SMC NEWS 2022 - Term 2 Week 5

Principal's Note

Dear Parents and Carers,

Thank you for your patience last week in a challenging time for all concerned.  I hope you and your son have not been significantly impacted by the weather.  If you need some support for your son, whether academic or pastoral, please let one of us know.  We are happy to help.

Toowoomba Catholic Schools - Excellence Awards

I am proud to acknowledge the following staff who have been nominated for TCS Excellence Awards in 2022.  Our staff are recognised by their faith, integrity, action and excellence at St Mary's College.  What a wonderful teaching and support staff we have!  We wish them well in the final judging for TCS Excellence Awards for 2022.

Hector Peralta - Excellence in teaching and learning: Secondary expert teacher

Hector Peralta has been teaching Religious Education classes at the College since his appointment. He has had a diverse range of classes in this time and has always ensured that he employs tactics to build student engagement and interest in the classroom. Hector has formulated and designed many resources which have been shared across faculties. His planning is meticulous, and he employs a variety of learning activities to engage all students and is also generous to share resources or information with his colleagues. Hector, at various points has been the lead teacher for Religious Education across years 7 to 9.

David Roy - Excellence in teaching and learning:  Secondary expert teacher

David Roy is a man held in very high regard within the St Mary’s College community. Aside from being an all-round wonderful human, his dedication and application to his work within the Learning Enrichment space is second to none. David gives much of his own time to vulnerable, challenged and at-risk students. This is indicated daily by his arrival and departure times from the College. He is the first to arrive and often the last to leave, as he makes himself available to all students before and after school for tutelage or a listening ear.

 Jake Weise - Excellence in teaching and learning: Secondary expert teacher 

Jake Weise is absolutely dedicated to the students of St Mary’s College, which is evidenced by his heavy involvement in sporting and extra curricula activities. These roles often see him giving his own time to the betterment of the students through committing to travel, coach, train and support most afternoons, weekends and school holidays. Jake coaches the under 13’s Rugby League side (Struddy’s Cup), the Opens Soccer team (EREA Football Tournament) and the Open Futsal team (State school Campion of Campions). Off the field, and inside the classroom, he is subject coordinator for Year 7 Physical Education, Year 7 English and Year 12 Essential English.This role includes mentoring staff, developing unit plans and leading marking moderation. 

Stephen Sowter  -Excellence in Leadership: Middle Leadership

Stephen Sowter is a very highly regarded member of the wider leadership group at St Mary’s College.A reputation earnt though his sincere, fair and learned approach to his work form many years as a Head of House. At the commencement of 2022, Stephen was appointed to the newly minted position of Director of Pedagogy.  His interest in pedagogical approach has been based in research and study that he has undertaken focusing on learning styles and impact. His immersion in his study enables him to be well equipped and informed to approach his pedagogical work to develop and improve the teaching and learning capacity of all teaching staff at the College.   

Jade Love - Excellence in Leadership: Middle Leadership

Jade is a very highly regarded member of the wider leadership group at St Mary’s College. Jade was appointed to the Director of Curriculum (Years 5 – 9) during 2020.Her interest in this area of learning is informed by research and a level of teaching skill that includes teaching students across a broad age range. She has a background in music teaching and interestingly, in pastoral care and wellbeing, before securing her position in curriculum. This experience gives Jade a well-rounded knowledge base to draw from, as she understands the different perspectives across many key areas of the College. 

Russell Craymer - Excellence in leadership: Middle leadership 

 Russell Craymer is a respected and very highly regarded member of the wider leadership team at St Mary’s College. Off the back of almost five years as a Head of House at the College, this year Russell was appointed to the position of Pastoral Leader.  His dedication to his work is based on ongoing immersion in research and study on boy specific behaviour management and pastoral care. This knowledge and understanding informs his work with staff at the College, with a view to gradually developing the self-directive and self-reflective capacity of all boys at St Mary’s College.  As an old boy, Russell innately understands what it means to be a St Mary’s man, and embodies the faith, action, integrity and excellence demanded of students and staff of the College. 

Kevin Murphy - Excellence in Leadership: Middle Leadership

Mr Murphy is student and staff focused in all that he does, and that focus reflects his deep spirituality. Every human being is seen by him to be in the “image and likeness of God”, and he shows respect and support so that all will achieve their full potential. As the Curriculum Leader (Religious Education) Mr Murphy is always looking at ways that he can work to enliven the curriculum so that students and staff experience the loving hand of our God. Mr Murphy is a deeply caring man who is always on the look-out for staff and students who may be on the edged. He reflects the Touchstones of Edmund Rice by each day in many simple acts to building an Inclusive Community, that reflects a commitment to justice and solidarity. Mr Murphy has worked to rebuild the units across all year levels and put in place a leadership team across those year levels.  Mr Murphy is a man with incredible leadership skills, particularly good interpersonal skills, and a wonderful work ethic.

Desiree Williams  - Excellence in education support: Teaching and learning support

Desiree Williams, affectionally known as Desi, represents the valuable contribution of teacher aids. Her work within the St Mary’s College primary school is focused on engaging and assisting tier three students in the classrooms and the management of one to one learning intervention program. Desi employs her initiative to independently prepare resources for interventions and works with the boys to not only build their academic abilities but also their resilience and independence as learners. 

Tom Bower - Excellence in education support: Volunteer support in a school setting

Tom Bower, a retired Anglican Minister is an individual who dedicates his time, skill and expertise to the College in delivering exemplary learning opportunities through play.   In May 2020, Mr Bower approached the College with the idea to establish a board game group, with the view of creating a program where students could engage and build relationships with each other through the common enjoyment of games. Starting out with 20 members, this group, now known as The Irish Brigade sees upwards of 35 students and staff attending each week. Initially, Tom supplied most of the games himself, but with the popularity of the Irish Brigade, the College has now acquired a vast collection; including dexterity games, simple and complex board games, strategy games and tabletop war games with miniatures.  

Kirsty Eckhardt - Excellence in education support: Administration, finance and facilities support

Kirsty Eckhardt is a highly regarded member of the administration team at St Mary’s College.  Her role as Executive Assistant to the Principal also encompasses work in enrolments and human resources for the College.Kirsty provides a high level of leadership and service in these roles, where her work is defined by high quality outcomes and loyalty to St Mary’s College.  She has taken on further responsibility over the last 12 months to include significant projects in enrolments and staffing administration.  Her dedication and service provided to the College is reflected in the consistently high levels of feedback and regard held for Kirsty and the SMC administration team. 

Cate Power - Excellence in education support: Administration, finance and facilities support. 

Cate Power is a long serving, dedicated, highly regarded and respected member of the administration team at St Mary’s College. Her role as administration support to the Assistant Principal – Student Engagement is a critical role to the successful operation of student engagement and welfare work at the College. In addition to providing executive support to the Assistant Principal – Student Engagement, Cate’s support services extend to the entire Student Engagement team of ten staff. She has held this role for a number of years, and in that time, has been able to refine and improve processes using innovative approaches and outside of the box thinking to both support the Student Engagement team, students, families and staff.  

Mrs Lucia Armstrong - Excellence in education support: Administration, finance and facilities support.

Mrs Armstrong is an outstanding example of our dedicated administration staff who work tirelessly behind the scenes to make things happen in our schools.  Mrs Armstrong is a selfless doer and a quiet achiever.  In all the tasks that she undertakes she is pleasant, prepared to seek solutions and always has a ready smile and a willingness to please. Mrs Armstrong’s present role incorporates support for the Assistant Principal Identity and Mission at SMC, as well as a key role in managing student enrolments.  In every difficulty, Mrs Armstrong always sought solutions, remedied the problem and had it resolved so that enrolments and interviews always went ahead with most parties never knowing that difficulties had occurred. She does all the administration behind the scenes for our faith-based programs, from booking venues, to arranging transport, ensuring photocopying and resources are prepared and following up the legalities of checking student permissions and details.  She is not afraid of hard work and always gives 110% in all she does. Mrs Armstrong is a team player, who through her quiet, caring manner inspires others to be engaged in the tasks at hand.

Peace,
Mr Brendan Stewart, College Principal - principal@stmaryscollege.com

Student Engagement News

Vaping

Recently, it has been reported that the use of e-cigarettes has increased dramatically among young people in Australia. This is an issue that the College is very much aware of, and we are continuing to work with our students around this dangerous trend.

It is important that parents are aware of the issues regarding vaping, and work with the College to support and educate our students in making better choices around the use of e-cigarettes. Below are a number of links that provide information for parents around vaping. I particularly recommend the last link which is a video by Child and Adolescent Psychologist, Michael Carr-Gregg.

If you have any concerns or would like to seek extra support on vaping, please get in touch with the College. 

What's On - Term 2, Weeks 6 & 7

Edmund Rice Day, sceduled for this Friday 19 May has been postponed to Wednesday 22 June, due to the currpent wet and boggy condition of the College grounds.

Mr Stephen Monk, Deputy Principal - monks@stmaryscollege.com

Curriculum News

NAPLAN Testing 

NAPLAN continues through to the 20th of May. Our Years 5, 7 & 9 students have been busy preparing for the testing and participating in practice sessions this term.  If your child is absent on the test session, they will be required to sit the testing during the scheduled catch-up sessions.

What to bring

It is important that all boys arrive to each NAPLAN session with the correct materials. This includes: 

• iPad (fully charged) 
• earphones 
• pencil case 

Last minute tips for students: 

• Ensure you have a good sleep and a full breakfast before the test. 
• Do your best with every question. 
• Read the whole question before deciding on an answer. 

• There will be questions that are difficult. Rather than worrying about this try and step through them, remember your strategies and do your best. 
• Remember all your equipment - fully charged iPad, headphones, pencil case. 
• Complete all questions you can do first, flag the questions you are unsure of and then go back and work on the others - the test does not have to be done in order. 

Mrs Jade Love, Years 5-9 Curriculum Leader - lovej@stmaryscollege.com 

Drama News

Eisteddfod Success!

Congratulations to St Mary’s Cultural Captain, Nikolas Elwell and fellow Year 12 student Caleb Allen for achieving 3rd place in the Senior Duologue section at the Toowoomba Eisteddfod last Monday evening!  Year 11 Drama students, Sean Woodall and Caedyn Stokell, were also one of the crowd favourites for their scene ‘Drama Class’. Well done, Gentlemen.

Earlier that evening, some of our younger boys also took part in the Duologue competition. Congratulations to Christian Kenyon and Uriel Meneses for all the work they put into rehearsing and performing in preparation for their Year 8 Duologue section. I am sure these boys learnt a lot from the experience and will be back next year to entertain the Toowoomba community with their talents again.

All these boys competed against some very talented students from several schools across the region and have done St Mary’s proud!

Mr John Condon, Director of Art and Drama - condonj@stmaryscollege.com 

Sport News

The annual 'St Mary's College Term 2 Sporting Fundraiser' is underway for 2022.

This fundraiser is aimed at helping support students who are engaging in school sporting pursuits here at the College. 

Our students continue to gain recognition for their sporting abilities with many students gaining Toowoomba, Zone and Darling Downs’ selection. A number of these students go on to gain selection in Queensland sides while a few select students gain the opportunity to represent Australia in their chosen sport. In recent years, we have averaged around one hundred students per year making Darling Downs teams.

Alongside this we have our Sporting Camps which see us competing against the best schools in the state and across the nation. We have had continued success across a variety of sports with credit to the amazing staff at St Mary's College who afford so much time and energy into helping support the boys.

This Fundraiser includes:

• College Sporting Camps: (CBSQ Basketball, EREA National Football Tournament, All Schools Touch, Senior Schools Cup Volleyball, Confraternity Shield Rugby League)
• Darling Downs Schools Sports
• Queensland School Sport
• National School Sport

 This excludes:

• Club Sport
• Club Representative pathways
  

Thank you to the following sponsors for donating goods/services to help us with our fund-raising initiative: 

• • Betros Bros
  • Brisbane Broncos
  • City Cave
  • Dynasty Sport
  • e-Sec Virtual Assistant
  • Kaboom Comics
  • Liebke Tyre Services
  • Millers Gourmet Meats
  • Murphy's Meringandan Pub
  • Pizza Guardians
  • Queensland Choice Meats
  • The Rock
  • Toowoomba Firewood Supplies
  • Up and Active Physiotherapy
  • World Gym

Mr Scott Cowan, Director os Sport - cowans@stmaryscollege.com 

Careers News

Contact the Careers Team

Please phone the College or email us at smc-careers@stmaryscollege.com to make an appointment (by phone, in person or Microsoft Teams).  We’re more than happy to assist you and your son with any queries you may have in areas such as, school-based apprenticeships, work experience, TAFE and university applications, career decision-making or industry connections. 

Mr Kris Glass, Career Development Practitioner - glassk@stmaryscollege.com

Mr Paul Barber, Career Support Officer - barberp@stmaryscollege.com

Ms Bronnie Littlewood, Career Support Officer - littlewoodb@stmaryscollege.com

Notice Board

The Hub

Support is available to all students who require assistance with homework, assignments or reviewing current classwork. Support is available in the Hub every morning before school from 7.00am and at both lunch breaks. Support will also be available after school on Thursday afternoons from 3.05pm until 4.00pm. If you would like further information, please get in touch.

  Mr Dave Roy, Learning Support Teacher - royd@stmaryscollege.com

Principal's Tours