Dear Parents and Carers,

Transcription

1 Term 4 Issue 5 4 December 13 December 2017 In this Issue: Page 1. Principal s Message 3. Religious Education Coordinator s Message 6. Director of Student Wellbeing Message 7. Youth Ministry Coordinator's Message 11. Resource Centre Message 12. Co-curricular Activities 17. P & F News 18. Parent News Upcoming Events: TERM 1 SCHOOL RETURNS 2018 Tuesday 30 January 8.30am 12 noon Year 7 and Year 10 Tuesday 30 January 9.00am 10.00am All New Year 8 11 Students Wednesday 31 January ALL STUDENTS YEARS 7 12 SAVE THE DATE MERCY COLLEGE OPEN DAY 2018 SUNDAY 4th MARCH (Compulsory School Day) Dear Parents and Carers, The Awards Night on Tuesday and our final Mass on Wednesday were fitting ends to what has been such an amazing year at Mercy College. I was delighted to see the number of parents and friends that joined their daughters for the evening and helped us celebrate the community s achievements in academia, on the sporting field and on the stage. Our special guest Mrs Prue Smith enthralled the girls when she gave the Occasional Address, speaking of her life experiences and pursuing her dreams. Prue gave all our students a clear message of never giving up when she spoke of her Mercy education, working at the War Crimes Tribunal in Tanzania and being an intern at the United Nations in New York. AUSTRALIAN CATHOLIC YOUTH FESTIVAL (ACYF): If your daughter is in Year 10, or one of the lucky ones in Years 9 and 11 who had the opportunity to attend ACYF your house would be a buzz of chatter and snippets of music and song that came from the Festival. It was a wonderful three day celebration for our Catholic youth, providing our students with the opportunity to deepen their relationship with Jesus and share their faith with other Catholic youth. The theme of the Festival was Opening New Horizons for Spreading the Joy and I saw that sense of joy in my encounters during the Festival, especially at the celebration of Eucharist on Saturday night with 15,000 people in the Domain. There was a great sense of hope, that our young people will continue the Christian message. STAFF LEAVING MCC: We have said farewell to nine dedicated and much loved teachers and our parish priest at the end of this term. I thank them for their commitment to being the educators of your daughters. Fr Paul Finucane who after seven years as our Parish Priest and spiritual guide is leaving to take up the role of Parish Priest in the Kincumber parish. Strive Page 1 for Better Things Mercy Catholic College, Chatswood mercy@dbb.catholic.edu.au 101 Archer St, Chatswood NSW 2067 Telephone: mercychatswood.nsw.edu.au

2 Message from Principal Mrs Rowena Lau who has given 32 years of her life in service at Mercy. Mrs Lau has a vast experience of everything scientific and always had a great desire for her students to share in her passion of working out why is it so? She has guided hundreds of students through the HSC and particularly the rigours of the Physics course. She is much loved and will be greatly missed. Mrs Karen Greenyer has been with Mercy since 2009 when she began casual teaching before moving into the History department. Her professionalism, passion for her subject area and the dedication she has shown to the students in her care is greatly admired and will be missed. Mr Sean Marshall started at Mercy in Term 3, 2011 and quickly became an integral part of our teaching staff. His desire to ensure our students understood the difficult concepts in Biology, his commitment to taking on the running of the Duke of Edinburgh Scheme for a time and his sheer exuberance in joining in all the fun activities, will mean he will be sorely missed by the students and his colleagues. Mrs Amy Gill leaves us this year as she is going to pursue an interest she has in teaching disadvantaged children. Mrs Gill began at Mercy in 2014, spending the last four years being committed to giving our girls every opportunity to express themselves through Drama. Her energy and creative ideas were seen many times over in our Creative Arts Evenings and drama productions. To those teachers who have only been with us on short-term contracts: Miss Brooke Lamplough, Ms Joanne Kalyzich, Ms Salina Bussein, and Mr Krzysztof Kukielka, we wish them well in their future endeavours. CHRISTMAS BLESSING: I wish all our families the peace and joy of the Christmas season and great happiness in the New Year. I hope that you have time as a family, to celebrate the birth of Our Lord and time to just be together enjoying each other s company. Seasons Greetings Principal Page 2

3 Message from Religious Education Coordinator REC Report ACYF 2017 Last week over 100 students from Years 9, 10 & 11 accompanied by 17 teachers attended the Australian Catholic Youth Festival. The theme of the festival was opening new horizons for spreading joy and it called on our youth to say Yes to God, just as Mary the Mother of Christ did at her annunciation. The three day festival which culminated in the celebration of Mass at the Domain with over 15,000 people was a powerful experience of encountering the spirit of God amongst the youth in our Church. The Festival included concert style plenaries, workshops, open dialogue with bishops and priests on issues concerning our youth, and the opportunity for contemporary prayer and worship. ACYF Drama Performance The ACYF Drama Performance the Mary of Now was written and produced by our very own drama teacher Mrs Gill and involved 43 students from Mercy and St Pius College. The four episodes appeared during the plenary sessions and the Closing Mass at the Domain. The performances were sensational, bringing to life our central Christian messages of joy, hope and love in a contemporary way that the young people of our Church could understand and relate to. Page 3

4 Message from Religious Education Coordinator REC Report continued Christmas Week The spirit of Christmas and the coming of our Saviour Jesus Christ has been alive here at the College through the student s involvement in Christmas Week. This is a time for students to focus on self-giving and making visible the presence of Christ in our school. Activities included Santa Photos, Candy Cane Christmas messages delivered by our Year 10 students in Tutor Group, decorating a Christmas Spirit Window for each House Colour, the Staff vs Student Trivia Quiz and the House Christmas Song Competition. We also enjoyed Christmas Parties and Kris Kringle gifts in our Tutor Groups. The spirit of joy was certainly alive in our community. Advent Mass Our final Advent Mass was a beautiful celebration of the Eucharist to celebrate the end of the school year and the season of Advent. This year we have been inspired by the teachings of Jesus who said, I am the light of the world. (Jn 8:12) In this season of Advent, as we journey toward Christmas we eagerly wait for the light of God to come into the world and make room for the presence of Jesus in our hearts. At our Mass we said farewell to Fr Paul who has been our Parish Priest for the past 7 years. During this time Fr Paul has supported our College in the faith formation of our community. He has celebrated Masses with us, joined us on Retreats and Staff Spirituality Days. He was there to see us celebrate our 125 th anniversary as a College, accompanied our students on pilgrimage to WYD and most recently came with us to ACYF. At our most important times of celebration, prayer or moment of need Fr Paul has been there to support our community. We wish Fr. Paul all the best as he leave us to join the Kincumber Parish and thank him for all that he has done for our College community. Ms G Stojanovski Religious Education Coordinator Page 4

5 Message from Religious Education Coordinator REC Report continued Advent Mass Ms G Stojanovski Religious Education Coordinator Page 5

6 Message from Director of Student Wellbeing Christmas Time Christmas time is always a special and joyous time. Everyone has an opportunity to stop and relax and spend more time with those they love. However, be aware for a young person the holiday season can be disruptive because their normal routine without the school structure goes out the window. The hardest part of holidays for your teenage daughter is she does not get to hang out with their friends every day. Though it is good to have a break from friends and school, remember social interaction is important for teenage girls. If your daughter wants to catch up with friends there is an added financial pressure during holidays. Your daughter will want to spend time watching youtube videos and other shows online, this is normal, but do encourage reading, time outside her room and venturing outdoors. If you can get a chance take your daughter to a café and have special parent time with her. Treasure these moments because they really do grow up so fast. In preparation for your daughter s return to school make sure she is getting to sleep at a reasonable time and not using her phone as an alarm clock, invest in an alarm clock. Take her phone away an hour before bedtime and encourage her to read. Here is a link about sleep: SMH- Good Weekend 18 March 2017: A sleep deprivation epidemic is endangering the health and learning of our 14 year olds-and it's not just technology that's to blame As the year comes to an end I care to thank you for the welcome you have given me this year. On behalf of the Pastoral Care team at Mercy I would like to wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and we look forward to seeing your daughter in Ms G McDermott Director of Student Wellbeing Page 6

7 Message from Youth Ministry Coordinator Australian Catholic Youth Festival (ACYF) A number of Year 10 students have shared their feelings and thoughts after the ACYF experience. The opening plenary enabled me as a young Catholic to embrace my faith and own my beliefs. The atmosphere at Qudos Bank Arena was one I will remember forever as it was so powerful hearing people singing in unison. The encounter with one of the Bishops on the topic of Marriage equality was a great experience and I felt as though I was part of a big moment in history. I am so grateful for ACYF and I will cherish the lifelong memories. Alana ACYF was an experience that we will hold close to us throughout our lives. It gave us the opportunity to express our faith in ways we would feel embarrassed to otherwise. Some things that we found really touching was the morning plenaries. Especially the Mercy Drama and Orange Sky. Bella and Amelia Page 7

8 Message from Youth Ministry Coordinator Before I went to ACYF I was not religious at all. But after ACYF I have a whole new opinion and respect for people. Being surrounded by thousands of people with such strong religious beliefs was life-changing. I will never forget how incredible I felt after the plenaries. Francesca It was one of the best experiences of my life. I went for the full two days (Thursday and Friday) and I regret not going on Saturday. As a person that comes from a Catholic family this experience has strengthened my faith. Francesca The highlight of the festival was the opportunity to meet new people and hear about their experiences in life and in faith. Everyone had a unique story to share and was very open to talking. So many new friendships were formed and the amount of wisdom we gained from the conversations we had was incomparable to other events we had been to. Mia My experience at the Australian Catholic Youth Festival was an incredible one. By the end I felt enlightened, free and more connected to God than I had ever been in my life. Spending time with 18,000 young people who shared my religion, beliefs and values was truly wonderful as I was given the opportunity to learn more about my faith in such a short amount of time. One of the most powerful moments of the festival was praying a decade of the Rosary with the thousands of people at Qudos Arena. I extend my deepest thanks and gratitude to the staff of Mercy who not only looked after myself and the students attending the festival but who put many hours into organising the logistics of the festival. It was an outstanding couple of days! Alyssa Mrs H Thomas Youth Ministry Coordinator Religious Education teacher Page 8

9 Page 9 Message from Youth Ministry Coordinator

10 Mercy Girls Inspire Quest International Challenge "In Brisbane, Queensland last weekend (Saturday 9 December), a group of talented Year 10s were given the opportunity to represent NSW in the Quest International Challenge for the Gifted and Talented after having successfully finished competing in the state finals with teams coming 1st (Emma Woodlock, Jamie Cunningham, and Vanya D'Silva) and 2nd place (Fiza Shaikh, Mia Heaney, and Hannah Nolan) overall. The teams were required to participate in three separate challenges on Humanities, Mathematics and Science at the University of Queensland. At the International Challenge, students were required to use their previously learnt knowledge on philosophy to write a children's story book exploring the concepts and different perspectives of rationalism and empiricism, and then to justify it. This task challenged us to define rationalism and empiricism in simple terms for children and place it into an easy-to-understand story. Most of us thoroughly enjoyed the challenge and agree it was, by far, the simplest challenge of the day. Our next challenge was Mathematics in which we had to partake in tasks involving GPS, trilateration, and vectors, and to use them to design a car park that could fit the most amount of car parking space. This challenge was harder than it sounded, and involved complex calculations to determine the exact number of spots as well as to draw the layout to scale. Finally, the day was concluded with Science. In this challenge, we had to describe the three different theories of relativity (if you don't know what that is, look it up. You'll find it as hard to understand as we did!) which included classical, general and special relativity. We had to create our own thought experiments which described situations in which each theory could be demonstrated and then to create appropriate graphs. While challenging and incredibly energy-consuming, we were able to complete the task, and also had fun along the way. Overall, the Quest International Challenge has been an exciting experience that we all recommend to anyone interested (in Year 7-10 only, sorry!). We'd like to thank Mr Regoli for providing us with this awesome opportunity, and travelling and supporting us every step of the way. We'd also like to thank Emma's dad, Andrew Woodlock, for also coming with us and supporting us in Brisbane." Vanya D (Yr 10) Congratulations to the girls who once again achieved Fantastic results: 2 nd Internationally for Humanities, 2 nd Internationally for Mathematics and 3 rd Internationally for Science. Mr Regoli Page 10

11 Student News Resource Centre NSW Premier s Reading Challenge Each year, we offer students in Years 7 to 9 the opportunity to participate in the Premier s Reading Challenge. The Challenge runs from March to August and students are required to read 20 books during this time. We are pleased to announce that in 2017, twelve students successfully completed the Premier s Reading Challenge. Congratulations go to the following students: Sonia A Teresa F Emma S Jewel Y Lisa D Isabel L Danai M Olivia T Of these twelve, four students received special awards. Congratulations to Hannah C and Olivia H who have received a Gold Award after having completed the Premier s Reading Challenge on four occasions, reading 80 books over that time. Two students have been awarded a Platinum Certificate after having completed the Challenge on seven occasions, and reading 140 during that time. Congratulations to Emma R and Sophie R, for this fantastic Achievement. The Premier s Reading Challenge will be offered to students to participate in next year. The Premier s Reading Challenge will be offered to students to participate in next year. accessed via any device, at mercy.wheelers.co and students can sign in using their school network username and password. Ms S Betts Teacher Librarian REMINDER FOR PARENTS Can you please ensure that State Transit are advised of any changes to your address as soon as possible to enable your daughters Opal Card to have the correct details. When updating your details the students will continue to use their Opal Card as normal and will not be issued with a new card. Only new students to the College will receive a new Opal card. Please contact state Transit if you need a replacement card. Page 11

12 Co-Curricular Activities Page 12

13 Co-Curricular Activities MCC BASKETBALL Semester 2 Wrap up There were two Mercy teams for 2017 Competition 2, Mercy Magic ( U16 Div. 3 ) & Mercy Wildcats ( U16 Div. 2). Both teams have had an amazing season which saw them both finish first on the competition table in their own divisions. The Wildcats became runners up losing their semis by only 2 points and the Magic went on to win the Grand Final on Friday 38-14, an outstanding result. I will be stepping down as Mercy Basketball Convenor after being in this role for over 5 years and my replacement will be Mr John Harmata. Any future enquiries for basketball can be sent to John humma5@bigpond.net.au or Margaret Kellendonk at Mercy College Margaret.kellendonk@dbb.catholic.edu.au Regards Sharon Houston Basketball Convenor Wildcats Season 2017 The Mercy Wildcats (Year 8 Basketball Team) had an excellent season 2 in The team was very competitive and had several close and exciting games throughout season, winning a few games by less than a 6 point margin, so they certainly kept their parents entertained on the sideline. With all these close results going the Wildcats way plus a draw along the way, saw the team finishing first in the standings in the Norths U16 Division 2 competition. This was an excellent result that the team should be proud of. The close games certainly continued into the finals a 2 point difference, but this time not in the Wildcats favour, saw the team finish their season at the semi-final stage. Overall, it was a great season 2017 for the Mercy Wildcats. Stepping up an age division from 14s to 16s, the team performed really well to make the semi-final playoff in both seasons 1 & 2. The team is looking forward to another successful season next year and hopefully going one game better. John Harmata Coach Page 13

14 Co-Curricular Activities Magic Season 2017 We started the second season with a positive team of 11 dedicated players, most of which were new to the concept of basketball. The girls had a strong season and won every game but one leading up to the grand-final game. Everyone was nervous but the girls used it as positive energy and won the under 16's division 3 competition, I am extremely proud of the girls as they worked together and played an amazing game. I hope to see them all back next year representing Mercy College in the under 18's competition. Sam Banbekian Coach Page 14

15 Co-Curricular Activities Page 15

16 Co-Curricular Activities Page 16

17 Co-Curricular Activities P & F News 2018 P&F Function Dates Open Day Mothers Day Breakfast Fathers Day Breakfast Graduation Afternoon Tea Year Welcome BBQ Sunday 4 March Thursday 10 May Thursday 30 August Wednesday 26 September Friday 16 November 2018 P&F Meeting Dates Term 1 Term 2 Term 3 Term 4 21 February 6 June 15 August 24 October (AGM) Page 17

18 Parent News Page 18

19 Page 19 Parent News