Despite the challenges of living in North Queensland at this time of year, the first week of our new school year has started very successfully. A huge thank you to all our parents and carers for the patience they have shown at drop off and pick up each day. Your calm nature is a wonderful example to all our students.

Extreme Weather and Cyclone Season

Townsville Catholic Education has procedures around school closures in the event of cyclones and extreme weather events. 

The link to this information is provided here:

Severe Weather Events

Please ensure that you are familiar with this information. We will send out notifications to parents and carers via SMS, email and our St Benedict’s Facebook page, in the event of a school closure.

End of school message

Thank you to all parents and carers and staff for their cooperation with today's early pick up procedures. The admin staff processed a total of 434 early departures this afternoon.

Take care everyone over the coming days. 

God In All of Life

Patrick Dempsey

pdempsey2@stbenedicts.catholic.edu.au

It’s great weather for ducks!  What a damp start we have had to the year - our students have done a wonderful job in settling into the year and their routines, despite the interruptions the weather has caused.  

Swimming Carnival

There is weather predicted for next week, however at this stage, our Interhouse Swimming carnival is still scheduled to go ahead on Friday February 7.  We will make a final decision on this closer to the day if a postponement is required.  

We have made the decision to cancel the Swimming Carnival Sausage Sizzle which our wonderful P&F usually provides for the day.  This decision has been made due to what will be the muddy and ultimately unsafe condition of the area that the cooking and serving normally takes place in.  We look forward to other sausage sizzles and similar events throughout the year!

Save the Date - Beginning Year Liturgy

Finally, I would like to invite everyone to our Beginning Year Liturgy on Friday February 14 at 9:00am.  During this liturgy, we will celebrate coming together for the year ahead, and induct our Year 6 students and our Leaders.

Welcome to the New School Year!

As a family, you are about to embark on an exciting journey into a new year level. The purpose of this email is to introduce the new Inclusive Practices Teacher (IPT) team at St Benedict’s. Mrs Charley Favalli (Prep and Year 1), Ms Tegan Barter (Year 2, Year 3 and Year 4) and Mrs Rhylie Mathiesen (Year 5 and Year 6). 

Inclusive Practice Teachers work cooperatively and in collaboration with school leadership personnel, teachers, other student support services team members and parents/carers to ensure that all students, including students with a disability, in primary and secondary schools across the Diocese are supported to engage purposefully in learning. Inclusive Practice Teachers will work to develop the capability within schools to cater for the diversity of these learners within the school population.

If you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to reach out. Open communication underpins learning here at St Benedict’s, and we extend an open and ongoing invitation for you to contact us at any time.

We look forward to supporting your child alongside our colleagues and warmly welcome your family to what is going to be a great year at St Benny’s.

Prep - Year 1  Charley Favalli - cfavalli1@stbenedicts.catholic.edu.au

Year 2- 4 Tegan Barter- tbarter7@stbenedicts.catholic.edu.au 

Years 5-6     Rhylie Mathiesen  - rmathiesen1@stbenedicts.catholic.edu.au