St Joseph's Parish School Weipa eNewsletter

2022 Newsletter Term 2 Week 1

Dear Families of St Joseph’s,

Welcome back to Term 2! We hope you had a great Easter holiday break. It really is lovely to see the students after the holidays and hear all about what they did and where they went! We have a fantastic term of learning ahead of us and look forward to working with all of our students and families.

This term we welcome back Mrs Gear from leave and have Mrs turner away on long service leave for first three weeks. Now that there are less restrictions with travel, this term we will again welcome visitors from Catholic Education Services. Mr Bill Dixon, the Director Of CES will be joining us for our Mother’s Day celebrations.

Congratulations to Mrs O’Brien (Ms Rowe) who got married over the holidays. We wish both Amanda and Ben every happiness and are pleased to be able to share this beautiful photo of them looking so happy together.

Last term we had to postpone our Swimming Carnival till Term 4. We will have some additional swimming days on PE days in Term 4 before holding our carnival. We are waiting for date confirmationed but will share with the comminuty asap.

It was only a short time ago that we gathered to remember how Jesus died for all of us. Since then, we have journeyed through Holy Week and celebrated Easter.

Today we come together to commemorate ANZAC Day. Instead of our normal Friday morning assembly this week, our staff and students prepared a moving ANZAC liturgy and service in the afternoon. Thank you to our special guests Lance Corporal McBride and Major Theo Hadgis for attending our service. A special thank you to Major Theo Hadgis our guest speaker for making the ANZAC spirit so real for our students. We are grateful for his time and his insightful presentation.

In coming together on this special day of remembrance, we think of all those who serve and have served in our Defence Force. We think of and pray for the safety of all those who are on active service right now and we ensure that we never forget.

Each year, students from St Joseph’s Parish School have the opportunity to March in the Weipa ANZAC Day parade at the dawn service. We encourage all St Joseph’s students to participate in the march. The parade will assemble at Hibbard Park at 5:15am and begin at 5:25am. This an extremely important and reverent occasion for our students to remember the sacrifice and service of our Australian Defence Force personnel. For those children representing St Joseph’s School, they need to wear the regular formal uniform (not sport uniform) but no hat. The march will commence at 5:25am and will finish at the Weipa Cenotaph with the service beginning at 5:30am. Students may be collected after the ANZAC Service has finished. The RSL Weipa sub-branch and Men’s Shed will be hosting a Gunfire breakfast from 6:30am at the Assembly Hall.

We have an important term ahead of us filled with some significant events. These have all been listed in the newsletter so you can plan ahead, but I have outlined the next two weeks below. you.

Cross Country The annual St Joseph's Cross Country will be held in Week 2 on Thursday 28^th April. We will be starting at 7am and running the longest races first to avoid the heat. Please see schedule in our sporting section. With such an early start for us all, we are hoping to provide a BBQ breakfast burger (bacon, egg, sausage) for $4 each but will need volunteers to help make this possible. Please let me know as soon as possible if you can help.

Feast Day of St Joseph the Worker Friday the 29^th we will be celebrating the ‘Feast of St Joseph the Worker’. All families are invited to attend our whole school Mass to celebrate and to induct our new St Joseph’s student leaders for 2022. Mass will start at 9am and be followed by morning tea and cutting of the cake. After first break all students will then get together in mixed aged group to complete our St Joey’s ‘Amazing Race’. Each team will follow clues and solve puzzles, complete physical and fun challenges as the race from station to station around the school. Looking forward to sharing lots of laughs and

Mother’s Day

St Joseph’s Mums and important women in our lives, please come and join us at our special ‘Boho’ themed Mother’s Day Picnic Breakfast on Friday 6^th May at 8:30am.

So that we can show you how much we appreciate your hard work and love, St Joseph’s Staff and children have planned a magical morning of food, entertainment, music, dance and most of all fun.

Gourmet breakfast box platters
Gifts, prizes and raffle
Entertainment
Music and party games
Art display

The Mother’s Day Picnic will be a fabulous celebration filled with fun, food and festivities. Buy your ticket on flexi-school, pick out a comfortable cushion to bring and get ready to be pampered! To help with catering numbers and seating plans please fill out the parent slip emailed to all families this week.

Fund raising Term One A huge thank you to our school community for your generous support of our recent fundraising activities. With fundraising activities last term our community raised $ 721.05 in total. Well done St Joseph’s!

Flood Appeal Total from our Disco and Easter Raffles $604.2
CARTIAS Total raised from our HARMONY Day Free Dress $120.85

PREP 2023 SIBLING ENROLMENT PAPERWORK Due by 31 March 2022

It is that time of year again where we urgently request for any existing family who may have a child eligible for Prep in 2023 to ensure their enrolment application paperwork has been submitted to the school. Children who are born between 01 July 2017 to 30 June 2018, are eligible for entry into the 2023 Prep program.

It is vitally important that we have secured a place for children of existing families prior to offering places to new families and as such, request our current families to please complete and submit enrolment forms no later than Thursday 28^th April 2022. The enrolment forms can now be found via our website. If you have trouble accessing this form, please see us at the office for further assistance and thank you to those families who have already submitted their paperwork.

Wishing you all a great long weekend.

God Bless,

Megan

Our first day back of Term 2 started with an Easter Liturgy to celebrate the Risen Christ and the 50 day season of Easter. We listened to John’s Gospel reading which retold when Mary Magdala visited the tomb of Jesus to find it empty. She and the disciples were in disbelief and shocked not knowing where Jesus was. This was the start of the Easter Journey for them and us as we move towards celebrating the Resurrection of Jesus.

Throughout the season of Easter, the prayer spaces in each classroom will represent the liturgical season with colour and symbols to include:

A White cloth to symbolise the change in the Church's liturgical season. As we enter the season of Easter- white represents new life.  

A Candle- The special large candle lit at the Easter Vigil is called the Paschal Candle. It symbolises the Risen Jesus who said, “I am the light of the world.”

Eggs- Enclosing and protecting little chicks, eggs represent new life in the world, and so they also represent new life in the Church. With their smooth, hard shell hiding the new life within, they symbolise a hidden promise just like Christ coming out of the tomb.  

Cross- The cross reminds us of the sacrifice He has made for us.   

What does Easter mean to you?  

How can you show that you celebrating the Risen Christ for the next 50 days? 

What will you do to bring hope to others?

Wishing you many blessing during the Season of Easter.