Newsletter 28/1/2022 Term 1 Week 1

Our prayer

From the principal

Dear parents, carers and community members,

By way of introduction, my name is Tim Bourke and I am the new principal of St Patrick's Primary School, Camperdown. Many of you may know me from my work as principal of St Colman's Primary School in Mortlake and my involvement with St Patrick's as part of the Hampden Catholic Schools Network. I feel honoured by the responsibility of this new role and excited by the prospect of becoming part of your school community. We also welcome Matthew Coop and Mel Pascoe to the St Patrick's staff for 2022.

This newsletter is a way to outline how the beginning of the school year will look and how we will respond to the ever changing landscape of the pandemic. Further details of the events of the school year will be available in subsequent newsletters.

Beginning of school

The school year for staff began today, the 28th of January, with a planning and preparation day for all staff members. Monday is a professional development day for staff and there is no school for students. Tuesday 1st of February is the first day for all students to begin the school year. Our Foundation children will continue the process of having a rest day next Wednesday and return to school on Thursday and Friday.

Unfortunately, we need to continue the practice of limiting the number of adults entering the school at the moment so we ask all parents to drop their children off at school and we will care for them from there. The Foundation families be asked to farewell their child at the school gate with our teachers and our school captains will escort them inside to join their classmates. 

Covid precautions

The school has begun to implement many new procedures to protect our students during this time of heightened pandemic risk. These will be outlined next week in our next newsletter.

The major change for families is that they will be provided with free Rapid Antigen Tests for each child attending our school. This is a voluntary process to allow parents to protect their children and protect the health of the rest of our school community by testing their child twice a week. Parents are asked to pick up a box of 5 tests from the school office on Monday to cover the first two weeks of school and another box two weeks later for the third and fourth week of school. If you are unable to do this, please contact the school office.

Details on the use of these tests and the implications of a positive result will be shared next week.