{"id":4374,"date":"2022-11-14T16:46:45","date_gmt":"2022-11-14T05:46:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/ssc\/?post_type=article&p=4374"},"modified":"2022-12-14T09:20:43","modified_gmt":"2022-12-13T22:20:43","slug":"college-principal-9","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/ssc\/article\/college-principal-9\/","title":{"rendered":"College Principal"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Congratulations to our musicians across the College who performed at the Celebration of Music concert at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music recently. The standard of our students is something that sets Santa Sabina apart from other schools, and I am in awe of how our youngest musicians play alongside the senior students to create such beautiful harmony. Many schools have music programs for their primary aged students but there are programs and then there are programs. This email from one of our parents to our Music department staff sums it up nicely:<\/span><\/p>\n

‘I just wanted to thank you so much for the incredible event you created on Saturday night. My wife and I\u00a0 were simply amazed at the quality of what you are producing.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

I am not someone that goes to many of these types of music events, but I honestly could have sat there for another two hours, waiting for you to feed me more of that beautiful music performance.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

The most notable thing I felt when I looked at all the groups was how relaxed, confident, and happy they appeared to be\u2026I am sure there was a lot going on in their minds and hearts, but from where I was sitting, they looked “concert ready”.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

It is something that really sets this school apart, and it is always so important to have passionate, patient and inspiring leaders\u2026thank you so much. Please pass this on to all the other tutors and conductors too.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Have a great week, and I hope you have the time to celebrate what you achieved.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

My only request\u2026keep it coming!’<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

I am hopeful that many of you have had the opportunity to listen to our first Santa Dialogues podcast<\/a>, The Joy of Reading<\/em>, but if not, I would like to share that from next year our Year 7 and 8 students will all have a dedicated reading lesson each cycle and we are in the process of buying soft furnishings and a hot chocolate machine to provide a welcoming reading atmosphere where our students can read and relax. Our Year 9 students will meet with book buyers to help purchase books that they want to read for our Library and they will be able to participate in the Reader’s Cup. During the winter break, we will be providing students and parents in Year 8 with a copy of the same novel for them to read together to spark great conversation and connection. Sustained reading is important for developing concentration, imagination, vocabulary, punctuation and sentence structure as well as providing us with an insight into different people, places and perspectives thereby developing empathy. It is also good for health and wellbeing as it takes our young people away from their devices, away from their worries and into another world. Professor Jenni Hudson from the Black Dog Institute talks about research that is linking smart phone use to increasing levels of anxiety and depression in young women and I strongly advocate for our young people to take on academic, sporting and cultural pursuits to take their focus away from their device as much as possible. We will be putting a spotlight on reading and building a culture of reading at the College by introducing a number of new initiatives next year. If you haven\u2019t listened to our podcast, it is a rich conversation with students and experts who provide great tips to support parents to encourage a love of reading in their child. As Mrs Lombardo, our Head of Library on the Santa Sabina campus says, ‘it\u2019s not that your child isn\u2019t a reader, they just aren\u2019t a reader, yet’.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It was wonderful to spend some time with our Primary families recently at the swimming carnival. This year\u2019s carnival at the Ashfield Pool was a one-off event and next year we will resume our usual format with the Year 3-12 carnival to be held at SOPAC. Our Year 3 students enjoyed their very first outdoor education experience at Tallong last week and our Year 6 students presented their Gioia House Showcase which was a wonderful exhibition of their learning. Big congratulations also to our Year 3 and 4 students who received distinction and high distinction results in the Maths Challenge. This is a\u00a0 problem-solving challenge organised by the Australian Maths Trust. We also welcomed a significant number of teachers from a range of independent schools who offer the International Baccalaureate to our campus for a full day workshop focused on deepening their understanding of the IB Diploma\u2019s Theory of Knowledge course.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I would like to advise that next year our Dean of Pastoral Care, Ms Whiley, will take on an additional role as Head of Year 7 in 2023. Ms Whiley will oversee Year 7 programs, Information Evenings and other Year 7 events. To ease the girls into Secondary, we will also have our Year 7 girls start the year in Year 7 only homerooms for Term 1. This will help them settle in and will provide more time to connect with incoming students before they move into their vertical homerooms in Term 2. We know that positive relationships are important for wellbeing and we want our students to feel they belong to our community and to each other as quickly as possible.<\/span><\/p>\n

Some other changes that are planned for 2023 include altering the date of the Year 12 Formal to place it earlier in the year and we will let our students and parents know when this will be held in due course. We will also present our Year 12 students with their academic awards at their Valedictory Assembly rather than expect them to return for Speech Night in Term 4. This will allow them to make plans for life after exams without any pressure of having to return to the College once they are finished.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I would also like to advise that three members of the College Leadership Team will be referred to as Deputy Principal moving forward.\u00a0 Mr John Gilmore\u2019s title will change to Deputy Principal \u2013 Operations (P-12), Mrs Melanie van der Meer will be Deputy Principal \u2013 Mission and Pastoral Care (P-12) and Mrs Jacqueline Pugh will be Deputy Principal \u2013 Teaching and Learning (P-12). These three leadership roles are student-facing and the change of title will just help our community understand the extent of their responsibilities a little more clearly.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Over the past few weeks, we welcomed new families to the College for various Information Evenings while their children joined us for Experience and Orientation days. There was a lot of excitement and, of course, a little anxiety as those new to our community took the first step in becoming part of our family. I am sure you will join me in welcoming them formally to Santa Sabina in Term 1 when we host our Welcome Evening on Thursday 9 February where we will gather around Dom\u2019s Plot for drinks and canapes. This will be a great opportunity to herald in the new year and to catch up with old friends and reach out to the new. This is an important school event and one to mark in your calendar.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Until next time,
<\/span>Go gently.<\/span><\/p>\n

Paulina Skerman<\/strong>
College Principal<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"featured_media":625,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","article_category":[],"article_tag":[],"class_list":["post-4374","article","type-article","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/ssc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article\/4374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/ssc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/ssc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/article"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/ssc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4374"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/ssc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/625"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/ssc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"article_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/ssc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article_category?post=4374"},{"taxonomy":"article_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thebuzz.net.au\/ssc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article_tag?post=4374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}