Welcome to Term 2 for 2022. It has been exciting to welcome several new students to our school and we trust that they settle in quickly to our community. I hope the Easter break was a positive one for you all and that your children are returning refreshed and ready for the new challenges of this term.

I sent an email about the COVID guidelines changes, so I trust you have read that. This should allow more students and staff to be at school regularly and we will monitor if it leads to any spike in infections. We have been promised more RATs as well so will let you know when they arrive and are ready for distribution.

On Wednesday we had a visit from an ABC film crew who are doing a story for the ABC’s 7:30 Report on why families are choosing independent schools over public schools. My special thanks to the Hobbs family, a returning family this term, who agreed to be the focus of the story and had the crew follow them around as they prepared their three children for their first day back at GPCC.The story will air on Wednesday 4 May. We had positive references that the reporter was trustworthy and would represent the family and the school fairly.

We saw this as an opportunity to contribute to the debate around public versus private schooling. Our view is that a diverse society like ours needs a variety of types of schools and that it is a Governmental responsibility to provide schooling accessible for all. While independent schools are not funded at the same level as public schools, hence your need to pay fees, we do support the idea of the Government contributing to the cost of every child’s education. We support public education but recognise that a school like ours is able to present a worldview different to the secular one of the public schools and that gives you as parents an option to choose what suits your family best.

Some parents have raised concerns about lost learning time due to student and staff absences last term. We are conscious of this and have spoken with staff about ensuring they address this issue early this term. If you are at all concerned about this for your child, please don’t hesitate to contact the class teacher or Year Advisor. We are happy to offer extra tuition to help students catch up.

I spent the Easter weekend out at the school property in Brewarrina Shire. I am excited at the possibilities for activities for our students out there and we will be working towards establishing programs for them. We have some small groups of students heading out this term for academic, service and mission activities and I know they will all have a wonderful experience.

As we enter this term, we need to help students focus on working hard to make the most of every activity to develop them as people and grow their ability to take on the challenges of life. My prayer is for a productive and positive term. Please join me in that.