Dear St John the Apostle families,

Welcome back to school! 

What an amazingly settled start to the school year for our community. From the first day teachers were organised and prepared while students remembered and participated in our well established routines that create a predictably safe environment where we can focus on learning.

I visited every classroom on the first day to welcome students back and to also hand out birthday stickers to anyone who celebrated their birthday in January. One of my own goals this year is to visit a collection of classrooms every day, wandering in and talking to different students to see their every day learning in action. As a teacher first, I genuinely miss having my own class to teach and am looking forward to these visits.

A community where you belong

In last year's Year 6 cohort we had over 30 families whose youngest child at the school graduated. These families finished their time at St John's. This year we welcomed 54 new Kindergarten students, as well as many other students in Years 1 to 6. This is a big change in our community. One of our big focuses this year will be to provide opportunities to build connections between students and families, helping everyone to feel that they belong. When families feel they belong, children thrive in their learning. Let's do this together.

Some great opportunities to connect with other families are coming up this term:

• Information Night & BBQ - Tuesday 13 February, 5.30pm
• School Fete - Friday 15 March, 4.00pm

Staffing changes

Welcome to new teachers Mrs Louise Osborne-Goldsbrough (3 Maroon) and Ms  Olivia Etzrodt (1 Blue). Louise and Olivia have joined the teaching team with great enthusiasm and excitement and children in their classes are already smiling and very happy to have them. We feel very fortunate to have found two very dedicated, positive and caring teachers for our students.

Ms Olivia Etzrodt	Mrs Louise Osborne-Goldsbrough

One of our dearly loved teachers, Ms Collins, needed to return to her home in Melbourne over the holidays and will not be returning. We wish her all the best for the future and look forward to hearing about the birth of her baby. During Term 1 Ms Collins was to assist in teaching the classes of Executive Team members. Due to teacher shortages we are doing our best to replace her but this is challenging. Mrs Bree Dess will be returning from Term 2, which will assist enormously. She's looking forward to seeing our students again.

Mrs Debbie Milne, finance officer, retired at the end of last year. We have already been through an unsuccessful initial recruitment process and are expanding the search for a new finance officer. Please feel free to continue emailing the finance.sjaps@cg.catholic.edu.au address with any fee queries. We are monitoring and responding to the emails as soon as we are able. In the meantime, should you know anyone who would be suitably experienced and interested in the position then please encourage them to contact me via email.

Temporarily unfilled staff positions can put considerable stress on others. To minimise the impact on student learning the Executive Team and Front Office are picking up many of the extra responsibilities. We're very happy to make sure that everyone experiences a smooth start to the year, we just ask your understanding as we try to assist everyone. We should be back to a full contingent within a few weeks.

New School Counsellor

Catholic Education, in Partnership with Marymead CatholicCare provide counselling services for students and families in all schools in our system.

These counselling services are short-term services, designed to provide some initial short term support for students and families. Where long term support is required these counsellors will refer families to the relevant support services.

Welcome to Cameron Day, our new school counsellor. Please find a message below from Cameron:

Greetings St John the Apostle families. My name is Cameron Day, and I am excited

to be the school counsellor this year. I am available Thursdays and Fridays.

I am a Social Worker with a passion for working with children, young people, and their families. I have previously worked in education, child and adolescent mental health, and acute mental health.

When I am not working, I enjoy reading, eating, spending time with my family and friends, and being physically active.  

In my school counselling work, I provide short term, client centred support to students, drawing from Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), Solution Focused, Mindfulness and Trauma informed approaches in a developmentally appropriate context.

I look forward to working with you all this year.

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We hope your child has enjoyed a positive start to the school year and that families are enjoying the return to a school routine. If ever you have any questions or concerns please always feel free to contact your child's teacher or myself. We're more than happy to do our best to assist you.

God Bless,

Matthew Garton

Principal