Embrace ........

On Monday 16th September, St Vincent’s will have a dress rehearsal in preparation for our upcoming performance. This will take place at school. This dress rehearsal gives us the opportunity to ensure everyone is prepared for the concert on the 19th of September later that week. 

Please send any costume items you have accumulated in a bag, clearly labelled with your child’s name on each item. The school has been able to supply some costume items for certain dances (as per notes), students will be able to change into their costume/s for the rehearsal and back into their school uniforms so they don’t get their costumes dirty.

On Thursday 19th September we will go to GPAC for a run through of our performances and a quick rehearsal of the entire performance. Please note for the rehearsal on the 19th September costumes will not be required. Thanks to everyone who has signed the excursion permission on PAM.

What to Wear: Sports Uniform

What to Bring: School Bags - Plenty of Snacks, Lunch and labelled Drink Bottle

* Some senior students with acting roles may be asked to bring costume items.

Doors open at 6:00pm (Students can be dropped off from this time). Ticket holders, please use this time as an opportunity to have a tea/coffee in the foyer while you wait for others to arrive and the theatre to be opened. Be sure to bring along some change and buy some raffle tickets to win some of the amazing prizes donated by local businesses, P & F have gathered over $1,500 in prizes. Raffle tickets will be sold on the night and drawn at the conclusion of the performance. 

Students will need to be dropped off at the meeting rooms no later than 6:40pm. This is so classes can finalise their costumes and move into position ready for the beginning of the performance.

Note: Car parking will get busy so please allow enough time to park and walk to the venue.

Show starts at 7:00pm. Please make sure you are seated no later than 6:50pm, ready for the show to begin. 

Once the show has finished, students will be taken back to the meeting rooms to pack up and collect their belongings. Students will wait with their class until a parent or guardian comes to collect them. 

St Vincent’s School Concert 2024, ‘Let’s Get Started’ will be professionally recorded and copies of the performance will be made available to the St Vincent's School Community in Term 4 . If you have any concerns about your child being part of the filming process or distribution of the performance, please let us know. 

Reminders of key times:

6:00pm - Doors to the GPAC foyer and meeting rooms open, students can be dropped off to the meeting rooms from this time.

• Students arrive in costume
• Bring a labelled drink bottle

6:30pm - Doors to the Auditorium will be open

6:40pm - Students must be dropped off to their teachers in the conference rooms no later than this time

6:50pm - Audience please be seated ready to enjoy the show

7:00pm - Show starts

9.00pm - Estimated Finish

NO PERSONAL BELONGINGS ALLOWED - EG. IPAD, PHONE

Dear Families

A busy newsletter says plenty about a school.  We certainly have plenty to celebrate and enjoy but I do feel sorry for Mrs. Marino who has the hard task of pulling all these articles together.

After another busy few weeks I feel this newsletter is a GRATITUDE EDITION.  Our Father's Day celebrations started in prayer and it was so encouraging to see so many Dads, men and family gather with our children.  Special thanks to all the children who had a role, the staff who coordinated the service and especially Aaron who offered such a powerful reflection on Fatherhood.  Afterwards we had many guests take advantage of the opportunity to visit classrooms. The children then had the chance to visit the Fathers Day Stall.  At lunch we enjoyed a snag supplied the  P & F Group ... on bread kindly donated by Three Bears BBQ - thanks to the Dunn Family!  Also thanks to the King Chef Kev, the Grill Apprentices Cohen & Jacob and the Kitchen Crew.

Our P & F Band have been busy working in the background putting together the Fathers Day Stall and the upcoming Concert Raffle.  The Concert Raffle in particular is loaded up with so many quality prizes - I urge everyone to get out and sell as many tickets as possible.  It is a positive sign when the raffle book production team have had to reconvene to create book spare books.  Please take a look at the Sponsors list, visit them and say a very sincere and joyful "Thanks".

The media this week has been busy publishing the news that the Federal and State Government have announced changes to the rules around children accessing Social Media.  In my first year as principal of St. Vincent's I engaged INFORM & EMPOWER as a key tool in our Child Safety programs, focussing on improving the cyber-safety skills and awareness of our students, staff and parents.  Across this term we have highlighted some important days - National Child Protection Week, Bullying-No Way Day and today, RUOK? Day.  These opportunities have given us the chance to engage with our children and I have been very impressed with the mature and informed way our students have described their online behaviours, as well as their concerns.  These conversations have identified attitudes, behaviours, and habits that have been prevalent across our nation.  In engaging with different families on this issue it is evident that parents are not aware of what their children are exactly doing online.  Can I please ask parents to take aware of the cyber-safety information on our SchoolsTV platform and read over the Inform & Empower Bulletins.  I am more than happy to share my learnings with parents as both an educator and a parent of teenagers.  Sadly I think parents would be unpleasantly surprised with the type of online behaviour that is typical of Australian children, so it is highly unlikely St. Vincent's children are immune.  Connecting with your children in communicating your expectations about safe, appropriate online behaviour is a critical component of parenting in the 21st Century.

As we hit the end of Term 3 I encourage everyone to take advantage of all the information contained in this newsletter.  Next week was have our Concert, our bi-annual extravaganza showcasing the Performing Arts elements of our school.  This year we have the added benefit of the work Cam Greenslade has completed with our students in Digital Technology.  I personally cannot wait for next Thursday!

With today being RUOK? Day I encourage everyone to take some quiet time to check out the wonderful RUOK? resources linked to the start of this email.

Have a great week, Dave

We have sent out different newsletters and communications about our concert over the past few weeks.  For reference we have added the key pieces of information to a page on the school website.  Feel free to acess this information via this link: