Newsletter Term 1 Week 1

39 Benfer Road VICTORIA POINT 4165

Ph: 07 3207 6628 Fax: 07 3207 6734

Email: pvictoriapoint@bne.catholic.edu.au

Online: www.stritasvp.qld.edu.au

For all absentees please log into the Parent Portal by clicking HERE

Office Hours: 8am - 3.30pm weekdays

OSHC: 0477 550 700

Parish Office: (07) 32079177

Click here for Parish Information & Mass Times

Important Dates!

Thursday 6th February - Year 6 Leadership Day ( Unitas)

Friday 7th February 2020 - Opening School Mass 2pm in the Unitas. Welcome BBQ 4 - 5pm

You will find all these school events on the School Calendar on the Portal.

From Our Principal Mrs Watson

Welcome BBQ

This week we hold two of our new school year traditions, the Opening of School Liturgy and our Welcome

BBQ. Thank you to those who have sent back their RSVP by today. Our liturgy will begin in the Unitas

Centre at 2pm, in place of our assembly. Students and families are welcome to proceed to the oval to

wait for the BBQ. We will have some sporting equipment out for students to use under parent supervision. BBQ food will be served from 4pm until 5pm.

At the beginning of the year it is important to make some policies and procedures know to all in our community. Please see some of these below.

Attendance Policy

Our class rolls are marked twice per day: in both AM and PM Sessions. The AM class roll is marked

between 8.35 and 8.45 am and the PM session by 2.00pm.

Rolls are checked by the school administration staff by 9.15am each day.

Late Arrivals

Any arrival after 8.45 am is considered ‘late’.

All students arriving late must be signed in at the School Office by a Legal Guardian and will be given a

late slip. This slip needs to be presented to the teacher when arriving in class. If they do not have a late slip they are to be sent to the School office to sign in.

Early Departure

A student is considered to be leaving early any time before 3.00pm. As with Late Arrivals, all students

leaving early must be signed out at the School Office by a Legal Guardian.

If you child is going to be absent, there are three ways to notify us of the absence

• Parent Portal

• In person at the school office

• Phone school absentee line

Unexplained Absences

An unexplained absence occurs when the student is not present at school and the Legal Guardian does

not contact the school. An SMS message will be sent to the Main Contact by the school secretary at

approximately 9.30 am each day. Legal Guardians are requested to respond to the Unexplained Absence message upon receiving it.

Complaints Procedure

At St Rita’s we value healthy, supportive relationships that nurture safety, a sense of belonging and

respect for all. We strive to promote open communication where individual concerns are addressed in a

respectful manner for all. Peace and respect happen when issues are dealt with at the level at which they occur whether that be student- student, teacher- student, parent-teacher, parent-school.

Most concerns can be resolved at the classroom level with open communication between teacher,

student and parents. Classroom teachers know the students and understand their social interactions

with their peers. It is important to have this information when investigating any issue, similarly it is important for school staff to have information about any concerns that are shared at home.   

Our complaints procedure is located on the St Rita’s website and outlines the procedure for complaints -

 the BCE Parent Complaint Procedure.  Generally, any educational or social concern a family may have

regarding a student is directed in the first instance to the classroom teacher.   If required, this issue may

be escalated to one of the Leadership Team - for students in Prep to Yr 3, Mr Nathan Mulhearn is the

main Leadership Team contact and for students in Yr 4 to 6, Mr Brian Mason is the main Leadership

Team contact.   

Issues requiring further investigation will be directed to me as Principal.   

St Rita’s Parent Network - SPN

All families are members of the St Rita’s Parent Network, a family and community engagement group

here at the school, formally known as the P and F.

The aim of the SPN is to support the school principal and staff in providing a high quality inclusive Catholic Education for our children within a nurturing environment.

This group is basically a team of parents responsible for planning,  organising, implementing and

evaluating family and community engagement activities at our school. The SPN does not form policies,

this is the role of our School Board.  

We aim to have two meetings per term, this year we will trial one morning and one night time meeting each term in the hope that more parents may be able to come along.

Our St Rita’s SPN will hold their first meeting for 2020 on Wednesday night, 12 February @ 6pm. It would be great to see good numbers in attendance, including some of our new families.

From Our AP - Mr Mason

Dear Parents and Carers,

Welcome

We’ve had a very positive start to the 2020 school year. Thank you for sending the students so ready to

learn. I look forward to catching up with many of you at our opening liturgy and Welcome BBQ this

Friday.

Student Attendance

We want to continue that positive start and so once again this year we will be aiming at maximising

student attendance, in line with the BCE Attendance Policy – ATTENDANCE MATTERS, with its focus on

“every student, on time, every day”. We ask all parents to please give importance and priority to having

the students at school on time and ready to learn every day that they are physically well enough to be here and, where possible, arrange appointments and activities for outside of normal school hours.

Friday Assemblies

Last Friday we held our first whole-school assembly for 2020. It was wonderful to be able to welcome

everyone back and very impressive that our new Preps were able to be there with us as well. This year,

our whole-school assemblies will be held on Friday afternoons starting at 2:00pm and, as always,

parents/carers, grandparents and community members are most welcome to join us as we celebrate the

week that has been and look ahead to the week to come. In the light of what I said above about

attendance, it is important that all students are present for the assembly time each week as well.

Year 6 Student Leaders

We commented on assembly last Friday about the great start that our Yr 6 students have already made

to their leadership year. They have already shown signs of being ready and willing to ‘step-up’, eg on

Friday at lunchtime I had 25 + Yr 6 students willingly give up their 2nd break play time to help set up

UNITAS for our first Friday assembly. I am looking forward to working with them as our student leaders for 2020. Well done, Yr 6 !

Safety Reminders and Requests - Student Drop-off and Pick-up

Parents are reminded to please make sure that you only park in legal and safe places for the drop-off and pick-up of students.

Drive-Thru - Our preferred drop-off and pick-up location is the Drive-Thru off Benfer Road, accessed via

the main carpark, as this is where our formal supervision is provided. It is very helpful to our supervising

staff if families have the FAMILY NAME in bold block letters displayed on the dashboard or sun-visor.

Thank you. Please also note that the afternoon Drive-Thru supervision operates from 3:00 – 3:30pm each

afternoon.

Benfer Road - There are some zones on Benfer Road signed as ‘No Standing’ zones on either side of the

crossing zone. This is to make sure that those supervising and those using the crossing have unblocked

vision of oncoming traffic in both directions. Please do not park, even briefly in these signed zones or

anywhere that has been marked or signed as ‘No Standing’.

Sycamore Parade & St Rita’s Drive – Please be conscious of the street signage in Sycamore Parade and St Rita’s Drive regarding parking restrictions.

Regards,

Brian Mason APA

APRE News - Mr Mulhearn

Opening Mass

Please join us for our Opening Mass this Tuesday 2pm in the Unitas. Families are very welcome to join us.

175 Years of Catholic Education

In 2020, we celebrate 175 years of Catholic Schooling in Queensland. Brisbane Catholic Education are

looking to celebrate, and as part of this, they want to hear your stories. If you went to a Catholic School in Queensland and have a story to share, please email 175years@bne.catholic.edu.au

If you would like further information, please check out the website https://www.bne.catholic.edu.au/news/Pages/celebrating-175-years.aspx

Anniversary of the Apology to Australia's Indigenous People

On February 13, 2008 the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, delivered an apology to Australia's Indigenous

peoples in the Parliament of Australia House of Representatives.

Possible ways to recognise this Anniversary in a prayer context include:

Acknowledgement of Country; lighting a candle; observing a minute of silence; praying prayers of intercession for those who suffered and for reconciliation; Prayer for the Journey of Healing (NATSIEC)

PLL Observations - From Mrs Maclean

I found it very exciting and rewarding to visit all our classrooms the first day of school and again on

Monday morning. Learning and Teaching at St Rita’s for 2020 is well underway and flourishing. As I

visited classrooms, I saw numerous examples of the collaborative work of teachers and students to set

each classes behaviour and learning expectations for the year ahead. This work was framed in a positive

way with of focus on growth mindset and optimal conditions for learning incorporating our St Rita ’s

Expectations Here are a some of the photos I took as I visited classrooms capturing this work.

Coming Up in our next Newsletter (Week 4) I will include the following:

Term 1 Overviews for HASS, Maths, Science, HPE, The Arts, Technologies

Week 3, 4 5 Overview for English

Positive Behaviour 4 Learning (PB4L)

As a BCE school, St Rita’s follow a PB4L framework. This framework is about people, practice and

processes. It is about the way we do work, not a program. Integrated into the PB4Learning is the use of

a school wide expectations matrix. This was reviewed by the PB4L team and staff in 2019, ready for

implementation this year. Students will be guided through the matrix ’s content with their classroom

teacher. It is included with this newsletter for your reference.

From The Resource Centre

Hello from the library

Welcome back!! We are very excited that student borrowing will begin this week, can you please ensure that your children all have clearly named library bags, we are not fussy any named bag will do.

We still have 80 books overdue from last year, can you please check under beds and behind couches for

any books that may be hiding?

Help Needed

Are you amazing at contacting books? Do you cringe when you get bubbles and creases in the contact

when you’re covering books? If you are this person, we need you to share your amazing abilities to help

us contact our new library books. Please come into the library and either speak to Jo Rossi, Alisha Gibbs

or Nathalie Holt, we would love to see you.

Happy Reading.

Music News - Mr Tyrrell

Welcome to the new school year! Last week I visited classrooms to greet the students and to drop off

music forms for any students interested in arts activities this year. I have had a large influx of forms and

will be arranging the groups this week, with activities beginning next week (Week 3). I will post lists of

students on the music room door, so students will need to check what day/time they need to be at their chosen activity.

For any students that wish to learn (or continue) band instruments, guitar or drums this year, a form will

need to be completed by parents, available from the office. The band program will again be run by

Creative Kids On Stage, and Mr Smith will be coming to demonstrate instruments on Thursday afternoon for students. The band program will resume in Week 3.

I am looking forward to an exciting year. Please watch this space as their will be some news about an exciting production happening towards the middle of the year.

Have a great week,

Paul Tyrrell

Arts Teacher

KEYBOARD LESSONS 2020

There are limited vacancies for Keyboard Lessons at St Rita’s for Term1. If you are interested in your

child leaning Keyboard, please contact me on vicki.minogue@icloud.com and I will send you the relevant information.

Vicki Minogue

Piano/Keyboard Teacher

From The Sports Desk - Mr Collavino

District Calander

Please see attached the 2020 District Sports Calander.

• Students must be at least 10 - 12 years of age ( no exceptions)

• Student must be a club player to play the nominated sport. If you nominate a sport ( eg soccer,

touch or hockey), your child has to be playing at club level to trial. Please provide me with the

name of club, where in the team they play and how many years experience / playing their nominated sport.

• This is non school event, therefore parents need to provide transport to and from the venue and provide supervision throughout the day

• If you are nominating swimming, can you please email myself your club / recorded times and

what stroke ( no later than the 11th February please)

All nominations need to be emailed to me no later than the 18th February ( 14th February for Swimming ).

Please note the district Swimming Carnival is on the 20th February. Nominations are due no later than the 14th February.

Parents please review and email myself your Childs district nomination to mcollavino@bne.catholic.edu.au .

Tuckshop News

Thursday 6th February

Lisa Austin

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2nd Break

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Friday 7th February

Amanda Tomarchio

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2nd Break

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Welcome Back!!

An email was sent out on Friday in regards to Tuckshop, Menu and our procedures.

If you are new to the school or your child is worried about coming to Tuckshop please come and see me in the morning so we can have a chat.

Volunteer Roster

I have attached our roster for volunteers and as you can see we have a lot of ?????.

If you would like to help out even if it is once a term please let me know.

We have families who like to be on the same day together, if this is you and your friends please just let me know.

For all inquiries or questions no matter how big or small please feel free to contact me.

Renee

E. renee.schafer@bne.catholic.edu.au

M. 0411 523 969

Uniform Shop

NEW WEEKLY UNIFORM SHOP TRADING HOURS:

Tuesday 8am - 10am

Thursday 2pm - 4pm

In regards to Uniforms and what to wear, year level teachers are the ones who advise students of their weekly timetable.

Students with full uniform ( formal and sports) can follow their Year Level Requirements as per this

weekly routine.

Students who do not have their full formal supplies can wear their Sports Uniform daily.

Sports Days:

Monday - Year 4 & Year 5

Tuesday - Year 1

Wednesday - Prep & Year 2

Thursday - Year 3

Friday - Year 6

School Banking - BOQ

Major Sponsor for our 2019 Colour Explosion Day

Congratulations to Sienna D (1T) you are the lucky winner of a bonus $2 deposited into your account today!

We would like to take this opportunity to welcome back all St Rita’s School Bankers, especially those

new to banking this year.

Don’t forget to bring in your school banking each Tuesday morning. To avoid disappointment and

missing out on your weekly banking, we recommend you drop it off to the school office before school starts.

For those existing bankers, please remember to update your class for this year so we can ensure a

prompt return the following day.

We look forward to helping you reach your savings goals this year. With this in mind we will continue to

provide our savings incentives to those who bank a minimum of 14 weeks in Semester 1. Those wonderful bankers will receive a $10 voucher to spend at Cineplex Cinemas Victoria Point.

For any enquiries please come in and see us at Victoria Point Shopping Centre, phone us direct on 3383

6700 or email us victoria.point@boq.com.au. From everyone at BOQ Victoria Point.

Important Message From Transdev

Please see attached a letter from Transdev in regards to an error on the cards that were distributed last

week.

Please destroy the old cards or return them directly to Trandsev Queensland either by post or to our Reception at 10 Smith Street, Capalaba.

From The Parish

Medical Action Plans and Medication Forms

Please ensure the school office has up to date and current medical action plans. Action plans are a

requirement for students with Epilepsy, Anaphylaxis, Asthma, Diabetes or any other conditions.

• Please ensure new/ Current Medical Action Plans (example only attached) that are dated and

signed by a GP.

• The office has a copy of any medication that needs to be administered has a new medical form handed in to the office.

Other Information / Events / Community News

ADVERTISING

If you would like to advertise your business here, please contact the school office on 3207 6628

Parent Portal Frequently Used Links

• Archived Newsletter Page

• Forms and Documents

• Calendar

• Class Blogs