Good afternoon everyone,

With recent changes to COVID restrictions, Term 4 has started with some increased optimism regarding the use of external presenters and large group presentations for a variety of Pastoral and Wellbeing programs. This actually commenced today with the commencement of the Youth Aware of Mental Health (YAM) program for Year 9. All students in Year 9 will be involved in three 100-minute presentations over the next three Fridays as part of an initiative supported by The Catholic Education Office of Wollongong and the Black Dog Institute.

Upcoming presentations and activities include:

• Year 11 Elevate Education presentation on Tuesday October 27, with a focus on organisation, study skills and time management for the HSC.
• Year 10 gender and team building days - Monday and Tuesday November 23 and 24. This will involve activities at Stanwell Tops on one day and guest speakers and gender specific activities on the alternate days.
• Year 9 YourChoicez “Gender Agenda” day on Wednesday November 4. 

After not being able to conduct activities and presentations of this nature over the past couple of terms, it is great to see that our students are again exposed to some great role- models, guest speakers, instructional activities and challenges as they head towards the end of the term.

Upcoming activities aside, our Pastoral Care and Wellbeing teams continued their great work on site during today’s Pastoral time. An overview of activities that were conducted for the respective year groups are listed below.

• Year 7 - Meditation and Visualisation Activity
• Year 8 - Assessment TAsk preparation
• Year 9 - YAM 
• Year 10 - Spirituality presentation and Tell them from me survey.
• Year 11 - HSC Preparation and Tell them from me survey.

As mentioned earlier, the Year 9 YAM program is supported by the Black Dog Institute. This program is just one of many initiatives that the institute provides to assist people with Mental Health issues, whether it be for themselves, a friend or a family member. As October is Mental health Month, the institute is also conducting a range of free webinars during October and November. Breaking down depression, Mental Fitness and Navigating your Teen’s Mental Health are examples of the type of webinars that are available. For more information regarding this, click on the link below.

Black Dog Institute webinars - October/November

As always, thank you for your ongoing support with the education, care and wellbeing of our students.

Mr Simon Huntly

Pastoral Care and Wellbeing Coordinator