Dear Parents and Carers,

Acknowledging Catholic Schools Week (CSW):

As a system of Catholic schools in the Diocese of Wollongong, we acknowledge 200 years of Catholic Education and what it means to be Catholic. The story of Jesus’ life and the love he showed inspires us to live our lives with love and kindness. Together, we celebrated a number of events across the week, that highlighted the importance of our work as Catholic school community and the positive difference we make to the lives of our students each and every day.

Thank you to our staff for their work and organisation in making CSW so successful and special for our students. We greatly appreciate your attendance at the 'Open Classrooms' evening on Tuesday and Wednesday. Our students did a wonderful job in showcasing 'life at school' and we are very proud of their efforts. To the P&F, we greatly appreciate your support and gifts to our students.

Congratulations to the following students who today received Catholic School Week Awards. These awards are given to students who consistently live out our Core Values  of Faith, Learning, Respect, Responsibility, Celebrate and Community. Well done!

Class	Blue	Gold
Kindergarten	Kane Durling	Florence Atkinson
Year 1	Carter Milne	Sebastian McIndoe
Year 2	Zali Mayo	Sophie Windisch
Year 3	Milla Briscoe-Hough	Felix Ibrahim
Year 4	Bronte Ireland	Nathan Noonan
Year 5	Bailey Mitchell	Isaac Tasca
Year 6	Ben Harris	Zahli O’Hara

As mentioned by Mrs Herring our Religious Education Coordinator, the Caritas organisation asks schools, parishes and the community to stand in solidarity with the world’s most vulnerable communities, to help end poverty, promote justice and uphold dignity. This year challenges us to venture into a new experience of compassion and is taken from the invitation of St Oscar Romero to “Aspire not to have more, but be more.”  

Many of our students have been giving up their time (at recess and lunch) and  collectively raised $350 for Caritas Australia - Project Compassion. Congratulations to the following Year 3 students - Ciara, Madison, Abbie, Milla,  Hudson, Ben F, Ethan O, Kade, Ivy, Georgia, Sophie, Andy, Rosalie, Kaylan (Year 1) and the parents for supporting them. These students demonstrated great initiative and service to those in need by raising this significant amount of money.

Thank you to the St Columbkille's Parish for their organisation of the Sacraments - Confirmation and First Holy Communion. Please refer to the information attached.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your continued support and engagement in our school community particularly during this time of Lent when we are once again called to pray, give generously and support others.

Enjoy the next couple of weeks.

Take care,

Brad Colquhoun - Principal

LENT

This weekend is the third week of Lent. Please remember to bring in any loose change you have to fill our class Project Compassion boxes. How are your Lenten promises progressing? Are you trying hard to pray more, want less and give to others? A number of students have already been fundraising to support our Lenten Appeal for Project Compassion, and we thank them whole heartedly. This week’s story for Lent is as follows:

We are now in the third week of Lent with the Project Compassion story of Oliva, a 22-year-old woman from Tanzania. She did not have the opportunity to go to school and was embarrassed that she was unable to read, write or count. As an adult, her business was losing money because she couldn’t add up her money and give the right change to customers.

Then Oliva enrolled in Caritas Australia’s literacy and numeracy classes. She also set up a home classroom to teach her neighbours, for free, because they were too shy to attend larger classes.

Oliva has now graduated, attendance at her classes are growing, her kiosk is thriving and she is helping her children with their homework. She aims to become a pastor and run for leadership in the next local election - to help her community to ‘Be More.’

• Approximately 260 million children don’t have the chance to go to school (oun.org)

Watch a short film about Oliva’s story here.

 “Aspire not to have more, but to be more.” Please support Project Compassion: lent.caritas.org.au

SACRAMENTAL PROGRAM

Preparation for the Sacraments of Confirmation, Reconciliation and First Holy Communion will be predominantly via remote learning. The online enrolment forms can be found on the Parish website www.corrimalparish.org.au along with all additional information and dates you will need to know.

NB: No enrolment forms will be processed after the 17^th March.

Confirmation Dates: Thursday 10 & Friday 11 June 2021

First Reconciliation: Wednesday 1^st September (9:30am to 11:30am)

First Holy Communion Dates: 20^th and 21^st November 2021

NB: Please make sure you have downloaded the correct enrolment form from the parish website. There has been a change in the parent evenings: Compulsory Night for Confirmation Parents only on Wednesday 24^th March 6-9pm and a Compulsory Night for Reconciliation/First Holy Communion Parents only on Wednesday 14^th July 6-9pm.

CATHOLIC SCHOOLS WEEK

This week St Columbkille’s has recognised Catholic Schools Week with class activities, parent evenings, a whole school liturgy and our Catholic Schools Week Awards. As this year marks the 200 year anniversary of Catholic schooling in Australia, it is timely to reflect on and give thanks for all those involved in imparting the Catholic faith, and the many who continue to give witness to this faith.

PRAYER TO ST JOSEPH

As we draw closer to celebrating the feast of St Joseph (March 19^th), may we continue to pray for his guidance and blessings.

Hail, Guardian of the Redeemer,
Spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
To you God entrusted his only Son;
in you Mary placed her trust;
with you Christ became man.

Blessed Joseph, to us too,
show yourself a father
and guide us in the path of life.
Obtain for us grace, mercy and courage,
and defend us from every evil. Amen. 

STATIONS OF THE CROSS

Each Friday during Lent the Stations of the Cross are celebrated at St Columbkille’s Church. It is a special time of prayer and praise, led by the Tongan Community, and occurs at 6pm.

Mrs Joanne Herring

Religious Education Coordinator

Congratulations to the following students:

Mary MacKillop Awards:

1 Blue - Jacinta Auld 

2 Blue - Halle Petch

2 Gold - Daniel Fleury 

3 Gold - Rosalie Larkin

4 Blue - Hugo Immens 

5 Gold - Chantelle Fleury

6 Blue - Bowen Bates x 2

St Columbkille's School Medallion 

3 Blue - Talon Mayo 

3 Gold - Kynan Merola

Merit Awards 

Merit awards are given by all teaching staff and are presented at the Award Assembly each Friday.  Awards are given for: 

▪ “Core Value” - Fortnightly focus (one per class per week) 

▪ Academic/behaviour/sport/social achievements (two per class per week)  

▪ Specialist Lesson (three per week across K-6) 

When children have received five (5) merit awards they will be presented with a Mary MacKillop Award.  The children will be required to bring their five merit awards to school and send them to the office, via the  office bag. When (3) Mary MacKillop Awards have been received a special school medallion will be presented. 

Sticker Books 

▪ All students at St Columbkille’s are issued with a sticker book. Stickers can be given for  academic/behaviour/sport/social/achievements.  

▪ Principal awards are presented at the Award Assembly. 

▪ The reward steps for all stages is as follows: 

Due to current COVID19 restirctions we are unable to hold our Class Assemblies in the usual manner.  So that each class can still have an opportunity to share their learning successes, we have commenced virtual class assmblies via our social media platforms.  This includes posts on Instagram and Facebook.  

Thank you to 6 Blue and 5 Blue for showcasing their learning over the past few weeks and we look forward to upcoming virtual assemblies in the coming weeks.  

If you aren't already following us on Instagram and/or Facebook, connect now @stcolumbkilles.corrimal (Facebook) and @stcolumbkilles.corrimal (Instagram) so you don't miss out on celebrating our learning with us. 

Maria Disibio

Assistant Principal

Congratulations to our Swimming Carnival Age Champions. Our age champions for 2021 are:

The winning Sports House for 2021 - Mackillop

Following on from our school carnival were the Diocesan Swimming trials at Corrimal Pool on Tuesday 2 March. A squad of 27 students represented our school at this event. The students swam very competitively on the day and a number of them have qualified for the Diocesan Selection Trials on Monday the 8 March in both individual and relay events. Eliza Woodford tied for the Diocesan senior girls champion. Well done everyone and good luck to our swimmers on Monday.

We hope students who competed in the  Diocese sports trials enjoyed the experience and did their best. 

Mrs Colleen Kipp

Leader of Sport

Catholic Schools Week Tabloids

Yesterday, Year 6 organised a tabloid day for all students from Kindergarten to Year 5. We had a mufti day which made it extra fun and kindly received a treat from the P&F at the end of the day. We did lots and lots of activities such as: Hopscotch, Skipping, Parachute, Croquet, Bowling, Sack Racing andQuoits

It was a great day - Well odne Year 6. 

By Jacob and Molly (6G)

Angolo Italiano

Ciao! Counting in Italian in many classes has been the focus in the past fornight. Stage 2 have been looking at Italian food and Stage 3 have been creating digital Fact Files on Italia.  Ask your child/ren what their focus has been and get them to share their learning with you.  

St Columbkille's doing their part in Cleaning Up Australia! 

Great Work Everyone! 

Take a look at our Year 1 students (some of their sibblings) within Andrew Chinn's version of Advance Australia Fair. Here’s the link: https://youtu.be/Lgf-MESj0W8

Facts about this song for 200 years of Catholic Education in Australia include:

• 21 schools
• 20 primary, 1 secondary (Merici College!)
• Every state and territory represented, all at least 2 except the ACT 1 (Merici College!)
• From Thursday Island to Launceston, from Geraldton to Byron Bay
• From Darwin, down through Santa Teresa to Adelaide

Our first P&F meeting will be held on Tuesday 16 March at 7pm in the Library. It will be our Annual General Meeting - all parents and carers are welcome to attend.

Did you know that you can acces the school calendar via the Schoolzine App? In the Home tab of the App, select School Calendar in the bottom right hand corner and all school published events will appear.  You can also choose an event and then select 'Sync Event' to add the event to the calendar on your device.  This is a great way to keep up to date with up coming school events.  

We have enjoyed having you and your Year 6 students join us at The Tops this term and we would like to invite students to join us for more fun in the upcoming April school holidays for Tops Day Camps! No sleepovers, but action packed days of fun and adventure. They are welcome to join us for one day, all six days or anywhere in between. They will be in the safe hands of our highly experienced team of outdoor guides.  You can register at https://tops.venueregistrations.net/ and find more details below:

 

Age: 2021 Year 3-7

 

Time: Each Day 8:30am-5:30pm

 

Cost: $65 per day (includes a day of safe supervised adventure activities, morning tea, afternoon tea and lunch)

 

BYO: Hat, Water Bottle, Covered Shoes (include bringing swimmer and towel – just in case it’s a hot day…)