New Seats Released for 'A Christmas Carol'

Due to popularity, another 40 seats have been released for the Junior Drama Club's Reader's Theatre performance of 'A Christmas Carol' this Thursday. The classic tale will be presented as you've never seen it before with a female Scrooge and a style of Theatre which does not focus on memorisation but on expression and plenty of Christmas Magic!

Free tickets can be reserved at www.trybooking.com/406427. Book now to avoid disappointment!

Christmas Mass Times - St Helena of the Holy Cross Parish

To help with your preparations for the Seasons of Advent and Christmas please see below for the Mass times at our Parish:
Saturday, 22 December - 6pm
Sunday, 23 December - 8am, 9.30am, 5.45pm
Monday, 24 December - 7pm (Family/Children Mass) & 12midnight
Tuesday, 25 December - 8am, 9.30am, No evening mass

There will also be Christmas carols 30 minutes prior to the Christmas masses.

Just a reminder that Saturday/Sunday (22 & 23 December) are normal masses for the 4th Sunday of Advent. As Christmas falls on a Tuesday, it is timely to remind people that we are encouraged to uphold our Sunday mass obligation as well as attending a Christmas celebration.

Mr Ryan Shelton
Director of Faith

Year 6 Transition Mass

As we approach the end of the 2018 Academic Year, the Year 6 students are preparing for the Transition from Junior School to Middle School. To celebrate this milestone, the Year 6 students will be participating in a Transition Mass on Wednesday, 28 November. The Mass will be held at Saint Helena’s of the Holy Cross Catholic Church commencing at 9:30am and will be followed by a Morning Tea. Families and Friends are also invited to attend.

Mrs Kylie Day

Assistant Principal, Junior School

Visual Arts: Pre-primary - Year 2

Mrs Borg has been working with the Pre-primary to Year 2 students this term to create some amazing works of art inspired by different artists.

Vanja Basell

Assistant Principal, Junior School

Student Leadership @ Holy Cross College

Are all people capable of being leaders? Yes. Leadership is the ability to move people from one state to another; it is inherently about change. At Holy Cross College we are committed to building the leadership capacity of our student leaders in four key domains:

• Visionary capacity: transforming a vision into reality
  
• Relational capacity: connect with people
• Integrity capacity: model and embody values and beliefs
• Effectiveness capacity: demonstrate technical and managerial skills

Inspired by the words of our College Patron, St Oscar Romero to "aspire not to have more, but to be more" our newly appointed Middle School and Senior School Students participated in their annual leadership workshop on 16 & 17 November.

Commencing with a short pilgrimage from St Mary’s Cathedral to St Joseph’s Church in Subiaco. Students then journeyed to the Catholic Education Centre in Leederville where Dr Tony Curry, Director, School Improvement, and, Mr Daniel Groenewald, CEWA Leadership Consultant, shared the essential ingredients of Christian leadership.

Students returned to school and participated in a number of practical leadership activities, planning and sharing within their teams in casting vision for 2019.

The Executive Student Leadership team stayed overnight in Lyon and continued their training throughout Saturday.

Community Cabinet - Youth Roundtable

On Monday, 19 November, some of our student leaders represented the College at a Youth Roundtable with Premier Mark McGowan, Minister for Education and Training, Sue Ellery, and Minister for Housing, Veteran Issues and Youth, Peter Tinley. This was a powerful opportunity for our student leaders to join with leaders from other local schools to raise issues relevant to them.

These wonderful experiences for the student leaders have allowed them to continue to ponder their leadership capacities. We are very much looking forward to working with this team throughout 2019. We are very grateful for Ms Bond and Mr Pisano for their work in facilitating this important experience.

Mr Ryan Shelton
Director of Faith

Orientation Day

On Wednesday this week, we welcomed all new and existing students and parents for their Orientation. Students came to the College for the whole day (Year 7s) or part of the day (Junior School) where they experienced what life at Holy Cross College will be like. Parents also enjoyed the same experience through the College tours and parent sessions on offer.

Junior School students familiarised themselves with their new learning environments, met some of their teachers and began to interact with their peers.

Year 7 students focused on what senior school life will be like, acquainting themselves within the Paris building that will form their home base for classes. They sampled some of the subjects on offer at the College. This including some crazy science experiments, baking home style cookies, making clay bowls in art and finishing off with Performing Arts; where they played the ultimate Rock Paper Scissors, got to hear from students what Performing Arts is like at HCC and concluding with Just Dance, where they learnt the skill of ‘leaving embarrassment at the door’. During these fantastic mini-lessons they got to know their House Coordinators and Student Leader body.

Thank you to all the students and staff who gave up their time to act as mentors, College tour guides, crèche assistants and assisting in the many sessions for the day. We also thank the Friends of Holy Cross for their assistance with light refreshments and conversations with new and existing parents.

We look forward to all new students joining us in 2019, as they seize their opportunity to ‘live life to the full’ at the College.

Mrs Christina Davini

Assistant Deputy Principal – Inter-Relationships

Student Executive Leaders 2019

Developing the leaders of tomorrow is an important part of the schooling process. There are many ways students can offer leadership; often simply by showing initiative and actively participating in the LIFE of the College is a good demonstration of leadership. More formal opportunities for student leadership are offered through the appointment of Captains and House and LIFE Leaders. The Student Executive Leaders were announced at the Annual Celebration Evening held in October and have already been busy assisting with College functions and planning events for the coming year. The Captains lead a team of LIFE Leaders and House representatives building College spirit and giving student voice to many aspects of College life. We wish them well in their endeavours in 2019.

Junior School Staffing 2019

What a buzz! This morning saw all of our new and current students for Pre-primary to Year 7 for 2019 gather as one for the first time. After a quick morning assembly, students moved to classes with their new teachers to participate in some fun activities for the morning. 

We are happy to announce the following staffing for 2019 in the Junior School. 

Pre-kindergarten – Mrs Sharper and Mrs Gorton

Kindergarten – Mrs Borg, Mrs Pecherczyk, Mrs Gorton, Mrs Mathews, Mrs D’Andrea and Mrs Hilton

Pre-primary – Miss Sibbald, Miss Rowlands and Ms Cooke (Final Education Assistant is currently advertised).

Year 1 – Miss Keating, Mrs O’Hanlon and Mrs Hasleby

Year 2 – Miss George and Miss Barron

Year 3 – Mrs McKinnon and Miss Edwards

Year 4 – Miss DeLeon and Miss Russo

Year 5 – Miss Water (4 days)/Miss Dunstan (1 day) and Mrs Sheppard

Year 6 – Miss Hickey and Mrs Knapton

We are farewelling Miss Armenti and Mrs Wright.

Mr Davis will take six months Long Service Leave and return to HCC in Semester 2.

Kindergarten Orientation will take place on Friday, 16 November, 9:30am -10:30am.

Pre-kindergarten parent sessions will be held on Friday, 23 November at either 9am or 4pm.

Mrs Vanja Basell and Mrs Kylie Day

Assistant Principals, Junior School

Christmas Appeal 2018

Next week, the College is launching its annual Christmas Appeal. Each classroom and House Tutor Group will be collecting non-perishable food items for the appeal this year. These food items will be distributed into the local community by the St Vincent de Paul volunteers at St Helena’s of the Holy Cross Parish, Ellenbrook. 

Donations will be collected on Friday, 7 December.

In order for the food to be appropriate for the Vinnies to distribute, please consider the following criteria:

• We respectfully ask that you please check expiry dates of the products you are donating. 

• Non-perishable food items only.

• To uphold the dignity of people receiving hampers, Vinnies is unable to accept pre-opened packaged items or second-hand items.

• Items that are Christmas orientated are encouraged.

• Examples may include: tinned tuna, tinned fruit, fruit mince pies, Christmas cake, lollies, vegemite, honey, pasta sauce, sweet/savoury biscuits, cereal, jam, orange juice, cake mixes, milo etc

In advance, I would like to thank all families for their previous support and I look forward to another successful year.

Mr Ryan Shelton

Director of Faith

Junior Drama Club Set To Capture Festive Spirit

The Holy Cross College Junior Drama Club will be presenting a Reader's Theatre performance of the classic Charles Dickens tale 'A Christmas Carol'. Reader's Theatre is a style of performance which does not rely on set, props or even line memorisation but instead on vocal expression and delivery, making it a combination in fluent reading and performance.

Scrooge is given a slightly modern twist and all the characters you know and love will be present as the story of Scrooge's lesson at Christmas is brought to life through the spoken word.

The performance presentation will take place on Thursday 29 November commencing at 4:00pm in the New Norcia Building and free tickets can be booked at www.trybooking.com/406427

Mr Chris McRae
Learning Area Coordinator (The Arts)