Friday 4th July 2025 ~ Issue 20

Child Safety Statement

School Values

Treat others the way you would like to be treated.

Respect Our School - Hormati Sekolah Kita

Do Your Best - Lakukan Yang Terbaik

Help Others to Succeed - Bantu Teman Untuk Berhasil

Important Dates

TERM 3

Monday 21st July - First day of Term 3

Friday 25th July - Grandparents' Day - details have been sent home this week

Friday 1st August - Assembly

Sunday 31st August - Sacrament of First Eucharist

Friday 5th September - Father's Day celebration at school

Wednesday 17th September - St Mary's School Concert at Hamilton PAC 

Thursday 18th September - Last day of Term 3 - 3.15pm finish

PUPIL FREE DAYS IN 2025

Friday 19th September - Structured Literacy

ADVANCE NOTICE

Wednesday 17th December - Last day of the school year for students

From the Principal

Dear Families,

After 11 weeks, Term 2 has come to an end! With some significant illness in the school, the end is very timely! We would like to thank our families and community for the outstanding support we are given in having the pleasure of working with our wonderful students each day. Our staff work incredibly hard, showing such commitment and dedication to their roles. And our students - an amazing group of children who bring us so much joy. We are truly blessed! 

This term we say farewell and good luck to teacher Teagan Wishart as she and Anthony prepare for the arrival of their new baby. Such an exciting time! We will let everyone know when we hear of the new arrival.

On the first Friday back at school next term, we will be celebrating Grandparents' Day. This is such an important event on our school calendar and, as new grandparents, we can certainly see why, even more than before! 

Have a wonderful holiday, shared with those you love and we look forward to all the amazing opportunities Term 3 will have to offer us!,

Terrielynn

Catholic School Culture

MASS TIMES – 2025                                                 

Hamilton: Saturday 6pm and Sunday 10.30am                                  

Dunkeld: Sunday 8.30am                  

Glenthompson:  Sunday 8.30am

Penshurst: Sunday 8.30am

Welcome!

This week we welcomed Addie Sutherland and her family to our school! She has joined 3/4S as a Gr 3 student. We hope they love being at our school!

Tinnies For Vinnies

A huge thank you for everyone's generosity in donating to the St Vinnies Winter Appeal. We have so many tins of food and non perishables for them to collect!  Our gold coin donation for our 'Winter Woolies and Crazy Hair Day' will also be donated to this appeal.

Learning and Teaching

School Wide Positive Behaviours

School Wide Positive Behaviour Support is:  A multi-tiered framework for establishing the social culture and behavioural supports needed for a school to achieve behavioural and academic outcomes for all students.

For the next two weeks at St Mary’s, we are working with our students on the following:

RESPECT - care for the people in our school

SAFETY - keep hands and feet off others

RESPONSIBILITY - seek help when needed

Assembly Awards

Congratulations to the following students who received an award last Friday for our value, Help Others to Succeed.  We are so proud of you!  Congratulations go to Brinlee Lowcock, River Ough, Franklin Donnelly, Molly Sherlock, Harper Andrews, Darrell Mhasho, Kai Turnbull, Phoebe Kelson, Hattie Stanley, Claire Cotton, Owen Lynch and Bella Templeton.

Staffing

At the end of this term, Teagan Wishart will be taking Maternity Leave until the beginning of 2026. Leroy Perez will move into her role and we are very grateful to him for providing continuity of learning for the 5/6s. We are very pleased to announce that Rebecca Kearney will move out of 1/2GK to share the 5/6MP classroom with Chris Minney. While we are waiting to appoint a new teacher in 1/2GK, Mharni Gordon has generously offered to teach full time. What a wonderful staff we have, always putting our students first!

End of Semester Reports

End of Semester reports were sent home last Friday - we hope that you found our new format more reader friendly!  We would love to hear your feedback. As well as being sent home as a hard copy, our reports were also released on PAM for the first time.  You are now able to access a digital copy of the reports via PAM and download them.  

Sports Catch Up

 St Mary’s AFL Superkick Program.

We are very pleased to offer AFL Auskick and AFL Superkick at St Mary’s in Term Three.

This will be a 5 week program aimed at 5-12 year olds. The program will run at St Mary’s on a Wednesday afternoon from 3.30pm-4.30pm. We are hopeful it will start in Term Three Week Two (Wednesday 30th July). It costs $55. No special clothing or football boots are required, the students would get changed after school (they can just wear their sports uniform if wanted) and then would need to be promptly collected at 4.30pm.

The set up and the structure of the program will depend on registration numbers and the age of students interested in the program. AFL Victoria staff will make a judgement in the first session and will happily allow younger students to participate in the Superkick program if they feel this is more suited to them.

We would need at least 12 interested students overall for the program to commence. Please see the flyer later in the newsletter, it is also on SeeSaw and a hard copy has been sent home today. Please scan the appropriate QR code to register. Please contact myself or Jono Box for further information. Jono can be contacted at jono.box@afl.com.au

Dates for your Diary

TERM THREE

July

Thursday 24th July - State Cross Country @ Melbourne

August

Thursday 14th August (TBC) - AFL 9’s @ Hamilton 

Wednesday 20th August - District Netball @ Hamilton 

September 

Tuesday 9th September - Grade 3/4 Hooptime @ Hamilton

Thursday 11th September - WHP Table Tennis (round robin format, no progression to state)

Friday 12th September - Grade 5/6 Hooptime @ Hamilton 

TBC Primary Golf

Elise Gordon

egordon@smhamilton.catholic.edu.au

Nationally Consistent Collection of Data

Wellbeing

Child Safety - Parent Webinars

The eSafety Commissioner presents free parent webinars on a variety of topics each term. They usually run for around 45 minutes and are offered at a variery of times.   Many of the topics offered next term are aimed at upper primary and secondary, but there are a few topics that are relevant for all ages.

These live webinars give parents and carers the knowledge, skills and tools to support their children to have safe online experiences.

The topics for next term are:

• Recognising online coercive control in young people's lives
• Understanding AI companions: What parents and carers need to know
• AI assisted image-based abuse: Navigating the deepfake threat
• The changing face of cyberbullying: Protecting your child in 2025
• Understanding and using parental controls to help protect your child online
• Sexual extortion: What parents and carers need to know
• Exploring the online experiences of boys and young men

A flyer with the times available can be found below. The link to register for these webinars is HERE

I Am Mindful Program

We are so excited to announce that we have been successful in getting a grant for the I AM MINDFUL wellbeing program, which will be delivered to our Gr 5/6s in Term 3. A huge thank you to Michelle Winnell from Brophy Youth and Family Services, who secured the funding for us. Our staff will participate in a training session and and online session will also be offered to the families of our Gr 5/6 families on Thursday 24th July from 7.30-8.30pm. More details have been sent home with the students this week.

Tania Stevens
tstevens@smhamilton.catholic.edu.au

Leadership and Stewardship

School Fees 

Fee statements were sent home yesterday.  All accounts for 2025 were due and payable by 30th June 2025 unless you have a regular payment plan in place or if you have spoken to Helen.  The collection process for unpaid fees will begin in early Term 3.  Please send me an email helen@smhamilton.catholic.edu.au if you have any queries on your fees.  Thank you.

Kitchen Garden 

Well, the Kitchen Garden program has started with a bang!

We have many happy students who have done and tried new things, in harvesting produce, cooking dishes and eating their fare.

Thank you to our amazing volunteers for guiding this amazing initiative, and for the excitement and motivation that the students have had in participating so far.

Today was our 'Celebrity Chef' day, and we thank Fushy & Stuart for sharing their expertise, offering yet another layer to our supported yet unique Kitchen Garden Program.

Until next term, keep up the cooking at home over the holidays!

Catherine Egan

Kitchen Garden - Celebrity Chef

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School Beanies

We have navy blue school beanies the students are allowed to wear (they have our school name on them) here for sale at the office for $15 each.  If you would like to purchase one for your child, please come to the front office. You can pay cash or card.

Community Engagement

St Mary's Christmas Parade

This year our annual Christmas Parade will be held on Friday 5th December.

Here are our amazing 2025 coordinators:

Tendai Mhasho - Parade Marshall coordinator

Katrina Turnbull/Teeghan Brown - BBQ coordinators

Shae Outtram – Gourmet Gifts/Baking

Lauren Cottrill - Stalls @ the PAC and will create our Parade advertising posters

Siana Causer - Raffle coordinator

All we need now is a Decorations coordinator.

The Decoration coordinator  will choose decorations we will use in front of the PAC from our storage shed here at school. In the past we have used our Christmas trees and boxes wrapped up like presents. They  will also have volunteers helping load/ unload and put up the decorations at the PAC.

Later in the year we will ask for helpers to assist the coordinators in the above rolls and keen bakers to make gourmet gifts to sell (Christmas cakes, biscuits, rum balls etc) at our Gourmet gift stall.

If you have any questions regarding the Christmas Parade please contact Shannon at school.🎄

Assembly

Our next assembly will be on Friday 1st August at 2.55pm.

Vacation Care OSHC

VAC bookings are open on Monday 16^th of June, please book in ASAP if you require care as we have limited places available. VAC Bookings must be booked through your Xplor app, contact the service if you have any difficulty. I have attached the flyer for your information.*If your child is attending on an excursion day please ensure you complete the correct permission form for your booking to be accepted. ThanksReminders:

• We are a Nut Free & Seafood Free service, please do not pack sushi, fish fingers, fried rice, peanut butter or Nutella in your child's lunchbox.
• Strictly no unhealthy foods, these will be required to stay in your child's bag until collection, we as a service provider are required to meet healthy eating guidelines.
• Please ensure you pack enough food for fruit, morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea, if your child does not have enough healthy food you will be called to collect them as we are unable provide food over VAC care.
• Ensure children have a bag that is large enough for their belongings, bring a full change of clothes, and bring a jumper for outside play.
• Please DO NOT send your child in thongs and crocs.
• All children MUST bring a drink bottle, those who do not have a drink bottle will not be able to stay for excursions.
• Our VAC fee is $95 per day before CCS reductions (regardless of what hours your child attends).
• Please note we close earlier during VAC Care and our service hours are 8:30am-6pm.
• Once bookings are accepted we CANNOT accept cancellations, if your booking is confirmed and you no longer require care your child will be marked absent and you will be charged an absence fee.