Happy Father’s Day, this weekend we celebrate you. To all of our wonderful dads, our father figures and those in our community who step into the role of dad to care and support our beautiful children. May they reflect God’s grace and guidance in their journey of raising and nurturing their children. We pray for those who mourn the loss of their dad, particularly at this time. Surround them with God’s peace as we continue to comfort them with our love and strength.

Amen.

Father’s Day breakfast

This Friday we will be hosting the Father’s Day breakfast. If you would like an egg and bacon roll please remember to put your order in on QKR by 5pm today. We will serving breakfast between 8.00-8.45am.

Father’s Day Liturgy Photos

Year 1 are celebrating our dads and father figures on Friday with our Father’s Day Liturgy from 9.00am. A gentle reminder to send a picture of the special man in your life to joseph.mcgrath@cg.catholic.edu.au if you would like to have a photo of you and your family added to the photo story.

Wasn’t book week just MAGIC!!! An enormous thanks to our wonderful families for your support in preparing our children for this special celebration of literature. My sincere thanks to our Librarian Danielle Smith and Assistant Julie for their terrific organisation.

Science week was another week filled with fun, excitement and learning. Special thanks to Mrs Stankovic for organising such engaging activities for our students. Ranger Jamie, ADF visit and science experiments were very much loved by all!

Staffing 2025

We have some of our wonderful teachers returning from their maternity leave in a part time capacity. This will mean there will be some job shares across year levels. We are very blessed at St Anthony’s to have such hard-working teachers who work so well together. I thank you for supporting our teachers and the class structures in 2025.

As I have in the past, I will endeavor to have classes and teachers finalised before the end of the year, so that students and teachers are involved in our “step up”day, where the students meet their 2025 teacher and know which classroom they will be in before they go on their Christmas break. Further correspondence, re. classes will be shared with you in term 4.

2025 Term dates

In preparation for 2025 school year. Please note that there has been system allocation of Pupil Free Days across the school year.

The following dates are for ACT student attendance

TERM 1              4 February – 10 April

TERM 2              29 April – 3 July

TERM 3              22 July – 25 September

TERM 4              14 October – 18 December

PUBLIC HOLIDAYS

1 JANUARY New Year’s Day

26 JANUARY Australia Day (observed on 27 January 2025)

10 MARCH Canberra Day

18 APRIL Good Friday

20 APRIL Easter Sunday

21 APRIL Easter Monday

25 APRIL ANZAC Day

2 JUNE Reconciliation Day (ACT only)

9 JUNE King’s Birthday

6 OCTOBER Labour Day

25 DECEMBER Christmas Day

26 DECEMBER Boxing Day

Kindergarten Interviews

Over the weeks ahead I will be conducting enrolment interviews before and after school. I will miss greeting the children in the mornings and afternoons, however, look forward to checking in with them through the day.

Faith formation

My sincere thanks to Father Tom, our year 4 teachers and Religious Education Coordinator Joe McGrath for guiding our students through their Reconciliation and First Eucharist journey. The children really love and appreciate you witnessing their faith formation. We continue to pray for our Reconciliation and First Eucharist candidates as they make their Sacraments in the coming weeks. We also pray and thank their families for their support and attendance.

The Second Rite of Reconciliation was celebrated in the Church last Wednesday evening, this is truly a moving experience and one I encourage all those who have made their reconciliation to attend. Father Tom will confirm the next date in the coming weeks.

FFF Mass

We have our triple FFF Mass on Sunday 8 September if you would like to join us. This has moved from the 1 September as it is Father’s Day. We really hope to see lots of families attend this Mass. It is a wonderful opportunity to celebrate Mass with your school community. Please come and join us. All are very welcome.

Hall renovation

Tender has gone out for the hall renovation. Over the weeks ahead there will be groups of people walking around the hall and site in preparation for submitting their application.

In preparation for when construction begins, please note that the overflow carpark area will be designated for the construction work vehicles and their site shed location. I hope that the work will not impact our school too much and we look forward to the opening of our new school hall in 2026. For now, it is business as usual and the canteen, school assemblies etc, remain in place as scheduled.

ICAS tests

Well done to all of the students who participated in the ICAS tests. The students all gave it their best and seemed to enjoy the experience. If you have any feedback in regard to this new opportunity offered at St Anthonys, please email it through to Mr Wigg or Miss Whitfield.

Sporting events

We have been very fortunate to have students participating in Oztag gala days this term. A very big thank you to the Mr Van Meurs, Miss Hall, Mr Uoifalelahi and the parents who volunteered their time to coach and manage the teams. These days wouldn’t be possible without the support of our teachers and parent volunteers. We also had a large number of students participate in the Tuggeranong Athletics carnival and they all did St Anthony’s proud. Thank you to Mr Van Meurs and Mrs Ryan for accompanying the students and assisting with official duties on the day. 

Have a beautiful week.

Erin