Welcome to our resurrected Newsletter! We had a newsletter many years ago, but we moved most communications with our families – which admittedly are just administrative – to Parent Lounge. However, we have realised that we have lost getting some ‘good news’ stories out there, hence the return. We will still keep our Facebook posts, but the newsletter is aimed at more in-depth, interesting stories of what students and staff are doing.

In this Winter Edition, we highlight some of the new initiatives throughout the College. There have been some very obvious developments such as our very first two-storey building which will house our Infants classes plus office space for Mr Storrie and a consultation room for use by the Wellbeing Team. There are though some other things you may not be aware of such as the establishment of a new Executive position – the Director of Teacher Recruitment, Accreditation and Professional Development. You may have heard of the national teacher shortage – it’s rather dire and fewer students are studying teaching at university meaning it’s challenging to find good teachers. Mrs Palmer has taken on this role and is working hard to develop a supply of teachers into the future as well as providing our existing teachers with growth and development opportunities. You may also not know that we established a new department in Secondary – Biblical Studies. This is because the teaching of God’s word is very important and having a small, dedicated team is essential. We’ve also launched the Altiora program for Year 11 students. It’s designed to provide those students who wish to achieve more highly with the knowledge and skills they can use to do so. Altiora in Latin means ‘higher things’ and these very keen students are learning lots of tips and tricks to propel themselves even higher.

We held Subject Selection Night two weeks ago (on the same evening as Year 7 Information Night which made things crazy busy but it was an awesome atmosphere) and we are looking forward to implementing some new courses in Stage 5 – Outdoor Education, F1 in Schools (check out https://rea.org.au/f1-in-schools/ ) and Study Hall. In Year 11 2025 we will have for the first time Economics, Textiles & Design, Work Skills Cert II, Visual Arts Cert III and the Vetamorphus Cert III in Christian Ministry & Theology. Our HSC grades have had significant growth in student numbers resulting in a broader range of courses.

I do hope you enjoy reading our newsletter – please send through some feedback.

May the God of all creation bless you and your family.

Firstly, I would like to communicate about how happy I am to see the return of a newsletter  so that we can convey in an easy, quick way all the wonderful things happening and the opportunities available in the life of the College and to continue to be able to build a connection between home and the College.

Well, this year is almost halfway through, and it is always good to reflect on where we are and from where we have come. I have noted a positive change in many students as they develop, mature and wrestle with daily decisions and larger life-changing decisions like what university course to choose or what career to pursue.

I am excited about a couple of new initiatives this year, one being the introduction of our College’s involvement in the School Formula One Competition. A parent of our College and I were speaking in the Christmas holidays about how a fun, challenging program like the solar car challenge would be great to do for our school as it builds skill, purpose and excitement in students and builds community among parents and the local community. I then met Karen Collum who began telling me about this exciting program she used to be involved with at her previous school.

God is good and so we begin!

Another positive this year has been Mrs Fletcher being employed as our full time Careers Advisor. After many years of faithful service from Mrs Wallis, the College was able to put Mrs Fletcher into this role fulltime and there has already been a noticeable change to the time that is being put into this important area. A visit to Williamtown RAAF base was the most recent event. Stay tuned to hear about Mr Brown in our next newsletter.

When people ask me what teachers actually do, they can assume it is about passing onto students key knowledge and skills in a subject. While this may be true to a degree, it is only a small proportion of what teachers do. In fact, the heart of teaching is inspiring a love of learning. This love sets up each of our students to respond to our ever-changing world as life-long learning with attributes of curiosity, wisdom, empathy and hope. To inspire such a love of learning starts with passionate teachers who role-model and share their own passion to continually learn.

Supporting teachers in their ongoing learning is core to my new role here at MCCC. Whether a teacher to is new to this vocation, or a more seasoned professional, we are committed to building a learning community that is founded on our own desire as educators to improve because we know that when we are committed to learning, our students thrive too.

To build on the excellent learning culture already here at MCCC amongst our dedicated and passionate teachers, we have begun some exciting initiatives.

We believe that creating a supportive and collaborative learning culture will help us recruit new teachers and retain our existing staff as MCCC continues to grow and flourish.

These initiatives include our participation in the University of Newcastle’s Quality Teaching Rounds to improve the quality of teaching as we build supportive learning relationships between teachers who observe each other’s teaching practice. We are also partnering with the St Philip’s Teaching School as we raise up new Christian educators with opportunities to develop their classroom expertise, alongside their tertiary studies. As well as overseeing the accreditation of teaching staff, I’m responsible for our January and July Staff Development Weeks and incorporating professional learning opportunities and developing a new Induction Program to mentor and support new staff as they orientate themselves to our college community.

An awesome meal requires a good recipe, and a good recipe requires good ingredients. School is a little the same.

I believe some key ingredients to an awesome school include: hard-working students, dedicated staff, a culture of learning and a culture of care, opportunities to have fun and opportunities to develop creativity.

Creativity can often be missed in the busyness of school life, but we try to make it a part of our daily learning in Primary. We also try to create spaces for creativity and physical activity during break times. Our Open Learning Area (OLA) is a hive of activity during lunchtime breaks. You will find students of all ages playing Lego, stacking blocks, playing chess, reading, drawing, laughing, and learning the important skills of negotiation, communication and sharing. Our new building will be set up with a similar space to allow students the opportunity to play in a safe space where collaboration and creativity are encouraged.

Our wonderful little Pre-K (Gingyangbaa) is another place you will see children happily engaging in play and learning on the job. Just outside Pre-K is our creative learning space under the trees where our little ones can play in the sandpit, make mud pies, cook, and other imaginary play things.

A recent addition to Primary are two fun and exciting Nudel Karts. The Nudel Rover and the Nudel Kart are two compact, transportable mobile play carts that are full of a range of different resources for construction and creative play. Classes will be able to book these out to enhance learning experiences and they will be accessible to our students at lunch times to play, make, create, and learn. It is possible, you might even find the teachers making things with them too.

As we near the close of Term 2, we have some exciting news regarding our new infants building (pictured below). As you may have already seen, the work is progressing well, and we have been informed that the classrooms will be ready for teachers and students in Term 3. We look forward to welcoming you all for a walk around soon.

Forster Campus update:

Our proposed Primary School site was refused for a number of reasons by the Joint Regional Planning Panel in December 2023. We revised our plans to address their concerns and resubmitted them to MidCoast Council for review. The plans are currently listed on the MidCoast Council website for public submissions. You can view the plans and a make a submission here.

Despite this, the recent refusal has currently left us looking for alternate options of how best to proceed. While we understand some of you may be feeling frustrated around the lack of development, we are confident that we serve a God who has all these things in His control.

Strategic Plan:

The College has engaged the services of Simon France to assist the Board in the developing a strategic plan to help guide the continued growth and delivery of an important ministry in our region.

Since commencing with Simon, we have been able to gain input from the Executive and staff members in helping shape our mission/vision, strategy and what actions we need to take for the school planning process over the next five years. Off the back of this, we will also be reviewing the masterplan of the college for the next ten years. We are looking forward to how this important work will shape the future of our College for years to come.