We have had a wonderful start to the 2023 school year. The children appear to have settled back into school life very well and it is hard to believe that we are at the half way mark of Term One.

Beginning of Year Mass:

On Thursday the 16^th of February the whole school gathered to celebrate our Beginning of Year Mass. This was a beautiful and reverent celebration. I would like to thank James Lloyd for all of his hard work in putting this Mass together and Father Mathew for celebrating Mass with us. Thank you to Basia Jedrzejczak for her wonderful organisation of the music for this celebration. All the children involved in the Mass read, sang and played the bells beautifully. I was just blown away with how many talented singers we have at our school. A number of children sang solos as part of the Mass and their confidence to perform in front of over 500 people was amazing. This singing was well supported by all of the other children who combined to sing some beautiful harmonies. If I didn’t know any better, I would have thought the children had been practising for over a month, not two and half weeks.

Our Beginning of Year Mass was wonderful whole school celebration.

Student Leaders:

Over the last couple of weeks our Year Six students have engaged in some learning around what makes a good student leader.

On Tuesday the 14^th of February all our Year 6 children were presented with their Year Six top, which signifies them as leaders within our school.  

We also ran a student leadership day with our Year Six students and a number of our Year 6 children decided to apply for our formal Student Leadership positions. In 2023 we have changed the structure of our Student Leadership positions at St Pius X. We have introduced 4 School Captain positions and there will continue to be 8 Sports Team Captains and 8 Sports Team Vice Captains. In order to be considered for this role the students were required to complete a written application and then prepare a speech which they presented to their peers and teachers. I must say that I was very impressed with the quality of the students who presented and it would be fair to say that there were more than 20 students who were worthy of undertaking a formal student leadership role in 2023. I have included the list of student leaders for 2023 and congratulate them on their achievement of being nominated.

Congratulations to all of our year 6 students who had the courage to put themselves forward for a leadership position.

“Leadership is not about a title or a designation. It's about impact, influence, and inspiration.” (Robin S Sharma).

School Captains

Yesha Patel
Levi Lanfranco
Isabelle Gaston
Mia Edge

Sports Captains

School Board Open Meeting:

On Monday, March 20^th  all parents and community members are invited to an open School Board meeting. At this meeting I will share our plans with the community for our building programs, future school developments and vision for St Pius X school moving forward. We will also present our Chair of the Board report for 2022. This will also be an opportunity to meet the 2023 School Board.

This evening will commence at 6:30pm with drinks and nibbles, followed the meeting at 7:00pm. I anticipate that this meeting will conclude by 7:45pm.

We were absolutely delighted with the response for nominations for our School Board. We had a large number of nominations for this position. Early next week information will be sent out about the nominees then families will be given an opportunity to vote for two members to represent the community on the School Board in 2023 & 2024.

An invitation to our open School Board meeting along with the voting slip will be sent home via the SZapp next week.

Sports Day

Just a reminder that our whole school Sports Day will be held at Bridgestone Athletics Centre at Salisbury on Thursday April 13^th. Information about this day will be sent home next week. This year parents will have the option to transport their child to and from the venue or book a seat for their child on a bus that will leave from the school. Please keep an eye out for this information.

Student Reports and Parent & Teacher meetings  

In 2023 all Catholic Schools will be using a program called SEQTA to generate their student reports. The report formats will look a bit different to our previous reports as we only have a small number of different templates to choose from. One of the main differences in our reports will be that there will only be one general comment included with the report along with the student grades for both achievement and effort. In order provide as much information to parents as possible about their child’s progress we will be changing the structure of our parent and teacher meetings and providing families with an extra opportunity to meet with their child’s teacher for a formal meeting early in Term Three.

We will still be hosting parent and teacher meetings for parents wishing to have these at the end of Term One (Monday 3^rd and Tuesday 4^th of April). These meetings will be a 10 minute opportunity for you to catch up with your teacher to see how your child is settling in and ask any questions you have about their social or academic progress.

Early in Term Three, there we be another set of formal parent and teacher meetings which will be 15 minutes in duration, where parents can sit down with their child’s class teacher and discuss the student report that will be sent home at the end of Term Two.

As always parents are welcome to book a time to meet with their child’s class teacher whenever they see the need to and do not have to wait for these formal opportunities in order to discuss their child’s progress.

Pupil Free Day

Just a reminder that next Friday March 10^th  will be pupil free day. On this day our staff will be undertaking training on the new SEQTA reporting formats which have been outlined above.

Staffing Announcement

Many of you would have read the news last week that James Lloyd will be leaving St Pius at the end of this term to take up a new leadership role within the Archdiocese of Adelaide as Pastoral Leader: Justice, Healing and Inclusion. This will be a wonderful opportunity for James and a big loss for our community. We will ensure that we have a community celebration for James closer to the end of this term. Stay tuned for more details. 

TUITION FEES INSTALMENT 1

Instalment 1 of Tuition Fees was due on Friday 24/2/23. 

Statements were  posted on Friday 3^rd February. 

If you have entered into a part time agreement to pay your fees over the whole year this due date does not apply. 

Please note that Years 4, 5, and 6 students will be attending a camp this year.  This charge has been added to your yearly account as a separate item.  You can either pay this camp fee upfront if you chose to pay your fee account in full, pay it part time over the year with your normal part time payments or wait until the camp note goes home later this year and pay the cost before your child attends the camp.

If you were unable to meet the 24/2/23 deadline for paying your fee amount, please do not hesitate to contact me and part time arrangements can be made.  For parent’s convenience, EFT, BPay, QKR, Visa and Mastercard are available. 

If you wish to pay your fees with internet banking, please ensure that you use the BPAY Reference number which can be found at the bottom of your statement.  If you chose to pay by Direct Funds Transfer, please use the Family/Billing ID number at the top right side of your statement.  This will ensure that the funds are applied to the correct account.

If you are holders of a Health Care Card you may be eligible for School Card and therefore Fee Remission.  Please see me if you feel you may meet the criteria or have any queries relating to fees.  Please note that cut off dates apply to School Card Applications so the earlier you lodge these, the more chance that eligibility will be granted promptly.  School Card applications can take up to six weeks to process and you will be notified by a letter re eligibility.

Thank you,

JULIE PARSONS
FINANCE MANAGER

An open school board meeting held in the Gymnasium on the 20^th March.

We extend an invitation to anyone who would like to join us, to hear about the projects currently in place at St Pius X, to get a better understanding of how the board works and an opportunity to vote for those who have nominated to represent the board this year.

The school has applied for a grant from the state government of SA, to develop the open space area and shade over the basketball court. We are awating costings for this project and hope that the grant will cover the significant cost to cover this entire area. 

In a Building update: Works are ongoing for this project and due for completion and handover in June 2023. The new area, stage 3A, will house the music suites, toilets and classrooms for students. Stages 1 and 2 have now been completed.

A new bike rack area, fully covered, is now ready for the children to use. Bikes can now be housed safely and securely at school. 

The Board is supporting the rolling out of The Resilience Project, an initiative which will allow teachers to work with students on building up mindset, confidence and providing them the tools to cope with any challenging situations they may encounter.

Reporting Absences

If your child will be absent from school please notify this through SZapp - Absences tab, as well as notifying your child'd class teacher.

Thank you

Uniform

School monogrammed hats must be worn by all children in Terms 1 & 4. Please ensure your childs hat is clearly labelled. School hats can be purchased from the Front Office, via QKR or from the Uniform Shop - Uniform Shop Online

All students must be wearing full School Uniform including predominantly white sport shoes. SPARX T-shirts are not part of the school uniform.

Parking  

Parking is not permitted in the bus zone outside the Kiss'n'Drop on Hillburn Avenue. Police and Council officers regularly patrol this area and issue fines. Staff will ask drivers to move on if they stop in this space.

Thank you for keeping our children safe.

SAPSASA Trials 

SAPSASA Trial information has been sent out to parents/caregivers of Year 5 and 6 Students - keep a look out for it.

Harmony Week is the celebration that recognises our diversity and brings together Australians from all different backgrounds. It’s about inclusiveness, respect and a sense of belonging for everyone.​ Education is a key focus for Harmony Week. The St Pius X School community will be celebrating Harmony Week from Monday 20^th – Friday 24^th March. Classes will be participating in a range of activities to promote cultural diversity in a fun and engaging way!

On Tuesday 21^st March, students will have the opportunity to experience ‘A Taste of Harmony’ by enjoying food items from our international menu. Food items available to order include Italian gelato, Vietnamese rice paper rolls, Greek spanakopita, and Portuguese tarts. Please see the attached menu for individual pricing. Orders will need to be placed and purchased through the Qkr! app. The app will be open for orders from  Monday 6^th March 10am – Sunday 12^th March 9pm. For catering purposes, we will be unable to take orders past this date, and students will not be able to purchase food on the day. Please note: the canteen will remain open for regular lunch orders.

We look forward to sharing a week of cultural experiences together!

Check out our menu options here - Harmony Day Food orders

St_Pius_X_and_Kildare_College_Tour_2023

Thank you to everyone who joined us for the P&F meeting last week. It was great  to see so many people attend and wonderful to meet some new members of our community.

We will be holding our annual Mother's Day Stall on Friday 12th May at school. We will be putting a call out for volunteers in the next few weeks. Stall helpers need to be a registered volunteer - if you would like to become a registered volunteer please contat Susan Trimboli in the school office on 8266 9400.

to contact us email pandf@stpiusx.catholic.edu.au

Click here to read the latest online edition of The Southern Cross February 2023.