Link Up Term 4 Week 8 2024

It is simply incredible to think that we are at the conclusion of the school year, my first as the proud Principal of St Francis de Sales College. The end of another school year allows us to pause and reflect on all of the wonderful faith and learning opportunities that our students have experienced this year. My deep thanks and appreciation to all members of the St Francis de Sales College community for your contribution to such a successful year. I take this opportunity to thank several people. Thank you to all our parents, caregivers and families for your support again this year and for your willingness to work with us. Thank you to every student for what you bring to our community, each of your personalities and gifts combine to make our school great. Thank you for the extraordinary care that you demonstrate for each other as well. Thank you to the leadership team of St Francis de Sales College, a more talented and committed team of leaders I have not worked with. Thank you to the staff, teaching and Education Support Officer staff who continually amaze me with their positivity and collegiality. To those staff who are concluding their time here at St Francis de Sales College, you all leave with our every best wishes and blessing, and we thank you for your contribution and commitment to our community. Thank you all from the depth of my heart for all that you do.

I wish you and your families every blessing and happiness this Christmas holiday time.

“May the Blessings of Christmas be with you,
May the Christ Child light your way,
May God’s holy angels guide you.
And keep you safe each day.”

Term 1 – Start of the school year for all students

All students (Reception to Year 12) will commence on Tuesday 28 January 2025.

2025 Term Dates:

Term 1: Tuesday 28 January to Friday 11 April
Term 2: Monday 28 April to Friday 4 July
Term 3: Monday 21 July to Friday 26 September
Term 4: Monday 13 October to Friday 5 December

2025 Student Free Days:
Term 1: Nil
Term 2: Friday 6 June (Moderation Day)
Term 3: Monday 21 July (Eastern Region Conference) and Friday 5 September (Staff Reflection Day)
Term 4: Monday 8 to Friday 12 December (Staff Days)

Staff News

I wish to acknowledge the following staff who are leaving our College at the end of this year, and to thank them deeply for their commitment to our community.

Lynette Campbell: 22 years of service to the College. Lynette has decided to retire from teaching. We thank Lynette for her commitment to the College and young people in her care over the last 22 years.
Mark Andrews: 10 years service to the College, Mark has been successful in gaining a position at Cardijn College.
Lauren Broadbent: 3 years service is moving to St Patrick’s Catholic Primary school in Stawell Victoria.
Sarah Dodd: 2 years
Daniel Lim: 2 years
Ebony McHugh: 1 year
Melissa Symonds: 1 year
Marella Hannaford: 1 year
Heidi Jamieson: 1 year
Isabel Dawson, Fern Cox, Caitlin Rule, Anna Broadbent and Miranda Shoubridge: Semester 2 contract staff

I am also delighted to take this opportunity to introduce to you to staff joining our wonderful St Francis de Sales community in 2025:

ESO Support Staff Appointment
Ashley Holland: Equity and Inclusion

Reception to Year 6 Teaching Staff Appointments
Stacey May: R-6 classroom teacher (joins us from Mark Oliphant College)
Thomas Baxter: R-6 classroom teacher (joins us from St Raphael’s Primary School)
Holly Wallace: R-6 classroom teacher (a recent graduate and completed her third year pre-service teaching placement here at St Francis de Sales College)

Years 7 to 12 Teaching Staff Appointments
Chantal Berry: Dance teacher (currently the director and owner of the Hills Ballet School)
Martin Gray: Years 7-12 English and Drama (joins us from Paralowie R-12 school)
Oriana Harris: Years 7-12 Maths (joins us from Mercedes College)
Roger Mills: Years 7-12 Science and Maths (joins us from St Peters Collegiate Girls school)
Shayne Tarling: Years 7-12 Music (joins us from Eastern Fleurieu School)
Martin Vivian: Years 7-12 Digital Technology (joins us from Harvest Christian School)

Leadership Appointment
Jo Cains
We are delighted to announce that we have appointed Jo Cains to the position of Director of Equity and Inclusion. Jo is currently the Head of Diverse Learning at Cardijn College, and prior to this was the Director of Wellbeing and Inclusion at St Mary’s College.

We look forward to having these staff join our community and will have an opportunity to introduce them in more detail in the new year.

Position of Responsibility Appointments

Year Level Leaders
Fran Nicholls: Reception to Year 2
Lara Kelly: Year 3/4
Alice Taylor: Year 5/6
Jen Ness Ferry: Year 7
Mark Billington: Year 8
Branden Hill: Year 9/10
Ros Mattner: Year 11/12

Leaders of Learning
Alice Taylor: R-6 Leader of Literacy
Michael Baker: R-6 Leader of Numeracy 
Martin Gray: Arts
Nicole Elding: English
Nadia Honner: Health and PE
Rebecca Nottle: Languages
Amy Ashley: Mathematics
Branden Hill: Technologies
Jackie Kerr: HASS
Zonya Grear: Science
Stephanie Hocking: R-12 Religious Education Coordinator

Andrew Baker
Principal

Success is a journey not a destination

The quote “Success is a journey, not a destination” is attributed to the American tennis player, Arthur Ashe. As a winner of numerous singles and doubles Grand Slam titles he undoubtedly has a good understanding of what success is and how to achieve it.

This quote is very relevant in relation to what takes place each year here at St Francis de Sales College. It suggests that success is not simply achieving a goal, but rather the concept of success encompasses the process of getting there. It speaks to the need for persistence and perseverance to overcome the challenges along the way, it includes the actions and choices each individual makes along the way (and the values and core understandings that underpin these) and it embraces the tremendous opportunities for growth and development that comes throughout the entire process.

The end of every academic year is a wonderful time to be engaged in our College community. It is a period of looking back and looking forward at the same time, reflecting upon the successes of our students throughout the year, and laying the foundations for further growth and development as we approach the start of 2025.

With the 2024 academic year coming to an end, we are excited to come together as a community next week to celebrate the R-6 Academic and Heart Value Awards on Monday 9 December and the R-11 Awards and the 7-11 Academic and Heart Value Awards ceremonies on Tuesday 10 December. These are very special events that recognise the academic and other achievements of our students and an opportunity to demonstrate our deep commitment to living out our Heart Values every day. We look forward to having families join us and share in these wonderful occasions.

Reactivation of SEQTA Engage

As a result of our recent system upgrade and temporary loss of access to SEQTA Engage, all parents should have received an email requesting that they re-activate their SEQTA Engage log-on.

At this stage we still have a relatively large number of parents/carers who are yet to re-activate their accounts so that they can access SEQTA and SEQTA Engage.

Access to SEQTA is essential for you to remain involved and engaged with student academic progress, College information and access to the upcoming end of year student reports.

If you currently do not have access to SEQTA Engage, it is important that you re-activate your account using the details in the email which you would have received from the following email address: noreply@seqta .

Please be mindful that the SEQTA Engage activation email may have gone to your spam or junk folder and that it needs to be acted upon within 7 days of being sent.

This week, we will re-send the SEQTA Engage activation email to all parents/carers who have not yet re-activated their accounts.

If you cannot find the email, have not re-activated your account within 7 days or are experiencing any issues with this re-activation, please contact the College on 8393 1000 or email Student Services at info@stfrancis.catholic.edu.au to re-provision access.

2025 Timetable Changes

Earlier this term you would have received notification regarding some changes to our College Timetable for 2025. The rationale for change was outlined in this communication, but of upmost importance was the desire to ensure an efficient, effective and equitable R-12 timetable structure that supported excellent student learning outcomes. The key points of the 2025 timetable are listed below. Please note the change of the end of school time to 3:15pm for 2025 and beyond.

• 1 week timetable: Timetable is the same every week.
• Start time: 8:51am (Same as 2024).
• Finish time: 3:15pm (Please note: Finish time is 5 minutes later than 2024).
• Lesson length: 45 minutes (all lessons are the same length).
• Buses: There are no changes to bus availability as a result of timetable changes. Although the buses will leave approximately 5 minutes later in the afternoon, due to the new dismissal time.
• Lesson times: Monday to Friday.

Thank You and Merry Christmas

As this is the final Link Up for 2024, I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone for their contributions to our College community throughout the year. Our school is very large and complex, and it takes a huge amount of organisation, collaboration and communication to keep it running efficiently and effectively. Thank you to all members of our College community for your part in ensuring we continue to work in partnership to help your child achieve positive learning and life outcomes. From a perspective of learning, I would like to thank our St Francis de Sales staff for their tremendous energy, commitment and passion in helping their students achieve success. Thank you also to our parents and caregivers, the first educators of our students, who work collaboratively and positively with the College to the benefit of their children. Finally, and most importantly, I say thank you to our students who throughout this year have strived towards their educational goals and endeavoured to be the best versions of themselves throughout this journey.

We look forward to seeing our students refreshed, re-energised and ready for school at the start of next year.

I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a safe and Happy New Year - God bless!

Paul Wadsworth
Deputy Principal - Learning

As our school year draws to a conclusion, I acknowledge the wonderful contributions that our staff, students and families have made to our College community this year. Thank you so much!

Below are some highlights of some of the wonderful service opportunities that the College has been involved in recently.

Vinnies Christmas Appeal

The Vinnies Christmas Appeal has now concluded for this year. A huge thank you to all members of our College community (students, families, staff) for the generous donations to this Appeal. The Vinnies Conference in Mt Barker are very grateful and will be preparing the donated goods into hampers for families in need this Christmas. See featured photos of some of our students who helped pack the donated goods.

As part of the Christmas Appeal, some members of the Faith-in-Action Group visited the Vinnies Women’s Shelter recently. They brought with them homemade baked goods and also care packs, containing toiletries and toys for children. I thank Sr Shiji, Stephanie Hocking and Jade Pace for leading this initiative, which was an ‘eye-opener’ and a realisation that life can bring up the unexpected for any of us at any time.

Year 6 Reflection Day

As part of their ‘right-of-passage’, our Year 6 students participated in their Reflection Day in November. The theme was “One Body, Many Parts”, and the day’s focus was to reflect on how the uniqueness of each of them is God-created, and that the diversity that they are as a cohort comes together to form who they are as a Year 6 community. This of course, can only come together when genuine relationship is cultivated. To bring deeper meaning to this theme, the scripture passage, 1 Corinthians 12:12-27 was unpacked and a number of physical activities were undertaken. The aim of the day was for the students to understand that they are loved absolutely by God just the way they are, and that they contribute to the Year 6 community in a very special way. A sincere thank you to the staff who assisted in the planning and facilitation of the day.

Advent

We continue to prepare for Christmas and the birth of Jesus, through this Advent Season.

Advent is a time of expectation, waiting, hoping, and praying in the lead up to the coming of Jesus at Christmas. Below are some resources which you may wish to engage with your families.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S02KOlw7dlA 

Advent Wreath 

Advent Wreaths are often used as a visual and symbolic way to mark the four Sundays before Christmas, and Christmas Day. You may wish to make a Wreath  at home with your family. 

What is an Advent Wreath?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPHXooW6NfI 

How to make an Advent Wreath
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_cunOkJlLe4

Thank you. Enjoy your Advent preparation!

Variety Club Christmas Lunch

This term the Variety Club Christmas Lunch event was held at the Wayville Showgrounds in Goyder Pavilion. It was a spectacular celebration for 2,300 children with special needs, and their carers.

I commend sixteen students from our College (Year 9/10s), who set-up the space on Tuesday, and then attended the celebration on Wednesday, to assist with running activities for the guests. The students who volunteered to assist with this were: Charlotte R, Amy R, Maisie O, Poppy L, Alicia D, Suvali S, Draiven M, Milly G, Cecilia B, Charlize G, Tayla B, Sophia F, Declan P, Hannah H, Emily C and Lei V. Sr Shiji also joined me for the event.

Our students assisted with table service, face painting, balloon twisting, photo booth, amongst other things. The main role for our students on the day was to be Sheridan Bear, which was a bear costume and mascot for Variety Club. Sheridan Bear was very popular and received constant hugs from the children. There were bands on the stage for the duration of the celebration, and at the end, Father Christmas came into the pavilion on a Harley Davidson motorbike to greet the children.

Everyone involved had lots of fun, and our students were tremendous in giving of their time and service to the children supported by Variety Club SA.

I’d also like to take this opportunity to thank Sr Shiji, Jade Pace and Fr Philip Marshall for their support of me and the Catholic mission of our College this year.

Peace, joy, and blessings for you and your family, as we continue to journey through Advent.  I sincerely wish all of you a joyous Christmas, as we celebrate and acknowledge the birth of Jesus. ‘Live in the now!’ with your loved ones and savour every moment with them during the school holidays. Until we meet again, keep well! We look forward to connecting with you in the new school year!

Oreste Farrugia
APRIM

Our R-6 community have experienced an array of wonderful events to celebrate the year over the last couple of weeks.

One very significant event for our students was the Year 6 Moving Up Ceremony, held on Tuesday 3 December. This event is always an exciting milestone for students in Year 6 as they make the transition from the R-6 community into the 7-12 community, and it is a wonderful celebration of their learning journey at the College thus far.

During the ceremony, each student received an individualised St Francis de Sales College Candle and a decorated cross. These serve as both a memento and as a welcome into the 7-12 community. A highlight for the students was the comparison photos of students from when they were in Reception alongside their Year 6 College photo. What a difference seven years make! The students and families loved reflecting on their growth and development over this time. Congratulations and best wishes to all our students in Year 6.

Another significant event for the R-6 community was the R-6 Christmas Carols, held on the evening of Thursday 5 December. The students and their teachers worked very hard over the last few weeks to prepare for the concert and the children all performed their songs beautifully. Of particular highlight was the Nativity play, performed beautifully by the Year 2 students.

It was fantastic to see such a large gathering of families and friends come along to celebrate this community event. The Christmas spirit is well and truly alive here at St Francis de Sales College!

Next week, we have two significant events scheduled to complete the year. On Monday, we will recognise nominated students from each class for Academic Excellence and Excellence in Endeavour. We also recognise students for their outstanding commitment to our College Heart Values. On Tuesday we finish the year off with a Liturgy and a wide range of R-11 awards. Both these events are shaping up to be wonderful celebrations of students and learning.

On behalf of all the R-6 College staff, we wish every family a joyous, safe, and blessed Christmas, and a wonderful summer holiday break. We look forward to seeing everybody in January 2025!

Year 6 Blessing:
Loving God, we ask your blessing on these young people as they begin their lives in the 7-12 Community. As we have committed ourselves to support them, we ask you to be at their sides, guiding their footsteps on the challenging road ahead.
May you find friends who will walk beside you in the challenging moments of life’s journey.
May you find happiness in every direction your paths take you.
May you never lose your sense of wonder.
May you go beyond the ordinary steps and discover extraordinary results.
May you hold on to your dreams and keep them safe in your heart.
May you meet every challenge you are faced with, recognise every precious opportunity, and be blessed with the knowledge that you have the ability to make every day special.
Know that you hold tomorrow within your hands, and that the way there will be shared with the makings of what will be your most wonderful memories.
And may you always remember each step of the way… to believe in yourself and your dreams.
Amen.

Alice Taylor
R-6 Director of Learning

As the term draws to a close we can reflect on yet another busy time at school. Our Year 12s completed their exams and we had the opportunity to celebrate their successes at a wonderful graduation at Cobbs Hill Estate.

Our Year 10s and 11s studied hard until the end of Week 6 for their exams in Week 7, and then the Year 11s were introduced to the expectations of Year 12 in their subject transition sessions. It was wonderful to see them all step up, as the realisation that they were moving to become the leaders of the College became a reality to them.

Our College Captains for 2025 and House Captains also had the opportunity to attend a leaders retreat lead by Catholic Education SA where they had the chance to meet leaders from different schools and begin networking with these other students.

This week our Year 9 students also undertook exams, whilst learning has continued for our Year 7s and 8s as we head towards the end of the school year. Students have been notified of their subjects for next year and with great excitement have begun planning their stationery lists. Transition days have been held as students new to the College had the opportunity to attend classes with a buddy to appreciate what it is like to be a student at our College. There were plenty of nervous smiles, but our community is such that everyone was made to feel welcome and put at ease.

Next week we will celebrate our Academic Award winners at our final assembly of the year and reports will be issued after school on Tuesday 10 December. I would like to take this opportunity to wish all our families a wonderful Christmas, a time to spend with our loved ones grateful for the year we have had and excited for all that 2025 will bring.

Kerin Tinnion
7-12 Director of Learning

On Sunday 10 November, Year 7 students ventured to Canberra for four nights and returned on Thursday 14 November.

This was a highly educational trip which was thoroughly enjoyed by 85 students and 7 staff members. It is the 13th year St Francis de Sales has visited Canberra.

The Canberra Tour has been assisted by funding received through the Federal Government PACER program (Parliamentary and Civics Education Rebate). This year the contribution from PACER was $90 per student.

As always, this was in incredible experience for students who were immersed in a variety of learning opportunities each day that would not be possible within the confines of a classroom. The tour allowed students to consolidate many of the concepts learnt prior to the tour and introduced them to some amazing and unique learning experiences, including attendance at the Remembrance Day National Ceremony at the Australian War Memorial on Monday.

The tour is also a special journey for students because they spend the week together as a community, building relationships with peers and their teachers, and building their independence. The Year 7 students were fine ambassadors for our College and staff were very impressed with the way they engaged in all activities and also with how they conducted themselves. We are very grateful to our families for being so supportive of their children and the learning experiences we offer.

Jen Ness-Ferry
7-8 Year Level Leader

As we come to the end of another school year, we can reflect on a year that once again has given our many talented musicians and vocalists many opportunities to experience the greatness of live performance, with students having performed at several College based concerts, assemblies, award ceremonies and masses throughout the year and where we have been very fortunate to be able to have our talented choirs, vocal groups and singers experience performing to large audiences at the Catholic Schools Music Festival and in the past couple of weeks with our very impressive Year 2-6 Angelicus Choir at the Balhannah Oakbank Christmas Concert and the massive community event that is the Mt Barker Carols and Fireworks event which featured our vocal group, Musaic.

2024 saw us take our jazz combo, deGroove to Mt Gambier for the annual Generations in Jazz Festival, our fantastic bands and ensembles featured at our End of Year Showcase cabaret concert, the Semester 1 Senior Music Concert which was an evening filled with super performances by our bands and senior soloists, the Instrumental Music Concerts, of which this year we had 3 due to our ever-growing instrumental music program, where we gave the opportunity to over 80 instrumental students the chance to showcase what they have worked so hard at over the year and if that wasn’t enough we staged numerous The Music Lunchbox lunchtime concerts, entertaining our College student community, our Semester 1 Year 9 class held a Classroom Music Concert giving parents and friends the opportunity to see what we do in classroom music, and to close out 2024, Week 8 we held our in-school Reception – Year 6 Music Concert on the Junior Deck, where our Years 2-6 classroom music groups had the opportunity to share their performances with their peers.

As previously mentioned, our Performing Arts Departments of Music, Dance and Drama are very much about giving all of our students the opportunity to experience the enjoyment of live performance, there is no greater buzz and satisfaction than getting up in front of an audience and entertaining people.

2025 will be a massive year for our Music Department as we move into our new facility, which will quickly become our ‘Home of Music’ where our already thriving music programme will be invigorated by not only being housed in a ‘state of the art’ music facility but with new music staff members who will bring a new and fresh approach, certainly an exciting period of development to come, but something will not change, and that is our quest to enrich our wonderful music students by continuing to give everyone the opportunity to experience the joy that music brings.

2025 promises to see the introduction of further options as far as instrumental tuition offerings go and we are now welcoming enquiries for student registrations (Reception – Year 12) for private Instrumental Tuition. Further information is available on our College website at St Francis de Sales College | Music.

To close out 2024, our Music Team of Sarah Dodd, Nicole Moxham, Fern Cox and Aleks Bojanic, together with our many talented Instrumental Tutors wish to thank all of our supportive families for the trust that they put in our program and we would like to give a heartfelt goodbye, thank you and good luck to our Senior School Classroom Music Teacher, Sarah Dodd, as she moves on to another chapter in her musical journey and a thank you to Fern Cox who came in during the year to takeover from Leeanne Mibus with Reception and Year 1 Music.

The sounds of Christmas melodies coming out of our music spaces still have a few days to go and then it is the BIG shift up the hill to ensure all will be in readiness to press play for 2025.

The Music Team
Sarah Dodd, Nicole Moxham, Fern Cox and Aleks Bojanic

Welcome to our final Link Up for 2024. This year has proved to be another amazing year for our students. We have enjoyed team success across a number of sports and we have had a number of individuals achieve outstanding results in their various fields. We have also provided a mountain of opportunities for our students to participate and have-a-go in a number of different physical activities.

One of the most significant events for this year has been the process of designing and creating our new Interschool Sports Uniforms. A select number of student sport leaders, athletes and staff were invited to attend a workshop with David Booth, a local Aboriginal artist. The students listened to a fantastic introduction to the history of our Peramangk land and understood the importance of telling our story. They were then involved in deciding what elements of the St Francis de Sales College story we wanted to bring to life on the uniforms. At the end of this process David went away and completed the artwork. He then brought the final piece named “Reconciliation on Peramangk Country” back to the College to present to the students. We then turned the artwork into our Interschool Uniforms. These uniforms have been worn with pride at various competitions throughout the year and look fantastic.

In past years I have provided an overview of all of the interschool events that our students have competed in over the course of the year - but this list has become way too long to record. I will therefore just say that from Swimming and Athletics in Term 1 to various field, court, pitch, oval, summer, winter, team and individual sports our students are involved in a lot!! And I love that we as a College recognise the benefits of competing in sporting pursuits and support all of these opportunities.

I also love that we encourage our students to participate in so many different activities within our Health and Physical Education curriculum area. We have reaped the benefits of a number of clinics that we have run to for Junior School students and our Senior students have also been involved in playing, coaching, managing and umpiring across different activities too. The way our whole community interacts is just wonderful.

I would like to take the time now to recognise the efforts of all of the teachers, students and staff members who volunteered to coach, manage and assist the various interschool sporting teams. These amazing people spent a huge amount of their own time organising trials and trainings, and coordinating the events. We have also had a number of old scholars come back to assist across the various sports, which is an incredible blessing. This year I have noticed that a huge number of parents and family members have been willing to give up their time to volunteer at the College. We have had coaches, scorers, managers, drivers, supporters, even coffee-makers come from our families and I am incredibly grateful for all of these efforts. If you are thinking about getting involved in 2025 then please register as a volunteer through the link on our College Website. And if there are ever any questions about our sporting opportunities please email me at nhonner@stfrancis.catholic.edu.au.

Have a wonderful, restful break everyone.

Nadia Honner 
Learning Area Specialist - Health and Physical Education and Specialist Sport Coordinator