McAuley Catholic College Tumut eNewsletter

Dear McAuley Families

Welcome to Week 7. The weeks are certainly staying busy with a multitude of educational, sporting, and cultural events filling our calendars. Please be very aware of notifications through Compass so that you can assist your sons and daughters stay on top of what is coming as the weeks speed by. The Google Calendar also lists events and happenings that are coming up.

We also seem to be experiencing another wave of COVID 19 and a nasty stomach bug. Please do not send your children to school if they are displaying cold and flu like symptoms or other illness. There are still RAT kits available from the office if you need them.

A very excited group of Stage 1 students headed off to the Dinosaur Museum this week as did our Year 7 group to camp at Narrabeen. Experiences like these are such a wonderful time to get to know other students and try and learn new things. They are always high on the list of “favourite memories” of school days. These experiences are a privilege and a reward for the excellent efforts our boys and girls make.

There have also been a large number of sporting events and trials where our McAuley students are performing at high levels. As always, we often receive compliments on our students’ good manners and cooperation. Well done to all on being fine ambassadors for our school.

Linda Stade recently wrote about the importance of being connected to school and the benefits that has for both mental and academic success. A strong sense of belonging is evident here at McAuley and is something that all our staff are very proud of. Our partnership in educating the young men and women in our care is paramount. Stade lists some ways in which families can build this connection from their side:

Show that your family values school and education.
Participate in co-curricular opportunities – sports, charity work etc.
Model good relationship skills.

In all - relationships are clearly at the core of any success. Like all things, we need to work on open and positive relationships and, be aware that things don’t always go smoothly. As Catherine McAuley reminds us “…be ever ready to praise, to encourage, but slow to censure, and still more slow to condemn…”

Mary our Mother, Look after us.

Eamonn Moore

Principal

17th March is the feast of a well-loved saint, Patrick, who was a man who trusted that God was always with him, protecting him, encircling him, filling him with love. With him, God assures us, “do not be afraid” in carrying out our mission. Let's look at this day as a wonderful opportunity for evangelization in the tradition of St. Patrick himself!

St. Patrick's Breastplate Prayer -

Christ with me, Christ before me,

Christ behind me, Christ within me,

Christ beneath me, Christ above me,

Christ at my right, Christ at my left,

Christ in the fort,

Christ in the chariot seat,

Christ in the [deck],

Christ in the heart of everyone who thinks of me,

Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks to me,

Christ in every eye that sees me,

Christ in every ear that hears me.

First Holy Communion

As a faith community, we congratulate and keep in our prayers the Year 4 students, who will be celebrating the Sacrament of Holy Communion for the first time in our beautiful Church next Wednesday 22^nd March. May Christ bless and guide them during this special time.

Pope Francis refers to the Eucharist as a gift. He reminds us about how important the Eucharist is to our faith journey. He has stated, “You will make your First Communion, always remember that day your whole life: the first day that Jesus came to us. He comes, makes himself one with us, makes himself our food, our nourishment to give us strength.”

As we reflect on these words of Pope Francis, we can give thanks for Father Joe, Ms Moss, Miss Mason and the children's relatives, and friends who have helped prepare them for First Holy Communion, and who assist them in their future growth in faith through their prayers and actions. We especially thank the parents who are the primary educators of the children in the ways of the faith.

“PRAYER FOR A CHILD’S FIRST COMMUNION”

Lord Jesus Christ, bless the children as they prepare for Holy Communion for the first time.

May this day be the step toward a life-long love of the Eucharist.

May they turn to you for comfort, guidance, and wisdom as they grow into full discipleship.

May they inspire all of us to cherish this sacred Sacrament.

Amen.

Our 5/6 students celebrated a special Mass last Wednesday. We were fortunate to be part of the baptism of our classmate and friend Charlie Nichols as we welcomed him into our church family.

The Resilience Project Parent & Community Webinar

A webinar was held on 15^th March for parents to gain an understanding of the Resilience Project which we are running at McAuley with both the primary and secondary students throughout 2023

The presentation was an explanation of the Resilience Project which presented building positive mental health in schools and practical tips parents can everyday to improve their child's wellbeing.

The ‘Discovering Resilience’ presentation shared those same evidence-based strategies being taught in the classroom, so they can be also practised at home and beyond. During the presentation parents were reminded of the importance of their own wellbeing - we bring the best versions of ourselves to our family and community, when we make time to look after ourselves.

Here is the recording link if you couldn't make it to the live session, or for those who would like to watch the presentation again. Please note that this link will expire on the 31st March.

McAuley radio announcers in Week 6 were Lachlan and Fletcher.

Tune into 96.3FM Sounds of the Mountains every Wednesday at 9.45am to keep up to date on all that is happening at McAuley.

The SRC will be running an Easter Raffle from this week.

$1 per ticket, sold at recess and lunch.

Raffle will be drawn at the end of Term Assembly, April 6.

Proceeds will go towards purchasing playground and sports equipment.

Congratulations to Chloe Pearce who was named Senior Girl Champion at the recent Archdiocesan Swimming Carnival.

Chloe and Ashton Ambrose will now represent the Archdiocese at the MacKillop Trials later this Term.

William Smith, Angela Potter and Russell Guppy also qualified at the Archdiocesan Secondary Carnival on Monday and will now represent the Archdiocese at the Combined Catholic Colleges Trials also later this Term.

What an amazing effort by all our swim team.

RESILIENCE AWARD

STUDENT OF THE WEEK

Term 1 fees have been emailed out from CE. BPAY preferred payment method – please refer to your statement.

Please check the Compass app for information on all upcoming events.

Compass Upcoming Events

K - 6 Cross Country - Friday 15 March

Year 9 Careers Day - Thursday 30 March

Year 10 & 11 Try A Trade - Wednesday 29 March

Year 9 & 10 Sydney Royal Easter Show Excursion - Wednesday 5 April

The K-6 Cross Country will take place at the Tumut Wetlands on Friday March 24 from 9:30 am to 11:30am. Like last year, we will be starting and finishing at the Riverglade Caravan Park, Tumut. We once again thank Matthew Pearce, from Riverglade Caravan Park, for allowing us to use this venue.

All students are required to bring a water bottle with them to the Cross Country. Any student who suffers from asthma is required to carry their asthma puffer on them.
For students turning 8 or older this year:

In alignment with the regional and archdiocesan carnivals coming up, students will run the distances and in the age groups below:
8/9yrs boys 2000m        8/9yrs girls 2000m
10yrs boys 2000m       10yrs girls 2000m
11yrs boys 3000m       11yrs girls 3000m
12/13yrs boys 3000m    12/13yrs girls 3000m

The first five students in each age group will qualify for the Western Region Cross Country which will be held in Grenfell on the 28th April 2023.

For students turning 7 or younger this year:

Students will run the following distances according to their age. There is no further representative opportunity for these age groups:

5yrs boys and girls 800m 6/7yrs boys and girls 1400m

School Sports uniform, including hat.

Transport:

All students will catch a bus to and from the Wetlands, departing the school at 9:15am. The cost for this will be $2 per student.

Parents can provide consent/pay online

On Tuesday March 14th, teachers from McAuley both primary and secondary campuses joined for a staff meeting centering on embedding Indigenous perspectives in our teaching. Katrina Cambridge from CE joined to lead us and share tips, resources and knowledge. It was a great opportunity to share great ideas with our dedicated staff.

On Saturday March 4th, our McAuley primary classes entered decorated pumpkins in the Junior Section of the Tumut show. There was Dog Man, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, a dinosaur egg hatching, a minion, Gary the Snail from SpongeBob, a delicious doughnut and the world's cutest butternut sausage dog. All our entries received highly commended awards with Gary the snail receiving second place and the hatching dinosaur egg winning the section and a $100 prize.

Year 5/6C decided to donate their prize money to Snowy Valley's School, to go towards their fundraiser for a new school bus.

There was also a display of some amazing schoolwork showing off our clever students and teachers. Well done McAuley.

Ms Julie Piper is running Maths homework support on a Wednesday afternoon for Secondary students.

Please meet in the library from 3:15 till 4. Students can work on class work, Hot Maths or bring questions with them.

The target group is Year 11 but anyone is welcome to join.

In Kinder we are counting numbers up to 20 and making groups and collections of things. We love numbers!

Year 4 have been measuring the distance of the planets from the Sun in our Solar System.

It's all about movement in Kindergarten PE!!

Five students travelled to Canberra for Winter Trials. Bella Crowe and Olivia Forsyth for the Primary CG Archdiocese Netball team and Brad Beavan (opens) Cooper Watkins (U11's) and Joey Parry (opens) trialled for the CG Archdiocese Rugby League teams.