Yesterday, the entire College community gathered in the MPC for the Commencement Celebration and presentation of 2018 Academic Awards. Unfortunately Father Jim was unable to attend, so the proceedings were led by Mrs Brennan and Mr Hodge along with an address from Mr Cuskelly. We also welcomed past Principal Mr Hegarty and his wife Jane who attended to present a gift of books from the late Andrew McGahan, a past student of the College and acclaimed author.

The 2019 Senior students were ushered into the MPC by the Prep students and presented with their Senior badges, a symbol which marks the start of their journey into their last year at the College and their expectation of leadership. Mr Hodge led the assembly in prayer and Mr Gillespie gave a reading from the Gospel.

Mr Hegarty then stepped forward to speak of Andrew McGahan who passed away recently but not before he signed a collection of his novels which he requested be presented to the College and added to the library collection. Andrew attended St Columba's School from 1972 until 1975 and then attended St Mary's College completing his Senior year as College Captain in 1981. Many College staff members were fellow students of Andrew and he is also the younger brother of longtime staff member, Mrs Marg Callaghan who retired in 2017. Andrew has had many novels published, some of which are centred around the areas on the Jimbour Plain where he grew up and his work has been recognised and celebrated with a number of prestigious literary awards. Andrew's great niece, Penny Kaiteie who is a student of the College in Year 6, joined Mr Hegarty on the stage to present the collection of novels to College Captains Lytana King-Togia and Laura May. These novels will be available for loan and we hope that all who read them enjoy them and remember the contribution Andrew made to our school and the literary world in general.

Mr Cuskelly gave his address and then welcomed the 2018 graduates and some of their peers who were in attendance for the Academic Awards presentations. Mr Cuskelly took the opportunity to highlight the successes of the 2018 graduates and the overall improvements in the OP scores and acceptances into university.

The Jenny Thornton Bursary is presented to a student who is pursuing a degree in Education and Science or Mathematics and this year, Mr Ross Thornton presented this bursary to Shivai Vakade who is studying a Bachelor of Dental Surgery at James Cook University. Six students received an OP of between 1 and 5 including Patrick Sankey, Mya Vadasz, Shivai Vakadi, Laura Cook, Eliza Bradford and Daniel Gillespie and each one of these graduates stepped forward to receive their award and address the students with their words of wisdom, particularly the Seniors of 2019.

Daniel Gillespie was also named as the College Dux for 2018 and was the recipient of the Western Downs Regional Council Bursary and also the Dalby and District Friendly Society Dispensary Bursary which was presented by Board Member Helen Stagg and CEO James Bannerman. The Dalby and District Friendly Society Dispensary has been supporting our College with this bursary for some years and we are very grateful that our College Dux is supported as they journey into university and a tertiary education.

The celebration concluded with the assembly singing the College song and despite the very hot conditions in the MPC, all the guests, staff and students sang with enthusiasm, a great sign of the bright start to the 2019 school year.  

New Subjects Soaring at OLSCC

Two of our new senior subjects hit full stride this week and Mr Hodge, Mrs Brennan and I were able to witness it first hand.  It was great to see Design students engaged in creative thinking and discovering new ways of thinking to be our entrepreneurs of the future! We were also privileged to witness the autopsy of the digestive system of a sheep with our students in Agricultural Science.  I hope the students learnt as much as I did! 

Digital Enhancement of the Curriculum

This week we finalised the rollout of the hardware for the first phase of the digital enhancement of the curriculum through the release of the student laptops. It has been very exciting to see the students immediately kaming full use of the devices in class and identifying the best way for them to work and organise themselves.  Most students have been introduced to CANVAS, our Learning Management System, and are beginning to engage in learning digitally.  Be sure to ask your child what they are learning about learning digitally when they next have their device out at home!

Executive Director Visit

We were blessed today to have Dr Pat Coughlan visit our College to discuss the impact of our College on the improved learning outcomes for our students.  Pleasingly, Dr Coughlan was very pleased with our agenda and plan to achieve it, as well as the practices happening in a variety of classrooms around the College.  It is always great have a visit such as this to provide me with feedback regarding areas where we are doing very well, areas we are excelling, and of course, areas we can improve our standards.   Thanks especially to students in 5C and 1D who shared their learning with us this morning.

Toowoomba Catholic School Primary Swimming Carnival

Today Mr Lincoln, on behalf of OLSCC, hosted the annual Catholic primary swimming carnival at the Dalby pool.  It was fantastic to have Dr Pat Coughlan (executive director- Toowoomba Catholic Schools) there to open the carnival.  It’s great to see Dalby so highly valued in our Diocese that we are continuing to have more opportunities to showcase our great town!  Thanks also to all of our swimmers, helpers and of course, Mr Gillespie for being the announcer and making the carnival very timely, especially for all of our visiting families who travelled.

Peter Cuskelly

Principal

We have had an amazing week with the roll out of Laptops in Year 7-12 and the 2019 Commencement & Academic Assembly on Wednesday.  It was great to join together as a College and pray for our student leaders who hold positions in our College and for our Year 12 seniors who are also leaders in our College.  This was the prayer of blessing used on Wednesday: 

Lord, today you raise up leaders from within our community. 

We give thanks for those who have accepted the specific role of leader and we undertake today to give them our support. 

Guide them and bless them in their leadership. 

We give thanks, too, for all those others 

who show leadership in our community without the title of School Leader. 

Guide them, encourage them and bless them in their leadership. 

Lord Jesus, we ask for Your help as we begin this new school year. 

Allow us to experience Your presence in the many blessings You put before us. 

Open our eyes to the new challenges and exciting opportunities that this new school year brings. 

Open our heart and mind to new colleagues and new students. 

Give us a generous spirit to be enthusiastic to new opportunities and courage to face new challenges.  

Guide us to your never-ending love. 

We ask this through Christ our Lord,

Amen. 

LYF @ OLSCC – Monday afternoon Community building 

One aspect of the LYF Program is the coming together as a College Community.  We do this regularly with our College Assemblies.  Assembly occurs every 2 weeks and is either a Whole College P-12 or in our Sectors EY, MY and SY.  Alongside this Assembly, students in Year 7-12 have House Connect, vertical groups of students and Year Level Connect, with students from their year level only.   

House Connect / Year Level Connect / Assembly is addressed through a caring and positive approach, we provide opportunities to build and celebrate our faith community. This equips students with skills focusing on a positive psychology strengths model where they are valued and flourish to explore meaning and purpose in their lives. 

We would encourage parents to join us for our College Assembly on a Monday afternoon. Week 4 is Sector Assemblies and Week 6 will be Whole College Assembly in the MPC. 

The goals of each component will be explored in future newsletters.  If you would like to discuss any of these in more detail or you have ideas you would like to contribute contact any of our teachers or myself cate.brennan@twb.catholic.edu.au .

Cate Brennan

Deputy Principal Mission

The five students in Mrs Fraser's Agricultural Science class had the experience of observing the dissection of a sheep's digestive system today. Mrs Fraser worked from the top of the digestive tract to the bottom, opening up each section and allowing the students to recall each name and function and then discussing the contents and process that takes place in that particular section. Keen observers from our Leadership team including Mr Cuskelly, Mr Hodge and Mrs Brennan were pleased to see the students actively and keely participating despite the interesting aroma.

Another exciting piece of news from the Agricultural Science department is the final competion of the chicken coop. The builders have completed the footings and cementing to ensure the safety of the chickens from roaming dogs and we eagerly await the arrival of the resident fowls. The chicken coop and the animals will be used for observation and learning in Agricultural Science and will be a welcome and much anticipated addition to the College Community.

SWIMMING CARNIVAL 2019- RESULTS

Record Breakers

Patrick Boland – Boys Open 100m Freestyle

                        Boys Open 50m Freestyle

                        Boys Open 50m Backstroke 33.20 (2017 Kurtis Sankey 35.60)

                        Boys 200m Individual Medley 2.41.70 (2017 Patrick Boland 2.49.20)

Jennifer Nothdurft – Girls 200m Individual Medley 2.49.70 (2017 Claudia Nothdurft 2.54)

Junior Girls Relay

1^st MacKillop, 2^nd Nolan, 3^rd Rice, 4^th McAuley

Junior Boys Relay

1^st Nolan, 2^nd McAuley, 3^rd Rice, 4^th MacKillop

Junior Boys Belly Flop Champion

1^st Barrett Haager, 2^nd Xavier Gibson, 3^rd Travia Tia & Alex Nothdurft

Junior Girls Bomb Dive Champion

1^st Olivia Burton, 2^nd Madeline Hemmings, 3^rd Monique Smith & Charlotte

Boys 200m Individual Medley Results

1^st Pat Boland, 2^nd Bailey Martin, 3^rd Clancy Biggar, 4^th Trent Young, 5^th Aiden Powell

Girls 200m Individual Medley Results

1^st Jennifer Nothdurft, 2^nd Clare Griffiths, 3^rd Gabby Parker

Senior Boys Belly Flop Competition

1^st Zac Trcka, 2^nd John Shorter, 3^rd Harrison Gwynne

Senior Girls  Bomb Dive Competition

1^st Sarah McQuaid, 2^nd Bree Tanks, 3^rd Laney Schloss

All Age Relay

1^st MacKillop, 2^nd Nolan, 3^rd McAuley, 4^th Rice

Staff / Captains Relay

1^st MacKillop, 2^nd Nolan, 3^rd Rice, 4^th McAuley

Unforutnately, our fantastic photographer, Miss Purbrick, had a small accident after the Senior swimming carnival and sprained her ankle so we have not been able to acceess her amazing photographs. We will look forward to Miss Purbrick's return to work next week and we promise to include a big gallery of photos in our next Newsletter. We wish Miss Purbrick a speedy recovery.

Junior

Catholic Schools Swimming Carnival

Congratulations to all students who competed at the Catholic Schools Swimming Carnival in Dalby today. Fourteen schools competed today as preparation for upcoming district swimming trials. 

Senior

Darling Downs Swimming Trials

The Darling Downs 13-18 Years Swimming Trials will be held in Gatton on Tuesday, 5 March. Students who wish to attend these trials are to see Mr Lincoln for more information.

Cricket

Round 1 of the DDSWQ Cricket competition begins next week. Games are scheduled against Oakey SHS, Chinchilla SHS, Dalby Christian College and Dalby SHS. This is open to all boys from Years 7-12 with games played in 20/20 format. Round 1 is scheduled against Chinchilla SHS on Wednesday 20 February (venue TBC).

Netball

Best of luck to the Years 7-9 Netball team who will compete at the Laura Gietz Cup in Toowoomba on Sunday. Thanks to Mrs O’Brien and Ms O’Reilly for coaching our girls and to Year 12 student Gabby Parker for umpiring.

Inner Downs Cluster 1 Trials

Congratulations to the following students selected in Inner Downs Teams to attend Darling Downs Trials in Toowoomba next week.

15 Girls Touch

Claudia Child, Maggie Laffy, Hannah Pattison

15 Boys Touch

Bailey Skinner, Dylan Nobbs, Michael McDonald, Brock Sankey, Tim Mauch

Open Girls Touch

Shiro Frid, Charlotte Crothers, Bree Tanks

Open Boys Touch

Ky Kirtley, Lachlan Wilkins, Dusty Brown

Open Boys Tennis

Ben Forbes, Pat Kelly

Inner Downs Rugby League Trials

Under 15 and Open Inner Downs Rugby League Trials will be held on Thursday, 21 February in Pittsworth. Players selected in these teams will attend the Darling Downs Gala Day in Toowoomba on Monday 4 March. More information will be available next week on these trials.

Inner Downs Cluster 2 Trials

Inner Downs Cluster 2 Trials will be held on Wednesday 27 February at Highfields. Sports include Under 15 and Open Netball, Basketball and Soccer. Travel will be via private transport. More details will be available next week.

Darling Downs Trials  

Darling Downs Trials will be held later this term in Under 15 Boys and Girls AFL, Under 15 and Open Rugby Union, Golf and Open Hockey. Students interested in attending these trials need to sign up via the Sports Notice Board.

Tim Lincoln

Sports Coordinator

With a case of Whooping Cough detected at the College, we must ensure all families are aware of the signs and symptoms of this illness and what you should do if detected.

This letter was provided to the College by the Darling Downs Public Health Unit with all the information you need to know about Whooping Cough. If you missed it on SZapp yesterday, here it is again. Make sure you read this important notice today.