Dear Parents and Caregivers,

The Gospel on Sunday contained the much loved and well-known verse ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength’ and ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself! There is no other commandment greater than these.’ These words comprise part of the response of Jesus to a question put to him by one of the scribes of Jerusalem asking, ‘which is the first of all the commandments?’

The question was placed in the context of the law of the Ten Commandments, which is contained in the book of Jewish law known as the Torah. This book comprises the first five books of the Bible (Pentateuch) and is the code that still forms the basis of much of Judeo-Christian law and morality today. We often think of a law as something that is externally imposed upon us. However, the Hebrew word for law ‘torah’ has it’s derivation in the verb yara, which means ‘to throw.’  Instead of laws being seen as something imposed upon us they could be seen as tools to cast us in the right direction. Jesus was able to condense the wisdom of the commandments into one word: Love - the love of our God and the love of our neighbour.

Essentially it is this commandment of Jesus that forms the fabric of life at Mary Immaculate. It is our communal hope that Mary Immaculate is a place founded in love and one that allows the experiences of love to come to fruition.

Certainly, we aspire to develop in our students a love of learning, a passion that will hopefully become a life-long aspiration for all our students. Our relationships too are governed by love. The journey of learning about the great gift of love begins in the family and moves outward. Love is not a one-dimensional concept. In learning about love we also learn lessons about being disappointed, misunderstood and hurt. We are also reminded that none of us is totally innocent of hurting others. It is here that we learn to forgive, as well as to ask for and accept the forgiveness of others. We learn that despite our best intentions we usually fall short of being the person God intends us to be. But God, just like a loving parent, reminds us to ‘come as we are’ and that we are loved even when we are at our least lovable.

Inspirational love also exists between teachers and students and between the students and their friends. The daily work of our school and our staff is an expression of this love.

Underpinning all our actions and emotions is the preeminent response of Jesus - to love our God with all our heart and all our being. It is the desire to seek oneness with our God that makes a school such as Mary Immaculate truly different.

Our School Motto to make ‘Christ Our Way and Life’ speaks of our search to bring to life our relationship with our God and with others. At Mary Immaculate we so regularly find evidence of our God, in action, in work, in learning and in thought. We find our God with, and through each other. In doing so we give ourselves the grace to love our God above all else and to love our fellow neighbours as ourselves.

Who will be the neighbour in your midst this week that will provide the vehicle to bring you closer to your God?

Tina Murray

PRINCIPAL 

WORLD TEACHERS’ DAY

World Teachers' Day will be celebrated this Friday 30 October 2020.

In a year unparalleled by challenges we are extremely grateful for the essential service provided by our amazing teacher who, with the support of parents and carers have ensured that the education of our students has been able to continue.

I encourage you to take an opportunity to express your gratitude to our wonderful teachers. The following link will provide templates that you may wish to use with your children to commemorate this very special day.  

Please never underestimate the power that simple words of gratitude can have on the life and work of a teacher.

Advice regarding the need for medical clearance for students returning to school

If any student does not attend school because they are unwell, they are required to provide medical clearance before returning.

This includes:

1. When a student is sent home unwell they are required to provide medical clearance before returning to the school site
2. When a student proactively stays home because of illness (i.e. they are recorded as 'sick'), they are required to provide medical clearance before returning to the school site.
3. Students who have had a COVID test are required to provide confirmation of a negative result so this can be added to our school register.

SPECIALIST LESSONS

Each week students have access to specialist lessons delivered by Mrs Bryant (Library / English), Creative Arts-Drama (Mrs Potter), PE (Mr Holmes) while their class teachers access Professional Planning Time (PPT). In order to support access to these strands during Term 4 the time allocation is from 40 minutes to 1 hour. This means that students will access the three specialist lessons on a rotational roster and will not be accessing each lesson each week.

Please Note: Whether students are rostered for PE / Library or not they are required to wear their Sport Uniform and bring their Library bag  on the following days. 

PARENT SURVEY

Thank you to the parents who have already provided input via the Annual School Report online survey. In 2020 we have faced many challenges and disruptions to our normal operations and in many ways we have been unable to operate as we normally would have.

We greatly value all feedback and suggestions as it will assist in the preparation of the Annual School Report and contribute to in planning for 2021.

The survey can be accessed by pasting the URL listed below into your web browser.

https://forms.gle/P2SA8KWTKEhrH1PL7

If you would prefer to complete this survey as a hard copy these will be available through the Office. This survey will be available for input for the next 4 weeks.