibition

It was fantastic to share a celebration acknowledging the significant impact Grandparents and Special People have in the lives of our youth. Today we were able to share our appreciation for them through prayer, food and showcasing our talents in art. Kim Post, our talented Art Teacher shares her amazing talent in guiding our students in this learning as well as organising a piece of art work to display for each student at St Agnes’. Thank you Mrs Post for encouraging students and promoting their skills for this exhibition.

2025 Planning - Parent Input Class Groupings

At the end of each year, we normally seek input from parents regarding class structure of friendship issues that need consideration. Our teachers work very hard throughout the year to get to know the children and all of their friendship connections and the class placement process is allocated considerable time from the staff. At St Agnes', we are always trying to improve on the way we have been doing things and following on from feedback, we have slightly altered the form this year. It will continue to be an online process. Just like normal end of year processes, this won’t be an opportunity to select a teacher.

As this process is conducted each year, we ask that parents include all necessary information on this sheet. Even if you have submitted information in previous years, please ensure you have recorded it on this form again, if it is still of relevance.

We ask that you please complete this information by 9:00am Wednesday 31 October 2024 so that it can help form part of our new grouping considerations. If you need to submit information for more than one child, please complete this form separately for each child in your family. If you have any further questions, please don't hesitate to contact me at school on (02) 65837433 or email pmaca@lism.catholic.edu.au

Parent Input Form

Would you like to win a Family Diary for 2025?

The Council of Catholic School Parents NSW/ACT are giving away 100 diaries to the first families in NSW and ACT to complete this link.

The Council of Catholic School Parents NSW/ACT has created the diary with parents and carers in mind. The pages are organised by school terms with school holidays highlighted, with lots of room to write all the family’s appointments and activities. 

Want to know more about  The Council of Catholic School Parents NSW/ACT ? Click here to read Parent Talk 2024 Issue 4.

Term 4 eSafety Webinar

Join the eSafety Commissioner's expert education and training team for a FREE live webinar - our last one for the year, especially for CCSP parents and carers

Tuesday 12 November, 12.30 – 1pm 

'Supporting healthy tech use as your child transitions into high school'

This FREE webinar is suitable for parents and carers of young people in upper primary school (aged 11–12) and Year 7. It explores the social pressures, peer influences, and technological challenges young people face as they transition into high school. It also offers practical strategies for navigating online friendships and connections to help minimise negative experiences.

CLICK TO REGISTER FOR THE WEBINAR:

https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/707533969409578587

Sports News

Summer Sports Trials

The selection process for the Summer Sports Trials has been completed for basketball, touch football, tennis and cricket. Both basketball and touch football saw strong competition, with over 60 students trying out for each sport in both the boys' and girls' teams. Congratulations to all the students who registered and participated in the trials. Notifications for those selected have been sent out via Compass earlier this week.

Our basketball and tennis teams will attend the Zone trials this Monday. The basketball trials will take place at the Port Macquarie Indoor Stadium (Hastings River Drive), where students are expected to arrive and be ready to start by 10:00am. The event will conclude at 1:00pm.

The tennis trials will be held at the Kempsey Tennis Centre (Sea St, Kempsey). Tennis players should arrive by 9:00am for a 9:30am start, with the trials wrapping up at 12:30pm. Families are responsible for arranging private transportation to and from basketball and tennis events.

The touch football and cricket selections are set for Monday 4 November at the Verge St playing fields in Kempsey. A bus, shared with St Joseph’s Primary School, will be provided for transport. Please note that the bus departure time from Aggies, initially scheduled for 7:40am, has been changed to 8:00am due to a later trial start time.

Aggies Swimming Carnival

The Aggies Swimming Carnival has been scheduled for Friday 6 December. This is a major event on the school’s sporting calendar for all grades and is one you won’t want to miss. The Carnival is designed to be a fun and inclusive day that encourages participation from everyone. 

Thank you to our community members who have already made themselves available to help at the event. If you would like to support our students, please contact Drew Wilson at andrew.wilson@lism.catholic.edu.au or Renee Shaw at renee.shaw@lism.catholic.edu.au.

More information and a schedule of events will be provided in the coming weeks.

St Agnes' Sporting Representative Jerseys

We are in the final design phase for our new Aggies representative jerseys. Over the past few months, we have collaborated with Coast 2 Coast to create new sporting kits for athletics, cross country, netball, touch football, soccer, rugby league and rugby union. 

A special thank you to Stewart Clark from DONE Coffee for sponsoring our rugby league and rugby union kits and to Emma Walker at Gem Socials for her work on the designs and concepts. Thank you to Ben Davidson at Coast 2 Coast for their sponsorship and guidance and the Aggies Community Forum for providing the funds to purchase the remaining kits.

We are excited to see our Aggies athletes proudly represent the school in their new gear! Watch this space for the reveal of our 2025 Aggies representative uniforms.

Future Dates

• Monday 28 October: Basketball Summer Sports Trials - Port Macquarie Indoor Stadium (Years 4 and 5) 
  
• Monday 28 October: Tennis Summer Sports Trials - Kempsey Tennis Centre (Years 4 and 5) 
  
• Monday 4 November: Cricket and Touch Football Summer Sports Trials - Verge St Kempsey (Years 4 and 5)
  
• Tuesday 26 November: Diocesan Summer Sports Trials (Years 4 and 5 Basketball and Tennis)
  
• Thursday 28 November: Diocesan Summer Sports Trials (Years 4 and 5 Cricket and Touch Football)
  
• Friday 6 December: St Agnes' Swimming Carnival - Port Macquarie Town Pool

Positive Behaviour Support

This week we continue with our focus on Respect: I respect the diversity of all members of our school community. This focus has come from our current PBS Data as a need to help teach this life skill to our students. To address this we will begin term four teaching our students about racism so they understand what it is and how they can take self-accountability to end this behaviour. At St Agnes’, we believe that racism is unacceptable and that we can empower students to know that change starts with us.

This week our PBS focus on being Respectful.

Catholic Social teaching: Human Dignity

We are made in God’s image. This means we each have a God-given dignity.

Family Resources: 

Websites:

https://emergingminds.com.au/resources/struggling-with-money-and-racism-at-the-same-time/?audience=family

https://thespoke.earlychildhoodaustralia.org.au/children-need-feel-world-safe-place/

Books to Share:

We would love to hear from You!

Last week we shared the results of two significant reviews that took place at our school earlier this year. In Term Two, external professionals conducted thorough assessments by interviewing staff and families. Both these reviews were a wonderful recognition of the great things happening within our school community.

We are now looking ahead to the future and using the recommendations from these reviews to shape our next three-year strategic plan. We invite you to be part of this process! If you’d like to contribute ideas about where we can grow in areas such as mission, learning and teaching, pastoral care, wellbeing, and family-school partnerships, please email us your responses by 9:00am Wednesday 30 October. Your input is invaluable as we continue to build a bright future together for our school community. 

St Agnes' Primary School Community Forum

COLOUR RUN FUN

Thank you to the many parents and staff that have been working hard in the lead up or helped out yesterday to make the Colour Run Family Event possible. Thank you particularly to the parent committee of Kate Burrell, Leasa Harris, Simon Hersee, Lynne Rangel, Elise Gardiner and Victoria Bedwell, plus Groundsman Dave and Cameron Ritchie who spent many hours setting up.

We hope everyone who could attend enjoyed the event!

The core purpose of the Colour Run was for family engagement, however, from the sale of show bags $551.30 was raised, which will go towards lowering the cost of Year 5 and Year 6 camps in 2025.

The event costs came to $2,538.70 (mainly due to the cost of the powder). The Social Sunday Family Events held at Springloaded earlier in the year raised $1666, which was put towards the Colour Run and $921.95 was raised from donations yesterday. We have therefore covered costs and raised $49.25. 

Keep an eye out on Compass for a separate Newsfeed with photos from last night's event.

World Teachers' Day – 25 October 2024

To thank the St Agnes’ Primary teachers for their dedication and to celebrate World Teachers' Day, the School Community Forum on behalf of all families, provided teachers with their morning coffee today from the 2 Frogs Coffee Van. Happy World Teachers’ Day!

To get in touch, please email pandfstagnes@gmail.com.

Canteen News

Parish News

Supporting healthy tech use as your child transitions into high school. This webinar explores the social pressures, peer influences, and technological challenges young people face as they transition into high school. It also offers practical strategies for navigating online friendships and connections to help minimise negative experiences. It is suitable for parents and carers of children in upper primary school (ages 11 to 12) and Year 7. Tuesday, 29 October, 12.30 pm Thursday, 28 November, 12.30 pm Registration link - https://register.gotowebinar.com/rt/5292449078565496666

eSafety 101: how eSafety can help you. An overview of The eSafety Commissioner and supporting programs and resources for parents and carers, children, and young people. It is suitable for parents and carers of children and young people in primary and secondary school. Thursday, 24 October, 12.30pm Wednesday, 4 December, 12.30pm Registration link - https://register.gotowebinar.com/rt/4429149931214716000

Community News

The Birds of Australia Storybox - Town Green

The Birds of Australia STORYBOX is a digital storytelling cube to discover the world of Australia's birdlife. Birds hold a sacred place in First Nations cultures, featuring in songlines, ceremonies, and as spiritual totems. The Story box will be touring Town Green, Port Macquarie courtesy of Australian Museum for 3 months.
Be sure to head in town & check it out through engaging, interacting and learning! Scan the QR code to unlock a treasure trove of interactive content, including First Nations stories, bird calls, in-depth profiles, and hands-on activities that bring these remarkable stories to life. 16^th October 24 - 2^nd February 2025Venue: Town Green, Port Macquarie (Outside, near CWA hall)