It is always a privilege to select the new school leaders each year. While the process is demanding for nominees, and disappointing for those who miss out, to hear students speak of their hopes, dreams and aspirations for their school is always uplifting and inspiring. 

Xavier Catholic College is more than the bricks and mortar visible to all in Eli Waters. It is a spirit consisting of beliefs and traditions, aspirations and achievements. While the place locates the spirit, it is the sprit which distinguishes the place. 

So, it is my pleasure to announce our Captains and Vice-Captains for 2021 – 2022 School Year. Congratulations to: 

College Captains: Georgia Cassidy and Alexander Pacifique 

College Vice-Captains: Isabella Jensen and Samuel Challies  

All shortlisted candidates were magnificent and those who missed out will, no doubt, express their leadership in other ways and in other positions of responsibility. 

During the interviews all nominees spoke eloquently about Xavier Catholic College being a connected and welcoming community and named this characteristic as the core of our School Spirit. For all in our community we know that we are the inheritors and guardians of the traditions established by those who have gone before us. We inherit that legacy and are called upon to be faithful custodians. But it is a living spirit, ever looking forward to creating new legacies and new achievements.  

It reminds me of the words of the homeless man in one of my all-time favourite movies ‘Bulworth’ when he proclaims: “You got to be a spirit. We don’t need no more ghosts.” A spirit is a living thing which motivates and inspires. It is not a ghost which is a pale reflection of the past. 

The challenge I pose to our Student Leaders is to look forward, to aim high, to contribute, to seize the day, and continue to build an even greater Xavier Catholic College. 

But it is a challenge that involves everyone. School Spirit means we are all called to get involved and be part of building something great. As the famous saying from Abdul Basit goes: ‘Life is a journey. Don't be a passenger - get in the driver's seat and keep your eyes straight ahead.’ It only takes a handful of passengers, who care little for this place, to bring our spirit down. 

The word ‘spirit’ comes from the Latin word for breath, meaning that it animates life. In the context of a community, school spirit is about creating an environment where everyone has a sense of belonging, inclusion, ownership and passion. It’s about supporting each other and celebrating our diversity as a source of strength. It’s about taking the risk to do something new that will benefit others in the community. Those risks may not always turn out the way you expected them to, but failure to try leaves you as a ‘nothing person’. Don’t be a nothing person:  

They do not take; they simply cannot bring themselves to give. 
They will not rock the boat; but did you ever see them pull an oar! 
They do not hurt you; they merely will not help you. 

So to all in our community, in this moment when we reflect upon leadership, I say: Whatever you do, do not be a nothing person. Get involved, contribute, turn up and support each other and take the risk to strive for high ideals even if that entails the possibility of failure. 

As the famous author, Neil Gaiman, put it so eloquently: 

‘I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes. Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. You're doing things you've never done before, and more importantly, you're doing something. So that's my wish for you, and all of us, and my wish for myself. Make new mistakes. Make glorious, amazing mistakes. Make mistakes nobody's ever made before. Don't freeze, don't stop, don't worry that it isn't good enough, or it isn't perfect, whatever it is: art, or love, or work or family or life. Whatever it is you're scared of doing, do it. Make your mistakes, this year and forever.’ 

School spirit is about creating an inclusive environment. This means we must stand together and work together. We are a stronger community when we are committed to the same cause. We are strong when we are willing to give our gifts to a greater purpose rather than holding them back for our own selfish ends. 

To all our students remember that YOU are the Xavier Wolves. Take pride in your school and its environment, take pride in the achievements of others and they will take pride in your achievements. Give what you have to building up an even stronger Xavier Catholic College every day and in every way. 

God bless 

Simon Dash 

Principal 

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CALENDAR OF EVENTS 

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 Head of School (P-6) – Russel Davey 

As we enter in to the second week of the new term, I would like to take the opportunity to welcome back all our current families. I particularly would like to extend this welcome to our new families and I hope your first week at Xavier was a good one.  As a staff were very pleased to welcome 23 new students to the Primary Years on Monday.  The students were very keen to meet our new students and the most hotly contested role on Day One was that of student buddy to our new arrivals.  This sense of community is very important at Xavier and is the foundation of our College. Community embraces spirit, character, image, and pride and is a vital element of a healthy learning environment. It is a feeling that people within the community matter to one another with a shared faith that their needs will be met through commitment and togetherness. Being a part of a community can make us feel as though we are a part of something greater than ourselves. I thank all current families for the ongoing contribution they make towards ensuring Xavier is a wonderful place to go to school. 

Please see below some general reminders and messages for all Parents/Carers as we begin the new term. 

Before School GOA Duty 

A reminder to all families that the before school duty does not start until 8.00 am. We have had an increasing number of students arriving at GOA before 8.00 am and as a result they are unsupervised during this time.  The 8.00 am duty is intended as a service to parents who may need to drop off before the start of the school day at 8.30 am. It will become increasingly hard to maintain this duty if accidents occur when students are unsupervised.  I would ask that all families respect the 8.00 am and ensure their children are not arriving before this time for the morning GOA duty.  

Semester 2 Parent Teacher Interviews 

Parent Teacher interviews for Semester 2 will be held in Week 5 (9th – 13th July) and Week 6 (16th – 20th July) of Term 3. I would encourage all parents/carers to take up this opportunity to meet with your child’s teacher and discuss their current progress. The relationship between home and school is invaluable and these interviews are an important opportunity to meet and ensure you are familiar with the learning which is occurring in your child’s classroom.  Parent Teacher Online can be accessed via the Parent Portal with interview times open to all parents/carers on Friday 6th August at 8.00 am.  Please do not hesitate to contact the College should you have any difficulty accessing Parent Teacher Online via the portal. 

Prep Come and Try Day 3 

Our final Prep Come and Try Day for the year will occur on this Friday 23rd July.  These sessions are an exciting opportunity for all current and prospective families to experience a Prep classroom in action. I would encourage to register your interest at the College and join us for a morning of play based activities focusing on familiarising children with the Prep environment. Register your attendance here. 

P-6 Disco/P-6 Athletics Carnival 

My thanks to the many families who attended both the P-6 Disco and Athletics’ Carnivals in the final weeks of Term 2.  All three events were very successful, and the community support was outstanding.  A particular mention for our Year 6 leaders who worked very hard with Mrs Brindell and Miss Young to ensure our K-2 Athletics Carnivals and P-6 disco went ahead. I would also like to acknowledge the Year 9 leaders who assisted at the 3-6 Athletics Carnival. 

All proceeds from the Disco will go directly to the purchase of new lunchtime equipment for our P-6 students.  

​P.1 Mackson Tanner 

P.2 Hugo Scott & Sophie Aplin 

P.3 Mila Shbeeb 

1.1 Azriel Cardwell 

1.2 Poppy Jacobs 

1.3 Willow Shiels 

2.1 Sara Rankin 

2.2 Archie Ninnes and Sharla Mably  

2.3 Leona Murray 

3.1 Alanna Blanke 

3.2 Sienna Farrell 

3.3 Hannah Priest 

4.1 Riley Murray 

4.2 Gus Manning 

4.3 Kira-Lee Paulsen 

5.1 Kaison Scott 

5.2 Luca Tomekovic 

5.3 Ellsie Hallett-Taylor 

5.4 Holly McWilliam 

6.1 Sienna Collins 

6.2 Lulu Wilson 

6.3 Grace Stephenson 

Award recipients - Term 2 Week 9 ​

P.1 Jesinta Hardie 

P.2 Lilah Gregory & Willis Fisher 

P.3 Savannah Holloway 

1.1 Anna Jeon 

1.2 Sophie McCrory 

1.3 Bethany Kritakis 

2.1 Mia Ballard 

2.2 Oliver Burke 

2.3 Alexis Gadsby and Matthew Keane 

3.1 Zave Roberts 

3.2 Kurt Hardie & Duke Ridgley 

3.3 Harry Carpenter 

4.1 Abrielle Owen 

4.2 Hallie Merrick 

4.3 Joshua Espulso 

5.1 Finn Wheway 

5.2 Aurora James 

5.3 Holly Fahey & Nalani Hunt 

6.1 Lucy Wright 

6.2 Addison Manning 

6.3 Finnian McDonald 

Award recipients - Term 2 Week 10 ​

P.1 Grace Cooper 

P.2 Volkan Bacaltos & Amelie Legey 

P.3 Maddison Ismail & Jagger Blaikie 

1.1 Willow Hansen 

1.2 Cooper Ismail 

1.3 Esther Heir 

2.3 Zachary Slater & Elsie Young 

3.1 Harrison Shaw & Ivan Miranda 

3.2 Lily Menhinnitt & Azaria Browne 

3.3 Sophia Davis 

4.1 Abrielle Owen 

4.2 Billy Franks 

4.3 Hunter Jackson 

5.1 James Naughton and Phoenix McArthur 

5.2 Oscar Loague 

5.3 Zane Stowers 

5.4 Charlie Lothian 

6.1 Trinity Morton-Block 

6.2 Tyler Brummell 

6.3 Pia McCue 

POSITION AVAILABLE 

A Tuckshop Assistant is required for a fixed-term position of 12 hours per week until 3 December, term-time.  Remuneration is as per Services Award, Level 2.  Some flexibility with hours would be an advantage, to cover other shifts or during busy periods.  A Paid Employment Blue Card is required.  Commencement as soon as possible.  Please visit the BCE Website, Employment Opportunities to apply on-line.  Please telephone Liz Mee, Tuckshop Convenor, on 4197 1177 if you have any questions. 

NAIDOC WEEK 

Last week we celebrated NAIDOC week as a college. There were many experiences to broaden our knowledge and understanding of Indigenous culture and history. On Tuesday our Junior school students learnt cultural dances from Emily, Noah and Ruby Burns, local Butchulla dance group members. The dance the students learnt was Wuruma, the fishing dance. 

This dance is about wuruma (the bird known as brahminy-kite) who taught the Butchulla a very important fishing law—when djilgar (the black wattle tree) starts flowering, the diamond scale mullet is coming through. From wuruma, the Butchulla learnt never to hunt the first school of fish when the season starts. Wuruma never starts diving until that first school of fish has gone past because they are scouts searching for danger—if they don’t return to the rest of the school, the fish will swim back out to deep water and not return for a couple of years. After that first school of fish goes past, wuruma starts diving, which lets the Butchulla know it’s time to go fishing. All the way through that season, there will be plenty of fish. 

PARISH NEWS - COMMUNION 2021 - Parent information night 

A parent information night regarding communiion will be held on Thursday 22nd July at 6.30pm in the Church.    In the Year when children turn 9 (Year 4), they are welcomed to the Lord’s Table and receive Holy Communion for the First Time.    

Children must be Baptised and have received the Sacrament of Confirmation (2020 or earlier) to receive their First Holy Communion. Please contact the office on 4124 3334 or email  pmc.herveybay@bne.catholic.net.au for further information. 

Year 10 Work Experience Program 

Over 120 students participated in Work placement in the last 2 weeks of Term 2 and we would like to extend our thanks to the community for accepting our students during their placement. It is a great experience for all students that take the initiative to source placement and learn skills in an industry of their choice prior to embarking on their work life / career.   

Australian Mathematics Competition 

The Australian Mathematic Competition will be held at the College in Term 3 on Thursday 5th August 2021 during lesson 1 and 2 for students from year 3-12.  This year we will be completing the competition online and the cost is $6.50 to enter.  A link on QKR has been set up for both payment and permission slip. 

A letter will be given to students at the end of last term who have shown interest in participating in the competition.   If your child has missed out on a letter and wishes to participate in the competition, they can collect one from student reception. 

If you have any queries please email: Year 3-6  slove@bne.catholic.edu.au  

                                                                   Year 7-12 jritter@bne.catholic.edu.au 

At the end of 2020 Ashleigh Relf was asked to apply to be a part of the Curious Minds STEM Program. The selection of these students was based on their Australian Maths Competition results.    Congratulations Ashleigh!                                    

Curious Minds STEM Program by Ash Relf 

During late 2020, I was chosen to participate in the Curious Minds program for girls in STEM. The program was created to encourage gender diversity and gain more enthusiastic women to pursue a career in this particular industry. The program included two camps and monthly catch ups with my STEM coach. In the first camp, amongst sessions with experts in different fields, we were told we had to conduct a presentation for the second camp. This presentation could be about anything, for example a friend I made from the camp talked about paper planes for her presentation and another girl presented her trip to the synchrotron. My chosen topic for my presentation was bees and their importance in our world. The STEM coach was there to assist you with your project over the six months between the camps. My coach helped me research and write my presentation. We got along so well that my mother once thought I was on call with a friend because I was laughing so much. Both camps were a lot of fun, and I met a lot of really nice people. I'm glad I got the opportunity to participate, and I hope other girls in Australia choose to take up on this enthralling program, if given the option. 

Prep news 

In Prep we have been learning to recall one or two events from a text. We have been reading the book Too Many Cheeky Dogs. We made our own map of Canteen Creek and put all the places that the Cheeky Dogs went to. We also did a comparison between Canteen Creek and Hervey Bay to see what is the same and different. During integrated play time the preppies made a yard to keep the cheeky dogs in. 

Dirum Dynamites! 

Congratulations to these Dirum students who received exemplary effort results in semester 1. Congratulations to: Bonnie Murphy, Emily Glock-Lewis, Lucas Tavaya, Taylah Mitchell, Lehansa Jayasinghe, Maria Rose Abraham, Juniper Canning, Milli Paxton, JP Boshoff, Sakina Baziani, Lucy Cambra-Bourne and Aiden Quinn. 

Kondari Stars! 

Kondari students from Years 7- 10 were recently congratulated on their outstanding application to their studies in all subjects during Semester 1. Congratulations to: Aylah Ikonen, Lilliana Binns, Madison Bonello, Hamish Bryce, Lilly Carbone, Katelyn Relf, Biaca Piggott, Jasper Brien, Erykah Nelson, Eloise Tinker, Jayneiquah Bligh, Damon Stewart, Scarlett Dunkley, Charlotte White, Lily Williams, Peyton Prizeman, Belle Bishop, Zara Kampman, Leah Lyle and Tanzi Rowell. 

To Register for this event please go to https://www.passionistyouth.com.au/camp/ Tickets are $150.00 or contact  Mrs Donnelly for more information  

SPORTS NEWS 

TOKYO 2020 OLYMPICS – KERBY, HAUSER AND STEPHENS! 

We are so incredibly proud to have 3 past Xavier students competing in the upcoming Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games (branded as the 2020 Olympic/Paralympic Games). Jordan Kerby (2009 Graduate) will represent New Zealand for cycling and is competing in the Team Pursuit on August 2nd and 3rd starting at approximately 6:30pm. Matt Hauser (2015 Graduate) is representing Australia in triathlon and is competing on Monday 26th July starting at 7:30am and on Saturday 31st July at 8:30am in the Mixed Relay. Keira Stephens (2020 Graduate) is representing Australia at the Paralympic Games for swimming and will compete in 50 Freestyle, 100 Breaststroke, 200 Medley, 4 x 50 Freestyle Relay and the 4 x 100 Medley Relay from Wednesday 25th August to Friday 3rd September. We have followed each of their journeys with great admiration and wish them our heartfelt best wishes in coming weeks. 

SECONDARY ATHLETICS 

Not long now until the 2021 Secondary Athletics Carnival. The participation in the 3000m and 1500m lunch time events has been outstanding with some incredible performances by students in these disciplines. Students will nominate for Championship events on Wednesday morning and will begin competing on Thursday and into Friday. Students are required to wear their House Shirt on Thursday and will complete Periods 1 and 2 before starting rotations at 12pm. Please note, there is to be no ordering from canteen at 2nd break on Thursday as students will not be permitted to leave the oval. Students are encouraged to bring fruit or snack down to the oval for the afternoon. On Friday, students are encouraged to dress up in their House Theme but all championship students will need to dress in suitable ‘athletic-style’ clothing when competing. Please see program details below… 

Schedule of Events – Thursday 22nd July 

Schedule of Events – Friday 23rd July – ATHLETICS DAY 

 COMMUNITY NOTICES