Our final Community Council Meeting for the year was an opportunity to thank two of our members whose last child moves to secondary school next year and so participated in their last meeting: Veronica Sammons and Heather Rattenbury. Veronica and Heather have both been very active members of our community for close to a decade. Not only have they assisted at fetes, carnivals and other significant school events, they have also played significant roles on the Community Council.

Veronica chaired the Community Council for a significant number years and during that time she has helped the Council to be highly active in contributing to the strategic direction of the school. She has been an outstanding representative regarding the needs of families. Heather has specifically organised fundraising and discos and more recently looked after the Clothing Pool for several years, helping it to remain a highly valued service for the school community.

I would like to thank all of the Community Council members for their contribution this year and their ongoing support for our community. I would particularly like to thank Veronica and Heather for their outstanding contribution. We are better as a community thanks to the work of Veronica and Heather.

School Fees for 2022

Next week we will distribute the 2022 School Fees Schedule to the school community, posting these on our school website. Careful consideration has been taken in reviewing the fees for 2022 to continue to support our school's needs while keeping increases manageable and fair for families in the current economic environment.

I can now advise you that in 2022, our fee for a single student will be $786 per term (excluding Building Fund). This is an increase of $39 per term (first child only) which is the equivalent of $3 a week over the course of a year.

This fee combines the Catholic Education determined Tuition Fee and school determined levies that include:

• Student Resource Levy: covering consumables used by students (e.g. books, pencils, pens, rulers, photocopying etc), excursion and incursion costs (bus, hire of venues, cost of presenters/performers) and maintenance and replacement of technology shared by students (ipads and chromebooks).
• School Levy: ongoing costs associated with maintaining the school grounds, some infrastructure and equipment, for use by staff and students on a daily basis including electricity, air conditioning, water, care of ovals, etc.

These increases will also us keep pace with rising salary and costs to ensure our school continues to deliver the quality education for our student that you would expect. Further details will be provided next week.

As always, if fees create financial concern for you, I would encourage you to make an appointment with me to discuss how we can help. It is a policy in the Archdiocese that no student should be refused enrolment, excluded or disadvantaged because their family is unable to afford fees. Any discussion is always strictly confidential.

Outdoor playground update

Today I met with the team from Wellspring Environment Arts & Design and Catholic Education to begin implementation of a large section of our Outdoor Education Masterplan, including the entirety of the junior playground space and a large section of the senior playgrounds space. A lot of work will be undertaken throughout next year to to transform our wonderfully spacious play areas into inclusive, explorational and modernised areas for learning outdoors.

If you would like an idea of what will be happening you can see the Outdoor Masterplan on our school website.

School Reports

On Tuesday School Reports will be sent home via Compass Parent Portal. Please make sure you have all of your details updated so that you can receive your child(rens) school reports. Rebekah Brown has written below on how you can book a Parent-Teacher Interview time to discuss your child's report. It has been a challenging Semester due to remote learning and our teachers will provide a reports that reflects what has been reliably assessed this Semester for each student.

Farewell Ann

Mrs Ann Morrison has been a piano tutor for a very long time at St John the Apostle Primary School and she will be retiring from the position at the end of the year. She has let all of the families of her current students know. Thank you Ann for working with so many St John's students and providing them with a love of music (my own son learnt from Ann and loves to play the piano today). Ann has recommended Ms Amelia Hewitt to take over looking after our young pianists and we welcome Amelia to the St John the Apostle community.

Congratulations

Lastly, I would like to offer my congratulations to Mrs Stephanie Stewart who, after a contract review process, has been reappointed as Religious Education Coordinator at St John the Apostle. Stephanie is passionate about faith and learning. She has been an outstanding support for staff in teaching Religious Education, built a strong link with our Parish and embedded the charism 'to be on Earth the Heart of God' across the school. Every child has an understanding of what this means. I'm very pleasedour community has the opportunity to be enriched by Stephanie's faith, knowledge and passion for another year.

God Bless