Dear Community,

Has Lent begun to seem long? We are now past halfway through the 40 days of Lent which means we are closer to Easter! We count the 40 days of Lent from the First Sunday of Lent through to Holy Thursday. Lent is not just a time for doing special things and saying special prayers for the sake of doing them. If our Lenten practices do not help us to understand God’s word more clearly and help us to live according to that word more generously, then they are not useful.

Later this term we will be hosting our Holy Week liturgies, just another way of spending quiet time reflecting on the importance of this special week. We strongly encourage you to join us for these liturgies in Week 10 (more information in the next few weeks).

Please pray for our students who attended the first ‘First Holy Communion Session’ last night as they, and their parents, prepare for this sacrament in early April.

NAPLAN

Our students in Years 3 and 5 commenced NAPLAN yesterday and will continue to do these tests on literacy and numeracy over the next week. We wish our students all the best during these tests. The results of NAPLAN will be released to parents and school communities later in the year.

Working Bee
We will host a Working Bee on Friday 22 March, from 3:30 pm to 6 pm. We have a lot to do to tidy up our school grounds in preparation for the enrolment period and open days and would love your support. Please claim the date and bring along gardening equipment: whipper snippers, blowers, gardening gloves, hedge trimmers, hand weeders, barrows, bags etc. We will cook a sausage sizzle and provide drinks following the Working Bee. Kids are most welcome to help too!

Athletics Carnival

I was so disappointed to miss the annual Athletics Carnival last week. From all reports, it was a fantastic day (albeit very warm!). Congratulations to Mrs Laura Stumbles who coordinated our carnival and to her band of merry staff and parent helpers who ensured it was a successful and fun day for all.

Swimming Carnival

Next Thursday is our annual swimming carnival. There is plenty of work behind the scenes to ensure another great day for our students. A reminder please that all parents need to give permission for their child to attend. You need to do this on COMPASS and we ask if you haven’t done it yet to do it as quickly as possible because we need to populate races and events.

Boys at Sacred Heart Meeting- Wednesday 20th March 5:30-6:30pm
I invite all parents who have boys in Kinder to Year 3 who may be undecided on upper-year enrolment or all parents who want further information about the offerings we have for our students during Years 4 to 6 at Sacred Heart, to attend a meeting in the school library on Wednesday 20th March, from 5:30pm to 6:30pm.

A few families have approached me to provide information about the educational, social and leadership opportunities which Sacred Heart has to offer during the remaining years of their primary education in Catholic Education. I am more than happy to address this and share information.

During this meeting, I will discuss what we offer in our Catholic K-6 co-educational systemic school, tuition fees, leadership and enrichment opportunities, curriculum focus and extra-curricular sports. There will, of course, be opportunities for dialogue and questions too.

Sacred Heart is part of the Mary Help of Christians Parish, along with Marist College. Being from the same Parish, we have written confirmation from Marist: “Catholic boys from Sacred Heart Primary will be guaranteed a position in Year 7 at Marist College Canberra should families decide to keep their sons at Sacred Heart Primary until the conclusion of Year 6.”

Please pencil this in your diaries and come along.

Book Fair

Thank you to many of you for supporting the 2024 Sacred Heart Book Fair. Today is our final day. A big thanks to Mr Aaron Fox who coordinated our Book Fair.

Congratulations Fr Emil

Last Sunday morning, our Parish Priest, Fr Emil Milat was officially ‘installed’ as our new Parish Priest by the Archbishop of Canberra and Goulburn, Christopher Prowse. (Yes, that is the correct term- Fr Emil was ‘installed’!). A special official welcome Fr Emil to the Parish of Mary Help of Christians, South Woden.

In faith and partnership,

David Austin

Principal

Compass Notifications

Please refer to Compass for the following notifications:

• Boys at Sacred Heart Parent meeting Wednesday 20 March 5:30pm
• It’s that time again, Easter Egg raffle!

The season of Lent began with Ash Wednesday (14^th February), which also marks the beginning of the annual Caritas Australia Project Compassion Appeal. Donations to Project Compassion allow Caritas Australia, the Catholic Agency for International Aid and Development, to work with local communities around the world to end poverty, promote justice and uphold dignity.

The theme of Project Compassion 2024 is ‘For All Future Generations’ and reminds us that the good we do today extends to impact the lives of generations to come. It invites us to make the world a better place by working together now and finding long-term solutions to global issues.  We encourage you to put your compassion into action this Lent through prayer, fasting and almsgiving in support of Project Compassion.

Our Term 1 Ride and Walk to school morning is Friday 22nd March

Continuing on from last year, we would like to build an independent ride and walking community within our school. This independence of riding or walking may become a more practical option of getting to school. Families/students can meet at various pick up locations within our community.  

Ways to organise this could be to find information and communicate/connect via 'The Sacred Heart Parents and Carers' Facebook page or utilise other parent networks you have. You may wish to set up a WhatsApp to organise daily or weekly walking to school days.  Below are the meeting points (without teachers) so parents can meet there and send their children on their way to school. This may help to organise future riding/walking mornings and if some parents are able to walk with the group, they can talk about how to get to school safely with the children.

As usual, we will have fresh fruit, music and a raffle draw when students arrive at school.

We hope this begins an exciting chapter of confidence and independence for our Sacred Heart Students, enabling them to nurture their hearts, minds and spirits.

Wednesday lunch club is THINK! with Mrs Wode. This week we were given a bamboo fork, two cotton balls and a piece of paper. Our challenge was to create something to wear or use. Look at our designs.

Both Emilia B & Olive W from year 4 are still enjoying this great sport. It’s lots of fun & awesome for fitness. They are constantly improving & doing it with a smile. Emilia scored her first goal on Saturday against tough competition!  

Girls & boys aged 9 & above are welcome to join. For more information: Link  

Dear MHOC Families,

We hope you are doing well in the lead up to Easter. 
We have a busy weekend in the Parish with Fr Emil’s official Installation at this Sunday’s 10am Mass with Archbishop Christopher Prowse, followed by a morning tea.  Please join us.

You will also find details in this week’s bulletin of:

• Palm Sunday Rally for Refugees on 24 Mar 1pm,
• An update on Fr Richard’s farewell (spread the word) and
• Vocations dinner being held in Pearce on 14 March.

Thanks and have a lovely week ahead.