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Dear Parents/Carers,
TERM 2 ARRANGEMENTS
Term 2 will commence with the current arrangements in place. The College will be open and will provide supervision for the children of those parents who have no alternative source of supervision and their ongoing employment is reliant upon their child (ren) attending school. All other students, as per the Premier’s previous recommendation, are to be kept at home.
ST JOSEPH’S SITE RECEPTION
Please be aware that the St Joseph's site reception is now the only front office that is open to the public. The St Mary's site (SMS) reception will be closed.
The main switchboard telephone number will remain as 6627 6600.
If you need to contact the Finance Office please phone the main switchboard to make an appointment.
Please continue to use the mail box after hours located beside the front doors on SMS as this will be cleared daily. During office hours (8 am to 4 pm) mail can be delivered to St Joseph's site office.
ICT SUPPORT
If there is a need for ICT assistance, simply email ictsupport@trinitylismore.nsw.edu.au. This address is monitored and help will be provided where it can. It may not be possible for the ICT Department to ‘fix’ every problem as they are not physically present to diagnose the specific problem. They will do the best that they can, under the circumstances. If the issue is a hardware issue, I would encourage you to contact your place of purchase for assistance.
ENROLMENTS / FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE
I am conscious of the difficult circumstances many of you may now be facing as a result of the growing list of COVID-19 restrictions. Some of your employers may have had to shut or you are in small businesses. I have heard first hand from a number of our current parents of the difficulties they are facing.
Please be assured that Trinity Catholic College will do what we can to support all our local families at this time. No child should ever miss out on a Catholic Education because of financial stress. Trinity Catholic College has a long tradition of assisting families in need and I am serious when I say we will do all we can to assist families seeking to enrol their child at the College.
Enrolments for 2021 are currently being accepted – application forms can be obtained by ringing 6627 6647, downloaded from the College Web Site or by emailing enrolments@trinitylismore.nsw.edu.au
I would ask that you encourage anyone you are aware of who is looking to apply to enrol their child in 2021 to do so. I ask that you tell anyone you know is thinking of sending their child to the College that we are always open to discussing financial circumstances and don’t let these prevent them applying.
Take care and may God bless us all in this very difficult time for our country and the world.
Brother John Hilet, fms
Dear Members of the Trinity Community,
Term 2 planning is well underway here at the College. The world of blended learning is set to continue for some time, so staff have been busy preparing learning activities for the period ahead.
The student and parent experience of the past three weeks has generated a lot of feedback for us to process. The key themes centre upon:
- The volume of work;
- The pace at which students are to work;
- How the learning is delivered;
- The clarity of instructions for students;
- The accessibility of learning activities;
- The role of Zoom video conferencing in the learning cycle; and
- The level of student engagement.
I can assure parents/carers that all of these challenges are acknowledged and are being worked on. Learning and teaching at school is vastly different to blended learning. Whilst these challenges must be addressed, and the College takes this feedback seriously, the pace of change and volume of work for teaching staff has also been immense. We all - students, staff and parents - need time to adjust.
In Term 2, our focus will be the consistent delivery of learning activities through Lighthouse Due Work. The delivery plan should see learning activities 'chunked' and published at the beginning of the week. Students will then work at their own pace through the activities and submit evidence of their progress at the end of the timeframe published (usually a week, with a desire to stagger submission deadlines). The use of some Zoom video conferences will occur across all year levels. We do not want students, however, to be attending no-stop Zoom conferences each day of the Term. A balance will be required and we will need to work hard to find that balance.
I thank you for your continued patience and understanding at this challenging time.
UPDATE ON THE HSC FROM PROFESSOR PETER SHERGOLD
HSC ADVICE - UPDATE
The latest NESA advice is here - updated 7 April. The NESA COVID19 Response Committee will meet again on Thursday. The link above contains updated information released today by NESA. I have emailed this update directly to Year 12 students this afternoon. State and Federal Education Ministers also met today. The outcome of this meeting remains unknown at the time of publishing this eNEWS. It is reported that this meeting was designed to bring about greater clarity for senior students, particularly in relation to external HSC exams in NSW.
YEAR 7-12 INTERIM REPORTS
Interim Reports will be issued to parents/carers this week via the online parent portal. Please ensure you have your login details. If you have issues logging in to Lighthouse that persist after resetting your password, please email parentportal@trinitylismore.nsw.edu.au so we can arrange access for you.
Take good care,
Mr Jesse Smith - Assistant Principal - Learning & Teaching
Dear members of the Trinity Community,
As we edge closer to the end of term - a term like nobody has ever imagined - I want to thank you.
- School Staff have done an amazing job. A parent asked me today how the staff are going and I was actually caught stopped in my tracks. I found myself having to gather my emotions for a moment as I explained to her how moved I have been by the profound and heroic efforts of what I called true Catholic educators.
- Parents and carers have had to adapt immediately and without warning to a very different world. Thank you, from the College, for the support and encouragement our families have shown. We cannot fully understand the hardships experienced by some of our families, but I would encourage people again to contact the College if you are experiencing hardship / difficulty and we will do whatever we can.
- Students have been, by and large, positive and willing. They have risen to the challenge, as they always do and most have been engaging with the work to the best of their ability.
Communication is noted as an ongoing challenge and at the College we have put together a team that is meeting daily to examine our communication. In an evolving situation we require an evolving response and we are adapting daily - trying to provide clear channels of communication.
We can only try to imagine what this time is like as a student, but some clarity was forthcoming from NESA today and can be accessed here. I continue to encourage calm, balance and overall health. This time will pass, and together we will keep moving forward.
Take care and God bless,
Mr Travis Lyon - Acting Assistant Principal - Students & Staff