What an absolute pleasure it is to be back at St Benedict’s! While it was an fabulous opportunity to work at TCE with the Staffing Guidelines Project as I have a particular interest in improving the current model and making it more reflective of contemporary school needs, I have missed our community immensely. I am definitely not ready to work anywhere away from our students anytime soon. Our students have treated me like a rock star upon my return and I have been bombarded with information about loose teeth, tooth fairy visits, stories about new baby brothers and sisters, sporting, dance and gymnastics accomplishments and I have thoroughly enjoyed every conversation. I managed to visit each classroom on the very first day where I have met new students at our school who have all told me how they have settled in beautifully and made friends already which is so great to hear. Many of our students were keen to test how many of their names I had remembered. Apparently I did okay but have some work to do :)

I was also especially impressed with the level of student engagement happening in every classroom (and outside of the classroom as we like to do here at St Benedict’s) with learning. I have had many students visit me in the office to show me their work over the last couple of days and it has been just wonderful to see how much pride students are taking with their learning. 

It has been very exciting to return to school and see the progress with our final building project. We are looking forward to these additional spaces that will not only take us to a school of 700 students within the next few years but also provide a number of key spaces for visiting specialists to use and provide more space for multi-pupose use. With these spaces, we look forward to expanding our instrumental and arts programs as well providing more undercover space for students to play and perform.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank Mrs Ros Baumann and the entire leadership team for their commitment to our St Benedict's community and for addressing a number of challenges that arose over the course of the last term and a half with such professionalism and care. I have always felt very blessed by the entire staff team we have at St Benedicts and the last few months have been no exception. 

I look forward to engaging with you all as the term and the year progresses. Have a fabulous week and Go Queensland!

Cheers

Penny