Dear Parents, Guardians and Carers,

It was a very busy weekend in our parish of St Michaels. There were 3 beautiful celebrations of the Sacrament of First Communion at the parish Liturgies. Fr Aju and Deacon Tony, along with the parishioners, welcomed 54 children to the altar to receive the Body of Christ for the first time. Please continue to keep them in your prayers as they continue along their journey of faith.

SAFE ROAD FOR SAFE CYCLING PROGRAM

The Amy Gillett Foundation was recently successful in securing $6 million from the Australian Government to roll out our Safe Roads for Safe Cycling program. As part of this program, we’re undertaking a range of projects designed to make our streets safe for people in the community who want to ride a bike, especially our most vulnerable road users like children. 

One part of this program is BikeSpot 2023 – an interactive map which allows anyone to mark where they feel safe or unsafe while riding their bike. You can view the map and make your mark at: bikespot.org 

The BikeSpot map will close at the end of January 2024, so please get involved as soon as you can. This is a fantastic way to help keep active and healthy, and encourage sustainable transport. 

FISHING KITS

As advised in the newsletter issued in week 9 of term 3 the Victorian Government is investing $1.5 million from the Recreational Fishing Licence Trust Fund to provide up to 95,000 Little Angler Kits to primary school aged children in Victoria.

The free kits provide a wonderful school holiday activity for children with their families and help ease the cost of living, providing a fun activity close to home.

The kits have arrived and will be sent home today with the grade 5 students apart from any grade 5 child who we have received notification from the parents that they did not want them to receive the kit.

The kits include a rod, reel with line, tackle tray, some tackle and information on how to use them to catch a fish. Please note that the tackle tray includes fishing hooks. The tackle tray will be wrapped in cardboard and placed inside a pocket inside the fishing kit bag, which will be sealed with a cable tie to discourage students from opening their kits until they are with a parent or carer.

The Victorian Fisheries Authority will create a Little Angler hub on their website, which will be live when the kits start being distributed. It will have useful information, instructional videos and online resources about where and how to fish linking to existing resources from Fishcare and new resources to be produced just for the Little Angler Kits program.

This initiative aims to grow recreational fishing participation in Victoria by actively encouraging primary school aged children to learn how to fish, as well as learning more about marine life and the natural environment.

Kind regards

Jodie

DATES TO REMEMBER:

• 1st December - School Closure Day
• 8th December - End of year Mass
• 13th December - Graduation Mass
• 18th December - students last day
• 31st January - First day for students in Grades 1-6
• 1st February - First day for Foundation students

Kind regards

Jodie

Mission Day - Friday 24th November

I’d like to send a huge shout out to our St. Michael’s family for your generosity and support of all of the fundraising efforts for Catholic Mission this year. We have had casual clothes days, colouring competitions, guess the number of lollies in the jar and the fabulous Grade 5/6 market Day.

With all of these activities we have raised a little over $4200. This is a fantastic effort and could not have been achieved without the enthusiasm of our children and your support at home.

We set out with the focus of providing money for school books and supplies for the Children's Home in Timor-Leste. This money will provide loads of resources to be used by the children. 

Thank you for supporting this worthwhile cause.

Sue Rickwood

Each week students from each class are awarded Student of the Week certificates. These children are nominated for the example they have been within the school based on the School Wide Expectation focus for that week. The weekly focus will be from Wednesday until Tuesday the following week. Awards will be presented to students in the classroom on Thursday due to the student free day on Friday.

In Week 9 the School Wide Expectation focus is Respect : 

I treat my peers, teachers and learning environment with respect.

I show appreciation for the efforts of others.

I speak kindly to others.

I show justice and fairness to all.

I listen carefully to others.

Term 1 2024 STAP applications are now open

• Existing families who have a current 2023 approval for their child in the Student Travel Assistance Portal (STAP) (all traveller types – eligible, ineligible and conditional) and their 2024 year level is offered at the school/ campus currently enrolled at, will have their application automatically rolled over and submitted for 2024 – no action is required by families at this time however they will receive an e-mail when the application is submitted, and will be encouraged to log in to their STAP account and ensure all of the details are correct
  • where there will be a change to residential address or school (including moving to a new campus) for 2024, families will need to make a new 2024 application – this can be actioned from today
• Families who are new to the School Bus Program will need to create a new STAP account and make a new application for their child – this can be actioned from today
• Existing families with a new child accessing the School Bus Program in 2024 will need to log into their STAP account, add the new child, and make a new application for travel – this can be actioned from today

Further information on priority of access is located here School Bus Program: Criteria determining eligibility for the School Bus Program | education.vic.gov.au (see ‘Student priority of access to services’)

Families will have received their 2024 travel offer on Thursday 16 November 2023 and will need to log into their STAP account to review and accept their offer. Offers will be valid for 14 days.

Please be in contact with the Student Transport team on 1800 338 663 or schoolbus@education.vic.gov.au should you have any questions.

We have a substantial number of items in lost property at the moment. There are currently 22 sports jackets, 9 school jumpers and many drink bottles. Lost property is located under the student reception desk at the office. Parents and students are welcome to come and have a look through it for lost items. At the end of the school year any school unforms will go into our second hand uniform shop.