9 November 2018

Newsletter Articles

From the Principal

Grandparents and Special Persons Day

On Monday afternoon we celebrated Grandparents and Special Person's Day and it was wonderful to have so many people join us for this event. The students from K to 6 thoroughly enjoyed showing off their school/class to the special people in their lives. Thank you to all the family members who were able to spend the afternoon with us. A very special thank you to Ms Cooper and the Year 6 students who led the event. We are certainly looking forward to making this an annual event in our College calendar.

Prayers
We welcome the return of Father Deva to our College community. Father Deva has been in India following the death of his father. We offer our prayers for him and his family at this time. Also, keep in your prayers all those in our community who are dealing with death and illness.

Sacrament of First Eucharist

A reminder that many of our students will be receiving the Sacrament of First Eucharist this weekend, we hope that you can join us for this special occasion.

First Eucharist Celebration (St James Catholic Church, Cygnet)
Saturday 10 November 2018, 6:00pm – 7:30pm

First Eucharist Celebration (St Mary of the Cross Catholic Church, Ranelagh)
Sunday 11 November 2018, 9:30am – 11:00am

Pierre de Coubertin Award

Congratulations to Sean Dillon (Year 10) who last week received a Pierre de Coubertin Award. The Pierre de Coubertin Award recognises secondary school students who demonstrate values which are consistent with the Olympic Movement through participation in sporting activities. More than 16,500 young Australians have received the Award since its inception in 1993. Sean was nominated for this prestigious award due to his continued efforts and demonstrated commitment in 2018. Well done Sean!

God Bless, Allan Clark- Principal

General Notices

SMS Absence Notification

The College accepts SMS absentee notifications. Please SMS: 0488 863 246 with your child's name, grade and absent reason. Please save this number in your phone for future reference.

School Fees

Thank you to those families who have made fee payment arrangements and/or paid upfront for 2018. School Fees are now due and if you do not have a payment arrangement in place or are experiencing financial difficulty which is impacting your ability to pay, you are required to contact the College Business Manager. The College appreciates the sacrifices our families make for quality education and is here to support our families with these financial commitments, all conversations and payment arrangements are held in the strictest confidence. For a confidential discussion please contact Kelly Du Bois (Business Manager) via 62 951 541 or email: kelly.dubois@catholic.tas.edu.au

Student Medical Details Update

Please consider if your child's medical information has changed. If you haven't yet advised the school office, please do so. If you have previously supplied an epi-pen or other medication which may have since expired, please organise a replacement.

Little Lights – Birth to Four Program

College Uniform – Hats

College Facebook page

Join our College Facebook page. Just type in: @StJamesCatholicCollege in the Facebook search bar.

Animals on School Grounds

Did you know…

An extract of relevant Tasmanian legislation (Dog Control Act 2000) states:

1. A person must not take a dog into –
   (a) any grounds of a school, preschool, kinder, creche or other place for the reception of children without the permission of a person in charge of the place.
2. This section does not apply to –
   (a) a guide dog that is accompanying a wholly or partially blind person or is in training for

that purpose; There are other exceptions besides just ‘2a’ above.

Your duty…

If you wish to bring any animals onsite, prior approval needs to be obtained from the Principal. The Principal may give approval, & discuss with you reasonable precautions.

Happening at SJCC

St James Catholic College Athletics Carnival

On Wednesday 30 October, the St James Catholic College annual Athletics Carnival was held. The day started with the students in Years 2-10 participating in the 100m sprints and Prep and Year 1’s doing 60m sprints. We then held the field events start with a great amount of participation in every event from each house. Whilst these field events were occurring we also held the 400m and 800m races.

It was great to see the number of students that dressed in their house colours and donated money to get house coloured hair spray and zinc. The lunch BBQ run by Ms Adams and some of the year 10 students was a great success with everyone enjoying a well-earned sausage in bread.

The day ran smoothly and so did the students as many took to the track continuously and cheered on their house mates. The Year 5 and 6 classes created war cries for their house that many sang to keep their houses motivated. By the end of the day, we had many students still enthusiastic to get as many house points as possible to win the shield for 2018.

The results came in, we had MacKillop coming third with 810 house points, then Lovett with 1393 house points, and finally Lourdes winning the shield with 1463 house points. The day could not of been possible without the amount of help we had from teachers and students. We’d like to thank the whole of SJCC for the tremendous amount of participation and the support shown on the day.

Lourdes House Captains: Ellie Gregory and Blake Patmore

3-2-1 Lego

St James College’s First Lego League team attended the Tasmanian Tournament in Launceston on Saturday. First Lego League is an international competition catering for upper primary and lower secondary school students. Every year teams of up to 10 students build, program and compete with a robot, while also learning about a problem in science, engineering and developing solutions for it. What Lego League teams accomplish is nothing short of amazing.

This year 28 teams competed in the Tasmanian qualifiers at the UTAS Campus in Launceston. St James students have been working for six weeks to build the competition board and programming the EV3 robots to achieve a number of quite complex actions. Our team consisted of 10 students from Year 6, 7 and 8 who worked as a team and gave their all. It was a huge day full of excitement with students and families travelling for hours to attend the event. A huge congratulations to our students who represented our school so well and a very big thank you to the parents who supported them.

Christine Galbraith
FLL Team Coordinator

MyState Film Festival

Year 5 students take on the 'MyState Student Film Festival'

We are excited to announce that many Year 5 students are taking part in the 2018 MyState Student Film Festival. During term 3 Year 5 were busy writing persuasive advertisements, with competitions new category this year being ‘Best TV Commercial’, several students have created and produced commercials to be entered into the short film competition for schools. Information about the Festival is available via the link below or via the Festival’s Facebook page.

BYOD 2019

The College is currently undertaking planning for 2019, part of this process involves the review of the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) program. Students in Years 3-10 will continue to require an iPad to be brought to school, each day, charged and ready for use.

In 2019, the minimum requirement for a student iPad is an iPad Air or newer.

Older devices will not be an acceptable option. If you do need to purchase a new iPad, the 2018 (9.7inch) iPad is the recommended option.

If an outright purchase of the iPad creates financial hardship for any families, there is an opportunity to pay a device levy of $120 per year to the College. If you wish to access this option, please contact our Business Manager, Mrs Kelly Du Bois on 62951 541 or email: kelly.dubois@catholic.tas.edu.au.

Upcoming Events: Save the Date!

From the Sports Desk

Community Notices