From the Principal

Dear Parent, Carers and Students

Happy Mother’s Day

A belated best wishes to all of our mothers and those many others who fill that role. I am sure that everyone on in our community will agree that mothers are irreplaceable and should be celebrated. We hope that your family cared for you last Sunday in the way you do for us each day.

Attached in the link below is a truly beautiful reflection on the essential role of mothers and those that fill that role. This reflection was shared by former St Joseph’s College Principal, Mr Dan McMahon in his Shalom College newsletter. I am positive that he would not mind me sharing in our newsletter and I thank Dan for sharing.

Take a moment to read this reflection –

Principal’s Gathering

Last week I attended the Toowoomba Catholic Schools Term 2 Leadership Forum in Warwick. This Leadership Forum involved the Principals from across the Toowoomba Diocese meeting with Executive Director Dr Patrick Coughlan, the Directors and the Senior Education Leaders of the Toowoomba Catholic Schools Diocese.

The focus of the leadership forum was ‘Staying on Mission’ and the factors that enable the schools within our Diocese to meet the following challenge provided by Pope Francis, and to realise our shared twin pillar vision of excellence in teaching and learning and student’s coming to know the face of Jesus.

“To educate is to give the present the hope that breaks the determinisms and fatalisms with which the selfishness of the strong, the conformism of the weak and the ideology of the utopian want to impose as the only possible way.

Only a strong education in an increasingly fragmented and conflictual world can contribute both to the evangelization mission entrusted to us and the construction of a world in which all people feel valued and can live in peace among ourselves.”  

Pope Francis​

One of the key factors in achieving this vision is the continued development of collective efficacy. Recent research highlights that collective efficacy is a critical factor that influences student achievement and it “refers to a staff’s shared belief that through their collective action, they can positively influence student outcomes” (Donohoo, 2017). It is about reaching agreement on how we should be moving forward and a genuine willingness to openly and collaboratively share experiences, success, failures and learnings (Killian, 2017). “Educators with high efficacy show greater effort and persistence, a willingness to try new teaching approaches, set more challenging goals, and attend more closely to the needs of students who require extra assistance” (Donohoo, 2017).

At St Joseph’s College we are committed to continuing to develop collective efficacy, improving our teaching by actively participating as co-learners with the students. Led by our peers and the senior leadership team our teachers have been working conscientiously on improving the teaching and learning experiences in our classrooms through the implementation of learner centred impact cycles, our reading improvement strategy and the exploration of our writing improvement strategy.

We thank our teaching and support staff for their continued commitment to these initiatives in the interest of providing the best learning opportunities for our students.

NAPLAN Week

This week our students have been involved in the annual NAPLAN tests. These tests provide a wide range of relevant data for the College to use in assisting to improve the educational experiences and learning of our students, provided that the data is accurate. With this in mind we spoke to the Year 7 & 9 students at the beginning of the week to encourage them to give these tests their best possible shot, aspiring to excellence. I would like to thank and congratulate our students on responding to this challenge in how they engaged with the tests. We look forward to using the data we are provided to inform us of the areas for further development with our students.

St Joseph’s College Open Day

Next Friday we are hosting our annual open day from 8.30 – 12.00pm. The aim of the morning is to provide families with an overview of the way the College provides a holistic education for the students, to give students an opportunity to participate in a range of activities and for all visitors to journey through the College on a normal school day.

It will be no surprise to anyone that in most communities, word of mouth is the most successful form of advertising for any school. We encourage current families to share their positive experiences of St Joseph’s College and remind prospective families that it is essential to rsvp for the event as we are almost at capacity and we want to ensure that we provide the best experience for all our visitors.

I would like to thank the teachers and ancillary staff for their continued commitment to our College. On top of the requirements to complete their everyday roles the staff generously give of their personal time to ensure that these events and activities occur providing the opportunities for our students and community to make the most of their education at St Joseph’s College.

This week we give thanks for the efforts of the teachers and ancillary staff of St Joseph’s College.

Kort Goodman - Principal - KGoodman@sjc.qld.edu.au