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- PRINCIPAL'S REFLECTION
- NEWS FROM THE PRINCIPAL'S DESK
- NEWS FROM THE ASSISTANT PRINCIPAL'S DESK
- NEWS FROM THE RELIGIOUS EDUCATION COORDINATOR'S DESK
- ASSISTANT PRINCIPAL'S AWARD
- WEEKLY AWARD RECIPIENTS
- RESPIRATORY ILLNESS REPORTING FORM
- YEAR 6 PROJECTS
- HAPPY BIRTHDAY
- NEWS FROM THE OFFICE
- NEWS FROM THE PARENTS & FRIEND'S ASSOCIATION
- NEWS FROM THE PARISH
- COMMUNITY NEWS
“My Lord and My God!”
Thomas, called Didymus, one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples said to him, “We have seen the Lord.” But Thomas said to them, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nail marks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.” (John 20:24-25)
Today we celebrate the Feast of Saint Thomas, the Apostle.Thomas is most remembered for his struggle to believe in the Resurrection of Jesus.
Even though he experienced Jesus’s miracles firsthand and devoted years of his life as a disciple, he still was not able to bring himself to believe, to have hope in what Jesus had promised. Jesus’s Resurrection seems to Thomas too good to be true. But Jesus’s response to Thomas reflects His great mercy. He doesn’t reprimand Thomas or let him dwell in disbelief. Rather, Jesus appears to Thomas and allows him to place his hand in His side. He wants Thomas to share in the joy of the Resurrection.
If we are determined not to believe, then no miracle can convince us otherwise. We will find a way to explain away anything, even putting our very hand in Jesus’ side. Every day we are surrounded by miracles, messages of God’s love for us, but so often we ignore them.
Doubt is a natural part of the human experience. Part of having faith is struggling to trust in a God who is beyond our understanding. To use Saint Augustine’s analogy, trying to understand God is like trying to fit the ocean into a seashell. Our minds can only hold a fraction of His infinite glory. When we experience doubt, we shouldn’t be afraid of it or push it away. Instead, with faith seeking understanding, we can seek to know more about the things that confuse us and ask Jesus to help us believe.
It’s what we do with our doubt that matters. Do we refuse to accept that there might be things beyond our understanding, things that we can’t quantify or control? Or do we present our doubt before God, being honest about our paltry faith and asking Him to help us see and understand, to draw us deeper? Jesus knows our weaknesses and doubts, and He wants to heal us despite our lack of belief or understanding.
Yours in Faith, Justice and Learning
HAPPY HOLIDAYS
It has been such a unique term, with the 'new normal' changing so frequently we were all in a head spin! From face to face learning to remote learning, with a rotational workforce and flexible attendance, our community navigated these unchartered waters with trust, hope and mutual support.
The student's educational and well being needs remain our first and only priority at this stage. Unfortunately, as the global pandemic is gaining momentum around the world, we continue educating under exceptional circumstances. We are still no where near 'business as usual'.
Despite the many challenges, the students have been awesome. They have coped confidently and demonstrated a sense of responsibility and calmness. We are very proud of them.
May each of you have a wonderful pupil vacation to recharge and renew. Stay safe and healthy. We look forward to welcoming you back to school on Monday 20 July 2020. Please arrive via car drop off zone.
On behalf of the staff, I would like to thank the P&F, Rebecca and Paulo and Culinarius for our 'thank you dinner' that was beautifully prepared and delivered on Wednesday night.
KINDERGARTEN CLASS OF 2021
Our Kindergarten class for 2021 has now been finalised. We have a class of 32 students, with 16 new families joining St Brigid's. We look forward to welcoming the class of 2021 for the Transition to Schools program that begins at the commencement of Term 4.
PARENT TEACHER INTERVIEWS
Thank you to the parents who made themselves available this week for teleconferences. The teachers appreciated the time to discuss the learning of your child/ren. I am grateful to the teachers for their preparedness and commitment in making the calls.
SCHOOL ATTENDANCE
It is a condition of enrolment that you send your child to school every day. A small number of absences may be justified if your child has to:
- go to a special religious ceremony;
- is required to attend to a serious and/or urgent family situation (e.g. a funeral); and
- is too sick to go to school or has an infectious illness.
Students are expected to attend all regular school activities, including sport. Do not keep your child away from school for the following:
- birthdays;
- shopping;
- minding other children;
- routine check-ups or care such as hair cuts;
- minor family events; and
- sleeping in.
Medical and other health appointments for your child should be made either before or after school or during the school holidays.
Lateness is recorded as a partial absence and must be explained to the school the same way as other forms of absence. Simply arriving 10 minutes late every day equates to a week of learning lost in a year.
From Term 3, we encourage families to ensure they are arriving between 8:40am - 8:50am each day. On any given day, we can have up to 40+ students arriving after the bell.
Until social distancing restrictions are lifted we will continue with EVERY FAMILY using the car zone for drop off and pick up. We thank you for continuing to support our efforts with social distancing.
Following consultation with the staff, students and parent body, some of the procedures we had to adopt during COVID-19 will continue as ongoing procedures.
The school day will still commence at 8.50am. Students are required to arrive from 8.40am and proceed directly to class. We will continue to provide supervision at the car zone as the entire school still needs to use the zone for drop off and pick up. However, from Term 3, supervision will cease at 8:50am. Therefore, teachers will mark the roll at 8:50am. Any student who arrives after this time will be marked absent and will need to go to the office for a late pass.
BELL TIMES FROM TERM 3
From the commencement of Term 3, the following changes to bell times will be made. We are condensing the arrival and dismissal times as the students are now very well trained in the new procedures.
|
TIME |
ACTIVITY |
|
8:40am |
Student drop off commences - students go directly to class |
|
8:50am |
Drop off supervision concludes. Bell rings. Roll is marked |
|
8:50 – 10:50am |
Session 1 |
|
10:50 – 11:20am |
Recess and playtime |
|
11:20 – 12.50pm |
Session 2 |
|
12.50 – 1.30pm |
Lunch and playtime |
|
1.30 – 3.00pm |
Session 3 |
|
2.55 – 3.00pm |
All students seated ready for pick up |
|
3.00pm - 3.15pm |
Car pick up zone supervision and dismissal commences |
GOOGLE FORM FOR RESPIRATORY ILLNESS
Your support in ensuring the health and safety of the St Brigid’s Community during this global pandemic is evident in the growing number of students who are either staying home with respiratory illness and/or being tested for COVID-19. We really appreciate your vigilance with this.
It is compulsory for us to keep a detailed register of the process, from symptoms to medical clearance, and so, it is crucial we know when your child develops symptoms BEFORE they are tested for COVID-19. To make this easier for you to communicate all the information that we need, we have developed a google form that will only take 30 seconds to complete and submit.
This google form can be found on the St Brigid’s website, as a link in the Brigid Bulletin and by clicking the link in this COMPASS news-feed.
PARENT FORM
This form is now ready for use if you have a child with respiratory symptoms. Thank you to the families who have already used the form. Please complete it any day or time of the week, including weekends. The information will automatically come to me and Mrs Benoit.
SAVE THE DATE
Our next Staff Development Day will be held on FRIDAY 25 September 2020. This will be a pupil free day.
HOME READERS - HOLIDAY READING
All students in Kindergarten, Year 1, Year 2, Year 3 and Year 4 have access to home readers via the PM eCollection app.
Attached are a set of parent instructions for you to support the use of the app.
ATHLETE'S FOOT
TERM 3 PLAYGROUNDS
MESSAGE FROM POPE FRANCIS
Pope Francis says the COVID-19 pandemic is an opportunity for mission and service to others
While isolation, social distancing and economic uncertainty caused by the COVID-19 pandemic prove to be a challenge, Christians are called by God to take part in the church’s mission in the world to help those impacted by the coronavirus pandemic, Pope Francis wrote in a message for World Mission Sunday 2020.
“The impossibility of gathering as a church to celebrate the Eucharist has led us to share the experience of the many Christian communities that cannot celebrate Mass every Sunday,” the Pope wrote in his message, which was released by the Holy See on May 31.
“In all of this, God’s question: ‘Whom shall I send?’ is addressed once more to us and awaits a generous and convincing response: ‘Here I am, send me,’” he said.
World Mission Sunday will be celebrated October 18.
In his message, the Pope said that despite the suffering and challenges posed by COVID-19, the church’s “missionary journey” continues.
Although pain and death “make us experience our human frailty,” it also serves as a reminder of “our deep desire for life and liberation from evil.”
“In this context, the call to mission, the invitation to step out of ourselves for love of God and neighbour presents itself as an opportunity for sharing, service and intercessory prayer,” he wrote.
“The mission that God entrusts to each one of us leads us from fear and introspection to a renewed realisation that we find ourselves precisely when we give ourselves to others.”
To be a “church on the move,” he said, is neither a program nor “an enterprise to be carried out by sheer force of will,” but rather follows the prompting of the Holy Spirit “who pushes you and carries you.”
Pope Francis said the celebration of World Mission Sunday offered an opportunity to reaffirm that one’s prayers, reflections and offerings were ways “to participate actively in the mission of Jesus in his church.”
He also reminded Christians that the mission of evangelisation was “a free and conscious response to God’s call” that could only be discerned by one’s “personal relationship of love with Jesus present in his church.”
“In all of this, God’s question, ‘Whom shall I send?’ is addressed once more to us and awaits a generous and convincing response: ‘Here am I, send me,’” the Pope said.
“God continues to look for those whom he can send forth into the world and to the nations to bear witness to his love, his deliverance from sin and death, his liberation from evil.”
And so we pray…
The Prayer - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-vDUpp3XSQ&feature=youtu.be
NAIDOC WEEK
A message from the National NAIDOC Committee:
National NAIDOC Week 2020 celebrations will be held from the
8 - 15 November.
The National NAIDOC Committee has decided to postpone NAIDOC Week 2020 (5 July - 12 July) in the interest of safety for our communities. This decision was not taken lightly.
We have taken on-board the advice from the Federal Government, health experts, our key partners and from leading national Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health organisations.
We all believe that an escalating COVID-19 (Coronavirus) crisis, as we head into winter, would have disastrous impacts on our mob - especially for our elders and those in our communities with chronic health issues.
The National NAIDOC Awards scheduled for Saturday 11 July in Alice Springs will not go ahead as planned.
ST VINCENT DE PAUL FUNDRAISER
Following recent conversations with Vinnies, there seems to be an increased need for warm garments this winter, in particular beanies, scarves and blankets.
The Catholic Education Diocese of Wollongong has been challenged to knit or crochet these garments, and because my skills in this area are ‘primitive’, I am extending the challenge to any of you that may be able to help me out.
All you need to do is knit or crochet a beanie, scarf or blanket and send it in to me and I will make sure that it is passed on to the organisers of the Vinnies Van to be given to those most in need.
PODCAST SERIES - RIPPLES
In response to COVID-19, a significant initiative has been developed for staff and parents to support their ongoing personal spiritual formation. It is a new podcast series entitled ‘Ripples: Inspired Voices, Treasured Stillness’.
Ripples seeks to offer a space where people can draw on the wisdom of a series of guest speakers and can experience some treasured stillness through meditation. On Tuesday of each week a new Episode and Meditation will be offered. Practices like these create a ripple effect. They have the potential to impact the way we respond to family, friends, colleagues, to others in our world, to creation and to our loving God.
The Ripples Podcast is now available
SUNDAY REFLECTION:
| Sunday 5 July 2020 |
FOURTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME YEAR A COMPASSION Jesus says, "Come to me, all of you who are weary from carrying heavy loads and I will give you rest. Take my yoke and put it on you. Learn from me for I am gentle and humble in spirit and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and the load I put on you is light." |
 |
| Sunday 12 July 2020 |
FIFTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME YEAR A GOOD SOIL Jesus said, "A farmer went out to sow some grain. Some seed fell along the path and birds ate it. Some fell on rocky ground; it sprouted straight away for the soil was not deep but when the sun grew hot, the seedlings died because they had no roots. Some of the seed fell among the bushes which choked the seedlings. But some seed fell on good soil; it grew and gave a great harvest." |
 |
| Sunday 19 July 2020 |
SIXTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME YEAR A THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN Jesus said, "The Kingdom of Heaven is like this. A sower sowed good seed in his field but while he slept, his enemy sowed weeds among the wheat. He said to his servants, ‘Do not pull out the weeds for you might pull up the wheat as well. Let both grow until harvest and then I will tell the reapers to gather the weeds to be burnt and then gather the wheat into my barn’. " |
 |
Congratulations to the students who have received the Assistant Principal's Award in Week 9. Well done!
| CLASS | STUDENT |
| Year 3 | Rio M |
| Year 3 | Sofia S |
| Year 6G | Piper L |
Congratulations to the following students on receiving their awards during the last fortnight.
Week 9 - Term 2
| CLASS | FAITH AWARD | LEADER OF THE WEEK |
| Kindergarten | Veronica A | Ruby K |
| Year 1 | Ned L | Alice M |
| Year 2 | Zara H | Daniel M |
| Year 3 | Eve A | Matthew C |
| Year 4 | Grace D | William C |
| Year 5 | Paige H | Natalia R-T |
| Year 6G | Kyah Z | Matilda B |
| Year 6W | Ryan F | Zara B |
Week 10 - Term 2
| CLASS | JUSTICE AWARD | LEADER OF THE WEEK |
| Kindergarten | Nathan S | Rita-Rose F |
| Year 1 | Lachlan C | Tom S |
| Year 2 | Neave M | Molly S |
| Year 3 | Zachariah C | Willow M |
| Year 4 | Leila M | Mason M |
| Year 5 | Quentin M | Lila J |
| Year 6G | Devrim T | Harrison M |
| Year 6W | Luca S | Keira B |
GOOGLE FORM
Your support in ensuring the health and safety of the St Brigid’s Community during this global pandemic is evident in the growing number of students who are either staying home with respiratory illness and/or being tested for COVID-19. We really appreciate your vigilance with this.
It is compulsory for us to keep a detailed register of the process from symptoms to medical clearance, and so, it is crucial we know when your child develops symptoms BEFORE they are tested for COVID-19. To make this easier for you to communicate all the information that we need, we have developed a google form that will only take 30 seconds to complete and submit.
This google form can be found on the St Brigid’s website, as a link in the Brigid Bulletin and by clicking the link in this COMPASS newsfeed.
PARENT FORM
This form is now ready for use if you have a child with respiratory symptoms. Please complete it any day or time of the week, including weekends. The information will automatically come to me and Mrs Benoit.
CONGRATULATIONS YEAR 6
Today, I was privileged to see the culmination of the Term 2 History unit which involved remote online learning and face to face teaching and learning. I was super impressed with the high standard of presentation and the knowledge the students had gained in tracing the history of migration to Australia from 1700's to 2010. Well done students, teachers and parents. Ms Uroda
Happy Birthday to the following students.
We hope you have a great birthday!
| Kinder | Year 2 | Year 4 | Year 5 | Year 6G | Year 6W |
| Hannah J | Theo D-B | Flynn S | Paige H | Caelan S | Arabella I-S |
| Sparsha V | Ruby T | Natalia R-T | Ilija G | Max D | |
| Enzo H-D | Ryder J | Luca S |
EXPLAINING STUDENT ABSENCES IN COMPASS
A reminder to please logon to your parent portal and provide a detailed explanation for any full day absences for your child/children. If you have completed the Respiritory Illness google form, you will still be required to enter an explanation into Compass.
Please do not email the school office with your absence explanation as a detailed explanation in your Child's Compass portal will be sufficient.
You do not need to enter partial absence explanations in Compass as this will be done from the school office when the student arrives or departs.
If you have any questions regarding any of this information please contact the school office.
TERM 3 SCHOOL SUPPLIES
As we approach the upcoming holidays parents are asked to ensure that their child’s pencil case and school supplies are replenished. Having everything at their fingertips each day aids in the learning process allowing children to focus on the task at hand rather than worrying about not having the equipment to complete the task.
SCHOOL UNIFORM
As we approach Semester 2 it is important that the students continue to wear the full school uniform. It may be a good idea to check your child’s uniform, including school hat, school shoes and joggers, to make sure that they will all ‘last the distance’ and that they satisfy the uniform policy until the end of the year.
STUDENT MEDICATION PLANS and REQUEST FOR SCHOOL TO ADMINISTER MEDICATION FORMS
A reminder to the parents who have been contacted regarding outstanding medical plans and forms to please return these to the office via email or with their children by the beginning of Term 3.
Australian Parents Council
Please find below a link to the online newsletter for the Australian Parents Council.
MOVING ROSTER
A huge thank you to the parents who volunteer to keep our grass mowed and the outside of the school tidy. Your efforts not only add to the overall presentation of St Brigid's but saves the school lots of money, which is diverted back into the purchasing of learning resources.
UPCOMING DATES FOR THE MOWING GROUP
| UPCOMING DATES | MOWER ONE |
MOWER TWO |
| 11 July 2020 | John Harman | Louise Macdonald |
| 8 August 2020 | Matt Duggan | n/a |
| 12 September 2020 | Anthony Petre | Paul Rustomji |
| 10 October 2020 | Jason Shoebridge | Fabrizio Curcio |
| 24 October 2020 | Mark Eckermann | Darrell Mitchell |
| 14 November 2020 | Gary Humphrey | Mick Zanella |
| 28 November 2020 | Brett Shrimpton | Neo Arian |
| 12 December 2020 | Daniel St Archangel | Paul Brogan |
| 19 December 2020 | Jeremy Crook | TBC |
CANTEEN NEWS
The canteen will remain closed until further notice due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
WANT TO BECOME MORE INVOLVED IN THE LIFE OF THE SCHOOL?
Are you interested in volunteering for P&F events? Would you like to help out the wonderful St Brigid’s Community but don’t know where to start? We’d love to have you on board.
Drop the P&F a line and we’d be very happy to get you involved in events or as a coordinator. We can also team you up with an existing volunteer to help share the work and learn the ropes. Email us at pandf@sbgdow.catholic.edu.au
ST BRIGID'S PARISH GWYNNEVILLE
WEEKLY PARISH BULLETIN
ST BRIGID'S MASS TIMES
| Saturday | 5:30pm Vigil - Please ring the Parish Office to register |
| Sunday | 9:00am - Please ring the Parish Office to register |
| Thursday | 9:30am - Please ring the Parish Office to register |
SUNDAY MASS ONLINE
SACRAMENTAL UPDATE FROM FR BERNARD
PARISH WEBSITE
CATHOLIC DIOCESE OF WOLLONGONG WEBSITE
COMPLETE TENNIS SCHOOL HOLIDAY CLINIC
KIDZWISH FUNDRAISER
Merrigong Gadhu Art Exhibition
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