St Pat's News

We Acknowledge the Gunditjmara people, the Traditional Owners of the land on which we are gathered today.

We respect and honour Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elders, past, present and future. We acknowledge their stories, traditions and living cultures on this land and commit to building a brighter future together.

Dear Parents and Carers,

It's Folkie week!  The school is gearing up for one of it's busiest weekends on the calendar.  Our school grounds will be transformed into a camping facility while many of our families will be involved in supervising and working at the BBQ at the Folkie arena. Thank you to all who have volunteered to assist with these major fundraising activities.  I hope to see many of you enjoying the music and buying a sausage or hamburger at our Folkie BBQ.  We will all enjoy a slower pace next week.  

Kind regards,

Olga Lyons, Principal

The plot for a folk festival at Port Fairy was hatched around August 1977 in the Bush Inn Hotel in Geelong by the small group who had restarted the Geelong Folk Music Club in May 1977.  It was suggested to look at Port Fairy,  as it offered very good venues and amenities and had a very traditional and historic atmosphere. The flavour of folk music was more traditional Celtic and Australian. The first festival was to be highlighted as presenting ‘Irish and Australian’ music. Since 1977, just over 2000 acts and around 8000 artists have appeared at the festival.

St. Patrick’s Day (March 17) is the feast day of St. Patrick, patron saint of Ireland. Born in Roman Britain in the late 4th century, he was kidnapped at the age of 16 and taken to Ireland as a slave. He escaped but returned about 432 CE to convert the Irish to Christianity. By the time of his death on March 17, 461, he had established monasteries, churches, and schools. Many legends grew up around him—for example, that he drove the snakes out of Ireland and used the shamrock to explain the Holy Trinity. Ireland came to celebrate his day with religious services and feasts. St. Patrick's Day is celebrated on Thursday, March 17, 2022.

To celebrate our school's patron saint we will have year level liturgies in the morning, followed by a hot dog lunch provided by the Parents & Friends.  Then the fun begins with Kaboom Sports and a Talent Quest. 

Dental forms were sent home last week for you child to participate in the free School Dental Initiative. Forms are to be returned to the classroom teachers by March 28.

The dental van is expected to be at the school the week of May 30.

Sporting Schools Program

The Sporting Schools program this year will run on Wednesday and Thursday afternoons after school from 3.20pm - 4.30pm. This program runs for 7 weeks each term. Term 1 finishes on Thursday March 24. Tom Sell, one of our Learning Support Officers, will be coordinating the program this year, along with our trainees.

Attendance forms are located on the Skoolbag App. Attendance slips must be filled out by 10am for each day your child is attending Sporting Schools. Any child without an attendance form will not be permitted to attend. 

Please use the Skoolbag App for each session your child is going to attend.

If you do not have the Skoolbag App, click on the link for instructions.

https://www.moqproducts.com.au/skoolbag/installation-instructions/

Our Athletics Carnival at the Brauander athletics track in Warrnambool is the highlight of our sporting calendar.  Parents are welcome to attend and view the events from the pavilion area and around the outside of the arena.  The teams will assemble in the middle of the oval. 

The Coffee Van will be attending, so we ask that you support  this business. 

On Friday 18th March the canteen will re-open with a more extensive new look menu. This year the canteen will be outsourced to our, local bakery, The Village Bakehouse. While volunteers are still required to collect and distribute the food, outsourcing should make it a far less labour intensive task. Orders are now available to be placed via CDF pay. https://spportfairy.cdfpay.org.au/

The cut off for orders will strictly be at 8.30am on Friday mornings. Please ensure a clearly named empty container or lunch bag is packed, adequate enough to fit the order. For new parents to the school, students are instructed on lunch order mornings to place their empty lunch container in the classroom's lunch order tub. Classroom tubs contain tomato sauce for pastries and scissors to assist with opening the packaging. Due to the school's no rubbish policy, all wrappings and packaging are required to be taken home by the student. 

I would like to thank outgoing Canteen Coordinator, Michelle Gapes for her years of service in this role.