POSITIVE CONNECTIONS

• The “Be More award”:. This Year 8 award recognises students who have displayed contributions to the school values and or the Learning Dispositions as listed in the diary pages 15 and 29. 
• Staff were asked to nominate students at the end of last term and these certificates were presented at a Year assembly last term.
• The aim is to continue to build a sense of connection and engagement through these awards and celebrate success.

The following is a list of students who received a teacher nominated award:

SPORTS COMPETITION TERM 4

Year 8 will have an opportunity to be involved in a Year group sports competition this term and this will be offered at lunchtimes throughout successive weeks. Details regarding this will be posted soon and discussed on Year Assembly in Week 3.

ATTENDANCE

Just a reminder as we progress through the final weeks of the year. Attendance at school is compulsory as per law.  Data shows that attendance relates specifically to positive connections being made between the student, the school and their learning. As part of the process of maintaining students' satisfactory  attendance at St John’s we have a school based policy that is a supportive positive process for this. This progression of support is as follows:

• PALS teachers will ring home if a student is absent for 3 or more consecutive days to enquire about the students welfare and offer support around this if required.
• If a student drops below 90% of attendance at any time during the school year, commencing from term one, a Step 1 notification will be issued to provide the students and families with an alert that they have reached this level and again any support that may be required will be offered.
• If a student is to drop below 85% attendance a Step 2 notification will be implemented again as an alert and a method of support to investigate whether the school can assist in maintaining consistent attendance. There are steps beyond this point where intervention may be required via the Catholic Education office to further support in conjunction with the family and the school

SOCIAL MEDIA

There are both benefits and challenges around the student use of social media. Positive conduct around the use of social media is obviously encouraged and this can involve effective communication in some circumstances between friends and families. However uploading material to the internet using any variety of social media platform can be harmful and dangerous.

If confronting or negative personal statements or videos are uploaded to the internet this can be extremely damaging for those whom they target.  The following issues need to be considered by all students at St John’s:

• It can be offensive to a range of people even if it was not meant to be.  It can be interpreted as such and have a big negative psychological impact on people.
• All students at St John’s have signed an agreement (technology) that outlines expected appropriate use of computers and mobile phones, this does not include posting inappropriate material through any social media platform.
• Individuals and families have the right to involve the police if any material proves to be offensive or harmful to anyone in any way.

In summary we are saying this to support you in making the right decisions and also to report anything that you feel is having an effect on you or someone you know. Please report any incidents of social media misuse that you know may be affecting the peaceful relationships and/or the positive learning environment at St John’s.

YEAR 9 SRC REPRESENTATIVES

Congratulations to the following students elected by their peers as Student Representative Council Members for 2023.

Mr Simon Vaughan

Year 8 Coordinator