FATHER WHITTY

It was very sad news to hear of the passing of Pastor Emeritus Father John Whitty. Former Parish Priest of Camden (over an extended period of years) Father Whitty was a well-known and respected figure in the Camden and Macarthur areas. Apart from a broad range of involvement across many aspects of the local community, Father Whitty was an important person in the history of Magdalene, playing an integral role in the choice of location for our College and in the naming of our House Patrons. Furthermore, Father Whitty was very generous with his time, saying mass each Friday at the College over many years.

It was very fitting that close to 40 Magdalene students volunteered their time today to attend his funeral and be part of the Guard of Honour.

Vale Father Whitty. Eternal rest grant unto him O Lord. May perpetual light shine upon his soul and may he rest in peace. Amen

ATHLETICS CARNIVAL

It is very exciting to see so many events being able to happen, after such a start and stop time over recent years.

Today House Captains met with Houses from Years 7-12 to discuss the upcoming Athletics Carnival. The Carnival will be held next week on Wednesday 18th May. The venue will be Campbelltown Athletics Stadium. We look forward to an exciting day!

NAPLAN

Well done to our Year 7s and 9s who sat their NAPLAN tests this week. It has been a disjointed couple of years but our students remained calm and various teething issues with the online platform were quickly overcome. For your information, this will be the last time that the tests will be sat in May. In future years the new adaptive online tests will be held in March in any given year.

TELL THEM FROM ME (TTFM) SURVEY

As a part of our College’s focus on improving student learning and effectiveness, we will be participating in an online survey for students, staff and parents/carers. The survey, “Tell Them From Me” (TTFM), will provide our College with valuable feedback on key aspects of College life. 

During Week 4, 16 - 20 May, students in Years 7-12 will be given the opportunity and time to participate in this survey during regular school hours. Students will be given a random username and password to access and complete the survey online. Students’ names cannot be linked to their responses - thereby allowing them to be completely anonymous. Results will show all student scores combined together – it is not possible to single out individual students in the results.

Similarly, parents/carers will have an opportunity to access this anonymous survey –  click on this link http://tellthemfromme.com/kzfwz

The survey takes approximately 10-15 minutes to complete. The survey measures include such topics as emotional and social well-being, physical health, and behaviours and attitudes linked to student success. The survey also allows students and parents/carers to give their thoughts and feedback in open-ended question responses.

I thank you in advance for your assistance in helping us reflect on what we are doing well, what we can do more of, what we can improve on and what we might do less of. If you have any queries about this survey, please contact me through the College Office.

PRAYER:

In this week’s newsletter I share a prayer which Pope Francis put forward last week. It is a beautiful prayer aimed at young people listening and valuing family.

“Speaking about the family, I would like to begin by addressing the young people first.

When I think of a model with whom young people can identify with, our Mother, Mary, always comes to mind: her courage, the way she knew how to listen, and her dedication to service.

She was courageous and determined to say “yes” to the Lord.

You young people, who want to build something new, a better world, follow her example, take risks!

Don’t forget that in order to follow Mary you need to discern and discover what Jesus wants from you, not what you might think you can do.

And in this discernment, it’s a great help to listen to the words of grandparents.

In those words of grandparents, you will find a wisdom that will take you beyond the issues of the moment.

They will provide an overview of your concerns.

Let us pray, brothers and sisters, so that all young people, called to live life to the fullest, may discover in Mary’s life the way to listen, the depth of discernment, the courage of faith, and dedication to service.”

The video can be watched here: https://youtu.be/U4dKr1BaZYM

On Friday April 29, Magdalene’s Annual Pink Stumps day was held. The day was an incredible success and we would like to thank all those who got involved, wore pink and donated. Together the Magdalene community raised $2500 with all proceeds going to the McGrath Foundation, which funds the McGrath Breast Care Nurses who provide support and care to those experiencing breast cancer. The day started with a House Captain race to collect all homerooms donations, where Sedgwick came first winning 20 points for their house. This was followed by the gold coin competition at recess where House Captains made a Cancer Ribbon out of gold coins, with Moore winning 100 points for the largest ribbon. During Lunch sausage sizzles, doughnuts, drinks and pink accessories were sold. A chocolate jar guessing competition and the LIVE event were held, providing much entertainment for the College community to enjoy while the Pink Stumps Staff vs Students Diamond Cricket game was played. The game concluded with a draw and much fun was had by all. Finally, a massive thank you to all staff and students who assisted on the day especially Mrs Taccone who organised and planned the day.

Another big thank you to the entire school community, we look forward to holding another fundraiser for a great cause! 

Your Spirit & Wellbeing Councillors Brianna, Sofia, Erin and Reece.

On Wednesday the 4th of May, the Year 7 Magdalene MISA Debating Team was accompanied by Miss Markoska and Miss Azzopardi to John Terry Catholic College for the Year 7 MISA Debating Training Day. We were joined by other High Schools from the Wollongong Diocese on the day and had a fantastic time. On the day, we were taught how to prepare for a debate, how to communicate effectively and work well in teams. We then had a chance to prepare a debate as a team and debate against another School on the topic “country life is better than city life”. Our team was the affirmative side which meant that we agreed with the topic. Lucia Vecchio was the first speaker, Kaizen Earl-Sawa was the second speaker, Sienna Micallef was our third speaker and Lacey Geary was the fourth speaker. Our team also included Giuseppina Vecchio and Sienna Vella who helped formulate ideas and arguments for the other girls' speeches. In the debate, our team competed against Mount Carmel Catholic College and fortunately we are proud to say that we won our first ever debate! To finish off this wonderful day, we were fortunate that John Therry's Year 9 MISA debating team gave us a demonstrated debate. Our Year 7 MISA debating team came back to School with so many new tips and tricks that we learnt and are ready to use in our next debate. We can’t wait for the competition to begin!

Written by Sienna Vella (7C). 

Luke 24: 

1 On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. 2 They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3 but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. 4 While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. 5 In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? 6 He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: 7 ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ ” 8 Then they remembered his words.

9 When they came back from the tomb, they told all these things to the Eleven and to all the others. 10 It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the mother of James, and the others with them who told this to the apostles. 11 But they did not believe the women, because their words seemed to them like nonsense. 12 Peter, however, got up and ran to the tomb. Bending over, he saw the strips of linen lying by themselves, and he went away, wondering to himself what had happened.

Mary Magdalene Reflection

Once again in Luke’s Gospel we see that Mary Magdalene is among the women who went to the tomb early on the Sunday morning, only to find that the tomb was empty and Jesus had risen from the dead. We can take great solace from the idea that the apostles originally did not believe the women because their words seemed like nonsense. Mary Magdalene was not the kind of person to be put off by other people’s opinions. She knew full well that Jesus had risen from the dead and that the apostles would need to eat their words at some point. 

Are we like Mary Magdalene? Would we be among the faithful people who came to pay tribute to the dead? Would we see and believe in the risen Christ? Would we be able to, in words and actions, be witnesses to the resurrection of Jesus?

Mary Magdalene was compassionate, courageous, independent and strong. She was a faith-filled disciple who lived a life of love. How blessed are we that Mary Magdalene is our patron saint? 

Mr Steve O’Neill

On Monday 2 May, Year 10 students visited the Sydney Jewish Museum as part of their studies in History relating to the Shoah (Holocaust). On the day, they took part in a guided tour of the museum, looking at artefacts from during and after World War II. They also took part in a workshop about the rights and freedoms to come out of the end of the war. Finally, they were able to listen to a survivor’s testimony about the experience.

A student, Chloe Rice, writes:

“I thought it was a great experience to get an inside look at the journey of the Jewish individuals throughout the Holocaust. It gave me a different perspective on the matter, as it is one thing to read and do research about the historic event, but it is something completely different to see first-hand testimonies and conditions they had to survive through. I especially liked listening to the survivors' testimony. We had a lady named Dasha, she was a young child throughout her imprisonment. She went through various challenges such as concealing her identity, hiding from the Nazis, and malnutrition. I found the section of the museum dedicated to the passed children that were involved in the mass murder to be especially impactful. The memorial wall of all the children killed was an eye-opening experience, it displayed names and photos (if the children had some) of the murdered. Behind this there was a bowl with water that would drop from the roof. It displayed the “tears of the children”, this bowl was filled with 1.5 million tears for each of those children who lost their lives.

The excursion to the Jewish museum was confronting and educational. I got an insight into the lives of families and couples that were forced to separate due to antisemitism. It was heartbreaking to read their goodbye letters and look at old photos of couples that never got their happy endings. I learnt about a very strong young woman named Lotte Weiss, she was a survivor of Auschwitz at only 16 years old. By using her intelligence to her advantage, she got good indoor jobs to escape the cold. Through her story we realised the effect holocaust had on their mental health, leaving most of the survivors; including Lotte, to develop PTSD and miss out on many life experiences.”

9 Dance Contemporary Workshop Incursion

The unit of work for Elective Dance in Term 2 is ‘From Stimulus to Dance’. This is a compositional based unit where students will engage in problem-solving tasks and manipulate the elements of dance as they explore, devise, select, refine and structure movement in a personal response to various stimuli to communicate ideas.

On 4th May, year 9 were visited by two teaching artists from Sydney Dance Company. These artists introduced the backstory of Sydney Dance Company and ran a creative contemporary workshop. It was a unique opportunity to experience how the company creates and performs new and original movements. Dancers were guided through a contemporary technique warm up, challenged with improvisation and completed a compositional task from their production ‘Impermanence’.

Choreographed by Artistic director Rafael Bonachela, ‘Impermanence’ was influenced by the impact of the wildfires that ravaged Australia late in 2019 and the devastation of the Notre Dame fire. The idea of a roller coaster and its elements were used to create movement in this piece and drove the compositional task for the students.

The year 9 dancers left the incursion filled with excitement for the term ahead. Eager to start creating their own original movement using a piece of stimulus material. The students felt safe whilst working with these artists as they knew their limits but were still able to push them out of their comfort zone. Improvisation was a tricky element to pick up, however, once the students were approached by the artists they were able to model movement and assist each individual student. 

Students received feedback from the teaching artists at the end of the incursion to let them know that the movement they had created was in fact original and they did not just stick to movement from their usual dance class. The year 9 elective class were very thankful for this opportunity and I am excited to see what they create over the coming weeks. You may even get to see some of their pieces being performed at Magdalene Shines in week 9.

Miss Tahlia Cupillari

Dance Teacher

On Monday May 9, Year 10 and 11 Drama students attended MISA Drama Day hosted by John Therry Catholic College. It was a fabulous day run by Zeal Theatre who performed their insightful show ‘Stones’. It was an engaging performance threaded together with interesting sound scapes, music and physical theatre that followed the journey of four characters played by two actors. The theme of innocence vs guilt was the primary focus and the audience were left to form an opinion about the verdict reached in the play. The performance prompted us to think about how to consider spatial proxemics in performance, when and where comedy is appropriate in a piece and how to create a minimalist set that has maximum impact. 

The second half of the day was spent in a group workshop with students from other MISA schools. Tom and Stefo from Zeal Theatre facilitated students to create theatrical moments through a range of tableaus and towards the end of the workshop, short scenes. Our Magdalene students had the opportunity to workshop a piece in a small group and perform publicly in front of all the participants. It was a rewarding experience and our students did really well to establish and maintain characters, use the stage space effectively and incorporate authentic storytelling through a range of dramatic techniques. 

It was such a privilege to attend this event and connect with other Drama students in MISA schools. A huge thank you to MISA and Angela Cascarino at John Therry for putting together this practical, effective and inspiring day of Drama Day for us.

Well done Year 10 and 11 Drama students for showcasing your passion for Drama and enthusiastically participating in this special event! 

Mrs McLaren

Drama Teacher 

Outstanding Uniform Orders 

If you have placed an order for any items, all items are in stock and available for pickup. Please call into the shop to collect your order ASAP.

Trading Hours:

Mondays 7.30am - 12.30pm 

Thursdays 10.30am - 3.30pm 

The Noone Team

Nicole and Mindy

Ph: (02) 7209 3736

Email: mcc@noone.com.au

Our College canteen cannot function without the valuable help of parent/carer volunteers daily. 

It would be greatly appreciated if you could assist in any way - once a week, once a month, once a Term or any other time that you specify. 

Each day, volunteers are required at the following times, you can do one session or two totally your choice:

Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday

9.30am to 10.30am

12.30pm to 1.30pm

Tuesday

10.30am to 11.30am

12pm - 1pm

If you are able to assist, please contact the College office on (02) 4631 3300 or email us at info@mccdow.catholic.edu.au.

Please note that all volunteers to the College will require to be double vaccinated as per the CEDoW Covid-19 Guidelines.