Week 10
26 June 2026
Dear Parents/Carers
Reports and Parent Teacher Interviews
We are looking forward to the release of the remainder of Stage 4 and 5 reports (today) and Week 11 Parent Teacher Student Interviews next week. These are a valuable opportunity to look for opportunities for reflection and growth. Parents and students are encouraged to ask questions and explore how they can improve. Not everyone will get an A and sometimes a C will feel like a huge success. Grades don’t define a young person’s worth and success will look different for everyone. Please celebrate the successes of the boys and support and encourage them to always look for ways to improve.
The good
On Thursday 25 June I had the privilege of driving all over Sydney to watch three winter season grand finals. We won the Intermediate Rugby League first of all to start the day at 11.00am. I then drove straight to Strathfield Park and saw the dying minutes of the Inter A Soccer team win. I then remained behind to watch the Senior A Soccer team win a thrilling 2-1 game over Rosebank College (clinched with an amazing goal by Nicholas Armstrong). All three successful teams played exceptionally well to win their Sydney Catholic Schools Conference titles, playing hard and fair. I was incredibly proud of them.
The not so good and the lessons we can learn
For the Senior A Soccer team, we wanted to support our team by taking a bus load of Year 12 students to support their peers. The supporters were all pretty excited and to make sure everything ran smoothly we had some pretty tight restrictions in place to ensure safety and make sure we represented the school with pride and distinction. During a very intense period of the game, we reminded the boys to remain standing on a retaining wall near one of the corners. The boys were encouraged to yell and cheer, but to remain where they were.
Marist College Eastwood received a penalty kick and we could sense the boys’ excitement. Ms Alvarez and myself reminded the boys they could cheer as much as they wanted, but they were not to run at the boundary fence if we were to score. They were all warned, if anyone runs at the fence, we are all getting on the bus and heading back to school straight away. Sure enough, we scored the goal, and a handful of boys ran towards the fence with one boy even jumping up on the fence. There were also a few expletives yelled out of excitement from the boys.
Now Ms Alvarez and myself had a decision to make as the leaders of the school. Remain true to our word, follow through with what we said and direct all boys on the bus, or ignore the behaviour and pretend nothing happened. It became a question of do we punish the majority of boys for the sake of a minority?
We remained faithful to our words and the expectations we set. All of the supporters had to get back on the bus and head back to school before the game concluded.
Ignoring the behaviour of the minority would have said to the majority that Ms Alvarez and myself would not follow through with what we preach, stand for and expect for our school. School leadership is a challenging task. Being responsible for nearly 1,000 teenage boys, approximately 100 staff and working with a few thousand parents is a huge privilege and tremendous responsibility. And as much as it kept me awake that night feeling incredible guilt, once the dust settled and a new day began, I’m confident that the majority of our parent community would be supportive that we remained faithful to our word. High standards are hard work and we want to role model to our boys that they should never shy away from what is right (and sometimes this involves making tough decisions).
Respice Finem
Mr David Sullivan
Principal
