News

This year, three of our Youth Ministry students, Cooper Sweeney, Laura Peters and Layla Hepplewhite had the opportunity to embark on an Equipping School experience in Canberra.  This Canberra retreat experience went from Thursday to Sunday morning and involved training and resourcing youth, young adults and ministry leaders for the mission of school leadership, church and wider community.

Before attending the equipping school, which began Friday morning, the Connecting Catholic Coasties (CCC) schools all collectively paid a pit-stop visit to the War Memorial and Parliament House.  These CCC schools comprise of St Peters, St Brigid’s, Mackillop and St Josephs.

The CSYMI Equipping School experience contained full days of workshops, speakers, sharing ideas, learning, socialising, games, Mass and a very powerful evening of Adoration and Reconciliation.

The enormous four days came to an end on Sunday morning with a special commissioning ceremony at the top of Mt Ainslie.  The students were presented with a pin of the Holy Spirit and encouraged to take all they had learnt and experienced back to their communities.  A literal mountain top experience to end a spiritual mountain top retreat.  We definitely feel more equipped to share the Good News!

Blurb from a Cooper Sweeney re: Canberra Equipping Youth Ministry School:

During our time at the equipping school we made new friends, learnt new skills about our faith, how to progress within our faith and how we, as leaders in our youth ministry can bring skills to help others advance their faith.   We observed sacraments like Reconciliation and Eucharistic Adoration and worshipped in the morning and evening to reflect on our journeys in faith and connect with our spiritual senses.

We had so much fun with games, making new connections and lots of acoustic guitars, flash mobbing, late nights and singing to accompany everything in between

I would recommend this fantastic opportunity to any student, even if it is outside their comfort zone.

As we all know, Easter will be here before we know it! Soon enough, four St. Brigid’s students will also be travelling on a Pilgrimage around Italy in preparation for World Youth Day, which will be held in Lisbon and Portugal, with millions of other Christian students and youth across the globe.

As St Brigid students, we have organised a College fundraiser to raise funds for this big international trip. We are hoping we can get our community’s support behind us in the holding of a St Brigid Easter Raffle. Big Easter Chocolate bundles and hampers are to be won!

The raffle will be drawn on the 5th of April at a whole school assembly. Tickets will be sold at the cafe, which is located below LP10. The cafe is open every Tuesday and Thursday from 7:40am – 8:10am.

The pricing of tickets are as follows:
1 ticket for $1
3 tickets for $2.

We are also asking if College families please bring in chocolate donations to support this raffle. There will be a bucket in student services, where donations will be placed.

We are asking the community to bring their energy behind this initiative in support of this life changing opportunity and experience!

– From World Youth Day 2023 students;
Tom Macmahon, Indi Chidgey, Chloe Debono & Holly Ross

Please join us in congratulating Isaiah R of Year 10 who recently entered the NSW All Schools Triathlon.  Isaiah is the first St Brigid’s student to enter this event and we could not be prouder of him and his results.  Isaiah is fairly new to triathlons and placed 10 over all at this state level event.  Well done Isaiah.

Our new Year 7’s under 13 touch team have been training leading up to the Under 13 Gala Day.  Not even rain could stop them last Wednesday at a before school training session.  A big thank you to the boy’s and girl’s teams, their parents for all their support and Mr Devlin for giving up his time to help both the boys and girls teams.  We wish both teams the best of luck for the 8th of March at the Doylo for their first gala day as a St Brigid’s student.

We are urgently seeking host families from our school community to host a student from New Caledonia in September 2023.

We are in need of 25x different families to host a student for ONE week.

They arrive on September 11th and depart on the 18th of September 2023.

What you need to provide is;

A welcoming home for 1 week.
A comfortable bed.
3x meals a day.
Involvement in family activities and outings on the weekend.

These students already speak a bit of English and are ready and wanting to learn about life in Australia. They are here to learn about Australian culture and way of life, as well as to improve their English skills.

If you are interested in hosting student, or would like to find out more information, please contact; Luke Richardson luke.richardson1@dbb.catholic.edu.au or (02) 4358 4278.

Merci beaucoup

Mr Luke Richardson (French Teacher + Leader of Learning for Languages)

I sincerely believe that being a student at St Brigid’s is a real privilege.  I understand that most parents that choose a Catholic education for their children feel the same way.  My hope is that over their time at St Brigid’s all our students will come to realise what a privilege it is, granted that some realise this the first time they walk through the front gate, others realise it as they walk through the clap-out as they’re graduating from Year 12.  Either way, I’m very confident that at some point they all come to know that St Brigid’s is a safe place, a community that cares for them, a place that challenges them with high expectations and its more than just a school, it’s a big family that you remain a part of forever.

With almost all privileges in life comes responsibility.  This is no different at St Brigid’s.  The school and its staff have responsibilities, parents who choose St Brigid’s have responsibilities as do our students.  When we all honour our responsibilities, we can be a truly amazing educational community.  Sure, there will be ups and downs but if we all play our part, I have no doubt in my mind that we are only scratching the surface of what we can be as a genuinely committed community.

When a family selects St Brigid’s as the school for their child it is typically followed by application paperwork, information evenings, taster days, enrolment interviews, transition days, etc.  We understand and respect that parents have choice in where they send their child to school, and it is a real honour for us when they choose St Brigid’s.

It’s very important that we are transparent with families so that they know what a Catholic education at St Brigid’s means.  We provide a holistic Catholic education that promotes faith, learning and wellbeing.  As a school we need to ensure that our expectations are clear, and we need to deliver on our promises.  As parents and students, you agree to commit to all components of a St Brigid’s education.

We fail when we start to pick and choose which components of a Catholic education we’ll engage with.  It can never be that I’m here to learn but I’m not going to attend liturgies.  It is not acceptable for a student to behave poorly yet expect they should have the privilege of representing the College.  It’s not OK to go to the Athletics Carnival because you like running but fail to attend the Swimming Carnival because you’re not a great swimmer.  There are countless examples, but the bottom line is simply this, by choosing St Brigid’s you choose everything St Brigid’s represents.

It’s a privilege but it comes with responsibility.

Paul Lynch
Assistant Principal