St Peter's Bentleigh East eNewsletter

UPDATE ON PROPERTIES ON CENTRE ROAD AND BIGNELL ROAD

All of you would be aware that over the last four years I, and prior to that for eight years Michael Juliff, have been working with our School and Parish Community to deliver on the component of the School Master Plan which included the two houses on Centre Road being demolished to create needed play space for our students. It is with great disappointment that I advise you that this will no longer be occurring. I have forwarded to all our families a letter from Fr Jacob detailing his explanation for the change in plans. I will continue to work with our Parish and School Community to try to bring an outcome that is just and fair. We must never lose sight of what we have, and the community we are, as we continue to strive for the best for our students, your children.

PARENTS AND FRIENDS MEETING TONIGHT

7:00pm West Wing - Entry via front office

The Parents and Friends meeting tonight will include in the agenda an opportunity to discuss a response to Fr Jacob’s letter. All families are welcome.

STAFF UPDATE

It is with sadness that I advise you that Pam Bruce our Business Manager has accepted a position as Business Manager at Preshil School in Kew. Pam has been Business Manager at St Peter's for nearly six years and has been responsible for bringing a high level of professionalism to the financial side of our school. Her expertise, knowledge and compassion have been invaluable to the leadership of the school and our whole school community. Pam’s last day will be Friday, 6th March. Processes have begun to find a replacement for Pam to minimise the disruption at St Peter’s. We wish Pam all the best in her new position.

UPDATE TO PLAY SPACE

Last week the final line marking for the play space between the Year Six Classrooms and the Junior Building was completed. This project began at the end of last year and was fully funded by our Parents and Friends. The space is being used by a range of students and certainly brightens up an otherwise dull area of our school.

Updated play space

P & F FAMILY FUN NIGHT

We look forward to seeing everyone at the Family Fun Night this Friday. It is a great way to gather as a community at the start of the year.

SCHOOL CLOSURE DAYS

This year we have scheduled six School Closure Days for staff Professional Learning, including our Staff Conference, and for the undertaking of our School Review. There will be no school for students on the following days:

Thursday, 26th March

Friday, 27th March

Friday, 5th June

Monday, 17th August

Monday, 2nd November

Friday, 20th November

OSHClub will be providing programs for students on these days.

ASH WEDNESDAY

Ash Wednesday is on Wednesday, 26th February. The Year 3 to Year 6 Students will celebrate Mass at St. Peter's Church at 10.00am along with St. James Students. Families welcome to attend. Prep to Year 2 Students will have a Paraliturgy in the church commencing at 3.00pm. Families also welcome to attend. Gates on the front playground will be open for parking at 2.45pm.

WEETBIX KIDS TRIATHLON

Last year Laurence Bloomfield (4KS) was chosen as a Weetbix Kids Triathlon Ambassador and we were visited by World Triathlon Champion Chloe Hartnett. Following this visit a number of children have registered for the upcoming kids Triathlon on Sunday, 8th March. As a result of the number of entries St Peter’s has won $500 worth of stationery from their partners at ACCO!

Registrations remain open until midnight on the 4th of March https://tryathlon.com.au/locations/melbourne/

ENROLMENTS FOR PREP 2021

Our Open Morning for Prep 2021 Enrolments will be held on Tuesday, 10th March - 9.30am - 11.00am. Other tours are advertised on our Website and also in the Information Pack.

Parents at St. Peter's who have a child starting in Prep 2021 can pick up an Enrolment Information Pack from the School Office from tomorrow.

SCHOOL FEES

The School Fees Statement has been emailed to all families today.

If you would like the school to set up a payment plan for you please return your completed Direct Debit Form to the School Office by No Later than Wednesday, 19th February as the first payment is scheduled for Friday, 21st February. Direct Debit Forms are available at the School Office. Reminder that a new Direct Debit Form must be completed each year.

Health Care Cards

If you have a Centrelink issued Health Care Card you may be eligible for Government Assistance. Please enquire at the Office.

SCHOOL PHOTOS

The School Photos will be taken on Friday, 6th March and the Photos with Siblings on Friday, 28th February.

Please Note the following:

Photo envelopes have been sent home today.
Please ensure that you complete one envelope for each child.
If you have more than 1 child at school do not place all your children's envelopes inside one envelope.
If you wish to pay for all your children's photos with one payment, you can put your payment (If paying by Cheque or Cash) in the eldest child's class envelope and note on the other children's envelopes where the payment is.
If you pay online, please still return your envelope to the school and note your payment receipt number on the envelope.
Please return your envelopes to the school by Tuesday, 25th February for Sibling Photos and by Tuesday, 3rd March for Class & Individual Photos.
If you have 3 or more children at the school, the Third & Subsequent children are free - Please Note this on the Envelope
Family Photo Envelopes are available from the School Office on request.
All Students are to wear their Full Summer Uniform on both the 28th February & 6th March, regardless of whether they normally wear Sports Uniform.

ST. PETER'S COOKBOOK UPDATE

Our Community Table - Final Call for Recipes!

Have a dazzling dessert? A fail safe salad? Party food that your guests love?

We have received a great range of fabulous recipes for our St Peter’s Cookbook but would really love a recipe from every family in our school community. If you would like to share a recipe, check out the list of required recipes here https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CaKqa-4uN9NMbeKamMka4wra8rch4wuZ/view?usp=sharing as some chapters are already full. Please send your recipe with your name and phone number to spcookbook2019@gmail.com by Wednesday, 19th February 2020.

We look forward to meeting some of the families and capturing their stories at our photography sessions in Term 2.

PUNCTURED BY GOD

One of our major foci for 2020 in the realm of Mission and Faith is Spirituality. Our ECSI data from 2019 across the three schools highlighted a need to up the ante in this area. This is something very positive and an area that deep down we all want to know more about but are often afraid to ask, search and find. Finding the answers to the unknown can be scary. The 1970’s era was a time to be passive about spirituality let alone anything! But today our young ones are wanting to know and many older people feel inadequate to answer questions asked of them. To say I don’t know can be confronting for some people.

Joan Chittister assists us by saying that in prayer you don’t need to do much except ‘be’. Just be by being breathing in God and hoping that you can breathe out God.

I believe we all pray in some capacity. The fact we think means that we pray. The fact that we all have a conscience means we are all the time making decisions. Often subconsciously but often enough consciously. Unless we lack wisdom and maturity we don’t make decisions in isolation. We seek advice. For me I seek advice from family but I also seek advice from God. God speaks in my heart. I say to others “Go with your gut”. I believe our stomach tells us a great deal about our inner and deep thoughts. Listen and feel to what is happening and often enough our gut is speaking to us. For me that is God.

Recently I bought online from Singapore some 1837 TWG Black Tea leaves (not bags!) I love tea leaves because it means I have to stop and make a real pot of tea. This means making time but it also means making time to stop and reflect. Often as I wait for the tea to brew I read.

May I encourage you to read this article from Joan Chittister which highlights the need for all of us to pray but also the realisation that if we think praying is work we miss the true meaning of what it means to pray.

Edward Dooley (Mission and Faith Leader)

Punctuated by God
The hallmark of a Benedictine community lies in its prayer life. The community gathers for choral prayer at least three times a day—morning praise, noon praise, and vespers. In Benedictine communities that devote themselves to the recitation of the more ancient Liturgy of the Hours, the times for communal prayer are even more often than that. To beginners in the life, the schedule can be a shock.

When we were in the novitiate, the older sisters delighted in telling us the story of the young postulant who came to the monastery full of zest for the life—and then, six months later, simply got up and left. “I like it here a lot,” the young woman said, “but there’s never a minute’s rest. And every time I do get time, the bell rings.” Then the old sisters would bubble over with laughter.

It took a while before I caught on to the joke. The funny part was that the postulant had the ideas confused. She couldn’t understand why it was that every time the chores of the day were finished, just when she thought she wouldn’t have anything to do for a while, the bell rang to call the community to another period of prayer. Prayer for her was work, an intrusion into her private time. But for those whose life is centred in prayer, prayer is time for resting in God. It is the “work” of the soul in contact with the God of the heart.

Prayer is what links the religious and the spiritual, the inner and outer dimensions of life. Every spiritual tradition on earth forms a person in some kind of regular practice designed to focus the mind and the spirit. Regular prayer reminds us that life is punctuated by God, awash in God, encircled by God. To interrupt the day with prayer is to remind ourselves of the timelessness of eternity. Prayer and regular spiritual practices serve as a link between this life and the next. They give us the strength of heart to sustain us on the way. When life goes dry, only the memory of God makes life bearable again. Then we remember that whatever is has purpose.

Prayer does not simply reveal us to God and God to us, I came to know after years of apparently useless repetition. It reveals us to ourselves at the same time. If I listened to myself when I prayed, I could feel my many masks drop away. I was not the perfect nun; I was the angry psalmist. I was the needy one in the petitions. I was the one to whom the hard words of the gospel were being spoken. I was the one adrift in a sea of darkness and uncertainty even after all these years of light.

“I don’t pray,” people say to me. And I say back, “Neither do I. I just breathe God in and hope somehow to learn how to breathe God out, as well.” The purpose of prayer is simply to transform us to the mind of God. We do not go to prayer to coax God to make our lives Disneyland. We don’t go to prayer to get points off our sins. We don’t go to suffer for our sins. We go to prayer to be transfigured ourselves, to come to see the world as God sees the world, to practice the presence of God, to put on a heart of justice, of love, and of compassion for others. We go to become new of soul.

Maybe we are forgetting to centre ourselves in the consciousness of God who is conscious of us all. Maybe that’s why the world today is in the throes of such brutal violence, such inhuman poverty, such unconscionable discrimination, such self-righteous fundamentalism. Maybe we are forgetting to pray, not for what we want, but for the sight, the enlightenment, that God wants to give us. And if I pray, will I be able to change those things? I don’t really know. All I know is that the enlightenment that comes with real prayer requires that I attend to them, not ignore them.

—from Called to Question: A Spiritual Memoir, by Joan Chittister

Read Less

BUCKET FILLER AWARD

The Bucket Filler Award at our first Assembly for the year was awarded to Joseph Zoghbi from 6KM.

Joseph was nominated by a teacher for being so polite, being able to hold a conversation with the teacher on yard duty and showing real interest in the chats.

He is always willing to help the younger students in the yard and is an exceptional role model for the younger students. Congratulations Joseph!!

RIDE/WALK2SCHOOL DAY

Our first Walk/Ride2School Day for the year is this Thursday, 20th February. So get Active and remember to have your Walk/Ride2School Cards clipped every time your Walk or Ride to school. New cards are available from the School Office.

Sex Education Family Program - Year 6 Families Only

A reminder to Year 6 Families that Cath McCallig is offering two Family based sessions on 20th February, covering how to talk to your children about reproduction and puberty. The cost per session is $20, if you attend both sessions the cost is $25 for the two sessions.

Below is a Trybooking link for Year 6 parents to use to sign up for the Family Program. Bookings close today, Monday, 17th February.

https://www.trybooking.com/BIIOJ

PERFORMING ARTS - IMPORTANT DATES AND TIMES

2020 promises to be a massive year in the St Peter’s Performing Arts life, and your children are front and centre!

As always, every year level will deliver a performance, and we also have a world premiere musical to show you!

Please note the following dates in your diaries: hopefully this gives you plenty of time to arrange your other plans around them so that your child is given the best opportunity to shine on stage for you. They spend the best part of a term developing and rehearsing their performance, and it’s always disappointing when someone misses out.

Of particular note is the 5/6 Popstars Performance, in which all students are divided into small groups to perform. This has become a highlight of the Performing Arts program, but if a student is absent from the performance, it throws their group into a panic - especially seeing they have worked on their piece together and side by side for 10 weeks! As always, the judging panel will be comprised of very special staff members and a special guest!

Here are the performance dates and times:

Term 2

Week 10 - Wednesday, 17th June - Year 5/6 Popstars Performance

Year 5 @ 6pm, Year 6 @ 7.30pm

Week 11 - Tuesday, 23rd June - Year 3/4 Performance

Year 3 @ 6pm, Year 4 @ 7pm

Term 3

Week 8 - Tuesday, 1st September - Prep Performance - 6pm
Week 10 - Tuesday, 15th September - 1/2 Performance

Year 1 @ 6pm, Year 2 @ 7pm

Term 4

Week 4 - Wednesday, 28th and Thursday, 29th October - SCHOOL MUSICAL

Show Begins at 7.30pm both nights

We look forward to sharing the great work the students do, and blowing you away with their amazing talents!

See you on stage.

Drew Lane

Performing Arts

Dear Families and Friends,

We are hoping to complete an OUTDOOR 'STEAMPUNK' SCULPTURE in Art this Semester. Gathering a variety of materials is important to the success of this project.

CAN YOU HELP?

We are looking for metals like Copper, Brass, Steel and Iron. Any items that could add to creating an industrial look.

Rivets
Gears and Cogs
Wood

Thanking you so much in anticipation.

Cate Sanders

Visual Arts Teacher

Fun Fresh Foods - Is very thrilled to be offering the children of St Peter's a fresh and varied Recess and Lunch Tuckshop Service.

We are open for Recess and Lunch Orders and Over the counter sales every Thursday and Friday.

Ordering is done via www.flexischools.com.au . Orders close 8.30am the day of service. Sushi orders close off 10.00pm the night before service.

Please contact Liz Martin via email liz@funfreshfoods.com.au or mobile 0418 577 120 if you have any queries or questions!