24 June 2022

Newsletter Articles

From The Principal

Welcome - This is Week 10 of Term 2 in our school year. Special thanks to April McLaren, staff, students and volunteers for the amazing job they did organising and running the Athletics Carnival. Special thanks also to Mrs Leisa Mullholland and her band of helpers for their contribution to the organisation of the Careers Expo, which from all reports was a great success. I have had many reports from various sources, complimenting our students on their manners and interest. Well done to all.

School Mantras: Be Safe / Be Respectful / Be Prepared / Be Responsible.

NAIDOC Week: NAIDOC week is fast approaching. As a school we will be celebrating NAIDOC week with many different activities. Auntie Joy has organised a guest speaker to attend and speak to the students, in relation to the theme of NAIDOC (Get Up Stand Up Show Up). A school BBQ will be held during the week, at which community members are most welcome to attend. We have a teachers v students netball game. As well as many smaller lunch time activities during the week.

Profiling: Last week we had Mr Warren Wintour from the Centre for Learning and Wellbeing (CLaW) at school working with staff and students. One of the professional activities he completed when he was here was to “Profile” a range of our staff. Profiling is a non-judgemental assessment of the lesson from a positive indifferent and negative (PIN) point of view. Warren has a template in which he uses a tick sheet with a red and green pen to assess the positives and negative actions of the teacher and basically everything happening in the classroom. Suffice to say that if the sheet comes back looking like my Year 12 Inorganic Chemistry exam, things have not gone that well. If, however it comes back looking like the Riverbank Grasslands, then the teacher has managed the classroom effectively and the lesson progressed systematically very well.

This however, does not in any way form a criticism of a teacher’s teaching practice. The data and environment is then analysed. This information will be used to take into context the environment and year levels the lesson took place in. Once this data is processed and reviewed, the teacher can then take the information to reflect upon practice and celebrate the successes as well as refine practice.

School Nurse: We will be interviewing early next term for vacant school nurse position. Our school nurses support our students through mental health and wellbeing as well as the assessment for physical function such as hearing and sight testing.

Truck Pull: The P and C are organising the BBQ for the Thallon Truck Pull on Saturday 27 August. Any help would be greatly appreciated. If you are like me and thought you needed a truck to enter, look up the Thallon Truck Pull on Youtube to see what it is all about. Get your teams sorted and entered.

Westmar Markets: The P and C are also running a BBQ at the Westmar markets on Saturday July 2 which is the middle weekend of the holidays. Once again, all volunteers are much appreciated.

Athletics Carnival: What a great day athletics carnival is. As a teacher and coach, I love seeing kids compete and improve. St George has some extremely talented athletes, who in my view, should have every opportunity to train and then showcase their skills in competition. I am very much looking forward to watching the students who were successful at our school competition competing in the Balonne District Sports Carnival on 15 July.

Chewing Gum: We all know the feeling when you put your hand on a wet piece of gum freshly pasted under a desk. Unfortunately, the problem is widespread in our school. Could I please ask parents and carers to ensure your children are not bringing gum to school.

Communication with School: The school has many methods of communication which include the Newsletter, a Facebook site, letters home, text messages. However, should you wish to communicate with the school on a particular matter please don’t hesitate to contact the ladies in the office. Please don’t forget to ring the school should your child or ward be absent for the day.

Rob Nowlan.

2022 STEM Girl Power Camp

Sixty Year 10 girls and 10 teachers were selected to participate in the Department of Education’s 2022 STEM Girl Power Camp, which was held on 16-20 May in Brisbane. Students travelled from all over Queensland, from Thursday Island to the Gold Coast, to represent their school in Brisbane, where they participated in a variety of events, innovative STEM workshops and networking opportunities with experts from science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields.

Students met inspiring role models from diverse fields including, engineering, industrial design, forensic science, ecology, palaeontology, marine science, biology and mathematical modelling. Camp students explored and discussed the physics behind the wind tunnel at iFly indoor sky diving, and the importance of STEM communication at the Wheel of Brisbane. Students also participated in a variety of hands-on activities including industrial design and strawberry DNA extraction.

Students developed their understanding of STEM and its importance to our society, as well as their leadership, critical thinking, creativity, collaboration and communication skills. The 2022 STEM Ambassadors will now collaborate in their regions to plan and deliver a STEM event to celebrate National Science Week in August 2022 during Term 3, which aims to encourage others to consider STEM subjects and careers.

Congratulations to Kaitlin Sheedy for being selected as a 2022 STEM Girl Power Ambassador!

Year 7 Humanities

Currently, in Humanities our Year 7 students are learning about Civics and Citizenship. In this unit, our students explore ideas, values and principles that underpin the processes in Australia’s political and legal systems. Students are learning how to explain the diverse nature of Australian society, and identify the importance of shared values in contemporary Australian society. We were lucky enough to have our Mayor, Samantha O’Toole come and visit to speak to the Year 7s about this unit, and specifically the roles of local government and the mayor. Thank you to Mayor O’Toole for coming and speaking to our Year 7s!

Jessica Embrey

Wellbeing Focus – Resilience Builder

As we come to the end of the semester, it is a good time to stop and reflect on all your achievements. A good way to do this is to create a Character Strengths Wheel where you can keep track of all your top, signature strengths by writing a strength into each section of the wheel. It is a good idea to look at your wheel often to keep your strengths circulating in your head. For example:

Blast From The Past Athletics Records

SGSHS Athletics Carnival 20 June 2022

Winner of the 2022 Athletics Carnival by 9 points was Mitchell on 815 points, 2nd Nixon 806 points and 3rd Leichhardt 770 points. Thank you to Miss April McLaren for organising this fun, yet competitive, yearly event for our school.

Vicki Wilson Cup

On Friday 10 of June, 20 netballers alongside Mrs Knights and Miss Weatherall braved freezing Toowoomba temperatures to compete in the annual Vicki Wilson cup.

We left on Thursday afternoon, with McDonalds and KFC on our minds as we bounced along the Moonie. We thought we were cold in St George, but we got a rude shock when we got out in Toowoomba.

Bellies full, we made it to our accommodation in Highfields and after a few Tik Tok moves were perfected, we got a good night’s sleep ready for a big day of netball on Friday.

On Friday morning, we headed to Nell E Robinson park, where negative temperatures meant there were special considerations to wear hoodies and trackpants under dresses, a Vicki Wilson Toowoomba first!

The senior team played in the competitive Vicki Wilson cup division. They played hard against some tough teams and Michelle and Skye said farewell to school netball with the final game against Fairholme college.

The juniors, playing in the Shield Division, came out strong, tying with St Joseph’s Stanthorpe, then going on to win all their games until a tough fought defeat by only three points to St Ursula’s. This meant they narrowly missed out on the top spot, but we were keen to get back on the bus into the warm and head back to tropical St George where we vowed we would never again complain about being cold.

We entertained ourselves on the way home by singing along and trying to guess Mrs Knights’ baby names.

Thanks to the amazing Kym Weatherall for her coaching, umpiring and bus driving as always, and to the girls who showed grace at all times, whether winning or losing!

Amy Knights

Balonne District Sport

There is now a Facebook page dedicated to providing information about district sport. Please like and follow Balonne District School Sport Noticeboard for updates.

State Trials Touch Football 13-15 Years

While the rest of us froze in St George, some of our talented touch football students were loving the weather in Cairns as part of the South West Touch Football team. Cohen Davis, Kahlela Prince, Sienna Beardmore, Bella Cubby and Sedeequa Clevin showed their skills at the State Championships and appreciated the great experience playing amongst the best in the State.

State Trials Netball 10-12 Years

Claire Stenhouse and Haylee Robertson were part of the South West netball team that participated at the State Titles in Townsville. It was a great experience and the girls enjoyed their time up in the Far North.

Down At The Ag Plot

It’s been baby mania down the Ag plot lately. Some lucky students have been able to take a quick break from assessment time for some cuddles with the Ag plot’s latest additions.

Shearing Camp - Dirranbandi

A handful of students were off this week to Nelyambo property past Dirranbandi for a week of shearing and learning with the Blue Light Shearing. These students are working towards a Certificate 11 in Rural Operations Shearing.

Deadly Recruits – Cunnamulla

Logan Hart, Aaden Taylor and Belle Sing were off this week to Cunnamulla to attend the Deadly Recruits Program with students from around the region also attending. Deadly Recruits is a camp run by Uncle Col Warego and members of the Australian army. This camp is to help encourage Indigenous culture, identity, respect, leadership and resilience. The students travelled to “TINNUNBURRA” (100kms down the Burke highway) and joined other students from Cunnamulla, Charleville and Quilpie in the five day adventure. This consisted of teams walking kilometres every day carrying their own packs, setting up camp every afternoon and sleeping in hoochi’s. This was challenging to say the least as there was a couple of cool mornings sleeping under a tarp which was a world away from their electric blankets. Thank you Mr Sam Holloway for accompanying the students on these camps.

School Opinion Survey 2022

The annual suite of School Opinion Surveys will be conducted in Term 3 and will close on 12 August 2022. All families, school staff and students in target year levels (5, 6, 8 and 11) will be invited to participate. We encourage you to take this opportunity to have your say about what our school does well, and how we can improve.

An invitation to complete the Parent/Caregiver Survey will be emailed to one parent/caregiver per family in the week beginning 11 July. The invitation will be sent from the Department of Education, not the school, and it will have the subject line School Opinion Survey for parents and caregivers, 2022. Check your junk email folders if you can’t find it. The survey can be completed as soon as the invitation is received and will take approximately five minutes using a computer, tablet or smart phone.

Parents/caregivers who do not have access to the internet at home are welcome to complete their survey online at the school. School computers/tablets will be available.

Young Achievers Program

The University of Queensland’s Young Achievers Program raises and supports the long-term tertiary education aspirations, career options and community-mindedness of nominated Queensland state high school students from disadvantaged backgrounds by actively engaging and mentoring them throughout their academic journey and beyond.

Applications for the 2023 intake are now open. If you think you might be eligible for this opportunity, please see (insert name here) or contact the Young Achievers Program directly on youngachievers@uq.edu.au or 3346 0005.

Calendar

P&C Uniform & Tuckshop

Tuckshop is available every Tuesday and Thursday. Try and get your orders in before school or the next break. Uniforms will also be sold only on a Tuesday and Thursday with EFTPOS, cash or direct deposit. Any questions please email pandc@stgeorgeshs.eq.edu.au .

P&C Proposed Meeting Dates In the School Library 6pm:-

18 July
15 August
19 September
17 October
21 November

All welcome to attend!

Community Notices

Choose how to add this event to your calendar:

Apple Calendar iPhone, iPad, Mac - Download .ics file

Outlook Desktop Outlook - Download .ics file

Android Calendar Android devices - Download .ics file

Other Calendar Google Calendar, Yahoo, etc. - Download .ics file

Download Event