The Townsville Catholic Education Office is seeking feedback from its schools about Strategic Directions for the next  five years. Last night at the Board we discussed the following questions:

“What are some important areas that should inform our system focus for the next five years?”

• How are our communities changing?
• What will be the future needs of our students?
• What will be the future needs of our staff?
• Is there anything happening in the Church which could affect our schools?
• What do we need to improve in our system of schools to meet future challenges?

We would like your feedback too. Please consider sending me an email with your responses to these questions. My email address is: kmccarthy5@goodshepherd.catholic.edu.au

In a few weeks we are celebrating Fathers’ Day by inviting our Dads to join us for Brekky at our morning Cafe. Please keep an eye out for dates and details soon.

We are looking forward to the Arts and Technology Showcase next Tuesday. This will be a fantastic opportunity to present the wonderful achievements of our students in Visual Art, Drama, Music, Media, Digital Technology, Design Technology, Furniture and Engineering. I hope you can join us!

Thank you to all of our families who attended the Year 7 Stargazing Night on Tuesday night. What a way to celebrate National Science Week!

Have a blessed week.

Parents and teachers working together

Parents' engagement is well researched and cannot be stressed enough.

A child’s academic achievement depends on many factors, but no one factor is as significant as a parent’s involvement with their child’s learning.  

Studies have indicated that these children tend to have a more positive self esteem, be more motivated to learn, are more positive about school, achieve better grades, and have higher aspirations.  

An article by the Queensland College of Teachers encourages parents with the advice below:

Parents need to know that they can make a big difference when they:

• hold high expectations for their children;
• show interest in the things their children are interested in;
• value learning and model the behaviours of successful learners;
• give specific, rather than general, praise; and
• establish routines that promote health, well being and regular study.

Perkins, K. (2014). Parents and teachers: Working together to foster children’s learning. The Research Digest, QCT, 2014 (10). Retrieved from http://www.qct.edu.au

Please be in touch with your child’s teacher for any support you may need.

Year 11, 2022 SET Plan Meetings

Compass Conference bookings are open for SET Plan Meetings. These will take place with students, families and a member of the College Tracking Team in Week 7 (23-27 August). Each interview will be approximately 30 minutes, and a parent or guardian must attend this meeting for all students.

As you may be aware, in Queensland, students must be "learning or earning" for two years after they complete Year 10 OR they must complete a Queensland Certificate of Education (QCE), QCIA, Senior Statement or Certificate III or IV.

In the senior phase of learning (Years 10-12) students can choose from a wide range of learning options that will help them when they leave school whether they are planning to go to university, TAFE, take up an apprenticeship or get a job.

To assist with the transition into Year 11, all Year 10 students across Queensland develop a senior education and training (SET) plan. A SET plan is a confidential document that students will develop, in consultation with their parents/carers and key staff at Good Shepherd to map their learning and career pathways. These SET plans help students to:

•  set & achieve learning goals in Years 11 & 12;
•  include flexible pathway options in their senior course of study;
•  think about their education, training and career options after Year 12;
•  structure their learning around abilities, interests & ambitions;
• communicate with parents, teachers & guidance officers about learning pathways &  post-school plans.

In preparation for this meeting, we have compiled this pathways planning information presentation to outline the SET Planning process, and senior school journey. Please take some time to look through the slides and write down any questions you might have so that we can discuss them at your meeting.

To book an interview please login to your Compass Parent Portal. If you have any questions or concerns (or need help booking!), you can email me, or contact the College office on (07) 4749 9400. Bookings will close this Thursday, 19 August.

Compass School Manager Phone App

If you have a smartphone, we would encourage you to download and log into the Compass School Manager Application. We send a range of information through this application, and it is a helpful tool to keep up to date with what’s going on at the College, to access report cards, to log attendance information and also book parent teacher conferences.

Booking Parent Teacher Conferences on Compass

Bookings using a desktop computer:

On the home screen, beside the student you wish to make bookings for, click ‘Book Parent Student Teacher Conference’.

A list of parent-teacher conference cycles will be displayed along with their booking status. Click on the relevant cycle.

Your booking sheet will be displayed and will show your available booking times. Click on a time in the grid to display teachers available for booking at that time.

Bookings using a mobile phone (Compass School Manager App)

• From the Compass home screen on your app, select the menu (top left) and click Conferences.
• From the list of parent-teacher conference cycles.
• Select the relevant cycle you wish to book for.
• Select the student you wish to place a booking for.
• Select the class or interview group.
• Click on a time slot to make a booking and confirm.

Parenting Tips for Your Child's Online Safety - Take #4

Here are the last five tips from Safe on Social Media on how parents can support their children in navigating the online world better. 

Tip #13. Know how to take a screenshot in case you need it as evidence. This is also a great tool to teach kids as young as possible.

Tip #14. Teach your child not to give away any personal information. Use a fake username like "popcorn fairy" or something. Teach your kids never to give away things like name, address, age, phone number, where they go to school, etc.

Tip #15. Watch out for what is in the background. It is easy for people to determine a location, take a screenshot, and zoom in on a certificate on the wall.

Tip #16. Turn off location tracking in your device settings, turn location tracking off for major social media apps completely. 

Tip #17. Set time limits and be very clear about how long they can be online, or they can be watching all kinds of stuff for hours!

School Attendance

Sourced & amended from: Cluey Learning

There are so many factors that impact student achievement — choice of school, teacher quality, the child’s interest in the subject matter, socio-economic status and geographic location are all well documented aspects that influence how successful a child is at school. Because there are so many elements contributing to achievement, it is problematic to apportion how much impact each factor has on learning. 

Despite this problem it’s fair to say that, “In order to learn at school you need to be present”.  Non-attendance has both an academic and a social impact. There is well-documented correlation between absences and achievement, which demonstrates that every day matters. And while every day matters, there are reasons for absences which impact differently. 

Factors that Influence Absence

While every context is different, there are some broad factors shown to negatively impact attendance levels, including:

• Medical reasons;
• Academic self-concept, depression, anxiety, negative attitude toward peers or teachers and a lack of sense of belonging;
• Family factors, such as how highly education is prized in the home and the level of family involvement in things like homework; 
• School-related factors, such as the tolerance of bullying, poor teacher relationships or poor connection to peer groups.

Lateness

Just as full day absences can become pattern-forming and impact negatively on achievement, so too is lateness. While 10 minutes is not long, it’s important to consider your child’s emotional space as they enter the classroom. A child who arrives midway through homeroom or their first lesson has no time to mentally prepare themselves for the day.  Lateness is cumulative. If a student is late by only 10 minutes a few times a week, the hours soon add up to 20 hours or more of learning missed in a school year. 

How Do We Increase Student Attendance and Decrease Lateness to School?

Students, parents and schools must work in partnership for the benefit of students and increasing their attendance.  We encourage parents to reach out to the College if absenteeism or lateness becomes an issue for your child. This will allow the Pastoral Team to identify possible triggers and seek positive interventions to resolve the situation, in partnership with the affected student and their family.  In short, while there is no safe level of absenteeism — every absence impacts achievement. Building and maintaining positive attendance patterns is a three-way partnership between students, parents and schools, where all parties hold an important piece of the puzzle. 

If you are concerned about your child’s attendance or increasing lateness to school, please do not hesitate to contact your child’s Pastoral Leader or myself to discuss your concerns.

Boring and Mundane

At Youth Group we had a session that I now include in my Resilience and Confidence course titled ‘Excuse v Reason.’ One of the problems with society today is that we make excuses for people when they do the wrong thing.

If someone steals a car we look at the ‘reason’ they stole the car but the only reason you can have for stealing a car is if it is to preserve life; any other reason is an excuse.

We all make choices and the hardest thing to do is make the right choice because making the right choice requires courage. People do the wrong thing and then apologise and are told how brave they are to come forward and apologise.

Recently an AFL player was suspended for a racist remark and then went on television and apologised. He was labelled as courageous for doing so but I ask why? Wasn’t he just doing what was right and wouldn’t it have been more courageous to do the right thing in the first place.

That isn’t bravery or courage, that title belongs to the person who has done the right thing. 

There is a movie set in the depression era called The Legend of Bagger Vance starring Will Smith and Matt Damon that revolves around Damon’s character coming back from drinking to play a golf game against some of the best players around.

In one scene a young boy who admires Damon’s character and has him on a pedestal sees his father, a former accountant, sweeping the sidewalk. The boy crosses the street out of embarrassment.

Deep in the rough with just Damon he makes a comment about his father and Damon’s character sets him straight.

“You're daddy is out sweeping streets because he took every last dime he had, and used it to pay up every man and woman he owed and every business who worked for him, instead of declaring bankruptcy like everyone else in town, including your best friend Wilbur Charles' dad, Raymond, which is why he's able to sit around all day long on his dignity! You're daddy stared adversity in the eye, Hardy. And he beat it back with a broom.”

The boy’s father had the courage to accept being seen sweeping the street instead of hiding behind bankruptcy and using dignity as an excuse. He did the right thing and good people noticed it.  

We think people who lead what we consider a normal life are boring and mundane; what we don’t recognise is the courage it takes to do so.

I had my first drink at 16 because I thought to be cool I had to. The next year I trained hard and set my goal to make the Queensland Schoolboys side. When I went away for North Queensland there were three of us on the short list to make the Queensland side after two games. 

That night two of us went out and one stayed home. Instead of icing an injury the alcohol I consumed caused it to swell and I ended up on crutches and unable to play. The bloke who was with me slept in and was actually late to the game. 

The third bloke played that day and was selected in the Queensland side. When I think back I wish to God I would have had the courage to be boring and mundane.

Grade 11 English students are doing short stories about telling their future children about turning points in their life. That was one for me and what I learned from it (eventually) was it takes courage to be mundane and boring but the rewards are respect and admiration.

Unfortunately those rewards come later in life which means you need to find the courage early in life to study or train while your friends are partying or the courage to say no when the easy option is to say yes. Do that and you will never get to old age and think ‘if only.’

But then people who lack courage sometimes take the easy route so they can sit back and say ‘I could have, if I wanted to.’ In other words they roll out excuses.

Inter School Athletics

In what continues to be a busy term for Sport at GSCC, this week sees the inter-school athletics carnival get underway this afternoon at Sunset Oval. Students competing in the 1500m event need to be at Sunset Oval by 3.30pm for this event.

All other events will be held at Sunset Oval on Thursday, 19th August. Students competing in the 800m need to be at the oval by 7.30am, whilst all other students will need to be there by 8.00am for roll call. 

A reminder that this carnival is not a trial for the district team. 

Sports Awards Night

The Annual Sports Award Night will be held on Thursday the 7th October at 6.45pm. I will be sending out a sports recipient list in Week 7 to all parents and students to confirm students' participation in school sport at GSCC. A criteria sheet will also be attached to define students who are available for awards. Parents and Students will need to contact me via email or phone if I have missed a child’s participation in sport.

Library Olympic Winners

Congratulations to:

• Elizabeth George (1st)
• Makayla Davies (2nd)
• Isabella Lee (3rd)

Every Wednesday morning from 7.00am - 8.30am. Parents and Friends are invited to The Arili Thina Cafe to purchase your morning coffee and breakfast.

By doing so you are supporting our Hospitality students to achieve their competencies towards their Certificate ll in Hospitality. 

There are a range of coffees, cold drinks and breakfast food available. Please see our Menu. Our students are becoming fantastic baristas. Come see for yourself how good they are.

Hi my name is Keely Johnson and I would love to welcome you to the Golden Octopus family. Throughout my journey with childhood cancer I have had plenty of time to think about the things in life I would love to help and make a difference to.

After seeing many children suffering and losing their battles with cancer I thought I would like to stop this and help make a difference. The idea of a Golden Octopus came to me as there needs to be a charity that covers all childhood cancers. There are 8 groups of childhood cancers and the octopus has 8 arms. Gold is the color of childhood cancer.

OLLEE is his name it was voted on by lots of random people but we made the spelling to include Lee as our wonderful ambassador is Lee Kernaghan.

He was awarded Australian of the Year in 2008 and his whole life he helps everyone from the farmers to the soldiers and now is going to help the kids as well.
Our foundation will be built on love, fun and hope. We will help the families, raise money to help with research and access to trials that children may never get, we will strive to get better facilities in the regional areas to stop families having to come to the major centres as much.

We will laugh and cry together, we will fight for a cure but most of all we will put all the arms of our octopus around each and every one of you.

Xx Love Keely – Founder of The Golden Octopus Foundation 2015.