Working together

As a Christian school there are practical applications to what we believe and what we expect from our parents
and guardians as they partner with us in the education journey of their children.

We believe that parents have the primary right and responsibility for the nurture and teaching of their children. Therefore GCCC works to support and extend the education carried out by parents, and will report to them regularly.

We believe that children benefit if parents and teachers work together. Therefore parents and staff need to encourage and support each other.

GCCC’s core values are G.R.E.A.T. and stand for Godliness, Respect, Excellence, Attitude and Teachabilty. These values are taught in school and we encourage our parents to reinforce and practice these behaviours at home with their children.

Problems have arisen recently when parent behaviour hasn’t been according to the mutually respected partnership between the College and parents. There have been too many instances this year of disturbing parent behaviour that goes directly against our school values and what we teach the students.

I would like to take this opportunity to strongly urge you all to think about your behaviour and how it is an example to your children. Think about the messages you are sending them.

Children are great imitators and pick up behaviour in us that we may not even be aware we are exhibiting.

As a Christian school we believe that everyone is a valued human being who deserves to be treated with respect. It is difficult it is to stay calm when you are stressed, angry or worried about your child but please don’t allow your feelings to result in abusive behaviour to others. It simply will not be tolerated.

Our front office Admin team will always greet you with a smile on their face and do their best to help however, they are sometimes the brunt of abusive behaviour and this has to stop. Please treat them with the same respect they show you each time they greet you in person or on the phone.

We sometimes forget how intelligent our children are and all the hidden messages they pick up on. If you are telling them not to swear or practice inappropriate language but then have unsuitable stickers on your car or wear suggestive logos on your clothes, what are the children really learning? The ‘do as I say not what I do’ method has never been successful and you will be in for a lot of heartache as your children grow older and listen to what you do rather than what you say.

On the upside I have witnessed many wonderful acts of behaviour by our parents which are shining examples to their children and other families. Families help each other out when the going is tough, parents volunteer at the school and assist those in need, people are warm and friendly even when they are worried or distressed. People do little things like saying please and thank you.

I know of at least one parent who went to great expense to change an inappropriate sticker on his car once he became aware of the message it was sending. He and others like him are to be commended.
None of us are perfect but all of us are examples to our children and need to do our best.

There was a famous movie where the motto was to ‘be excellent to each other’. At GCCC, excellence is one of our important core values. I encourage you all to be excellent to each other.

Christien Festa

One of the ways our parents and staff have been showing great partnership is how they have all been praying for Christien Festa. As you know from my last article, Christien was involved in a life-threatening motocross accident which resulted in him being in a coma in hospital.

Since then I’m happy to report that Christien is (very slowly) recovering. This is a great miracle given his early circumstances so thank you to everyone who prayed. Please keep praying as Christien has a long way to go for a full recovery. He is out of the coma and showing some responses in body language. However, Christian has developed a nasty lung infection which causes him to cough and brings great pain to his head which has sustained so much injury. Christien’s mum has asked specifically for us to pray for Christien’s lungs to heal.

If you have ever had a child in hospital, you may be aware of the many hidden costs. Things like travel, parking, making arrangements for other children, and eating on the run, soon add up to huge amounts. We are setting up a donation box at Main Admin and Secondary Admin for staff, students and parents to make donations to if they so wish. You would be surprised how soon a few gold coin donations add up to being a real help – especially when a lot of people give. We would be very grateful if you could send in small donations to help this family.

Swimming Carnival

This is the first time we held the Primary and Secondary Swimming Carnivals on two different days but it went
so well that I think it will continue as the plan for the future.

Spacing the carnivals over two days meant there was more time for novelty races, fashions on the field and for everyone to have a more relaxed and fun time. After the Primary Carnival, it looked like Sinai was in the lead but by the end of the Secondary Carnival, Ararat had swum to a firm win.

Congratulations to all the students who participated by swimming and cheering. I think the cheering this year was better, louder and with more gusto than previous years. Thanks also to all the staff and parents who helped make both these occasions such successes.

There are photo galleries of these two events in the Sports section.

P and F Family Fun Day

This picnic is especially designed to welcome new families to GCCC and provide the opportunity for them to meet other parents and families. Although the weather was very hot this year, everyone still had lots of fun making new friends and reacquainting themselves with old ones.

Once again the fabulous Wendy Stott had set up lots of fun games and showed more than one child how to hit a ball.

The P and F bravely faced the hot barbecues to sizzle those sausages and the biggest hit of the day was probably the icy cold drinks. Next year the P and F are planning to incorporate some water games just in case the hot weather decides to repeat itself.

There is a photo gallery of this event in Alaina’s P and F article.

Ecumenical Service

On Tuesday 18 February, 21 of our student leaders, two chaplains and myself travelled to Matthew Flinders Anglican College for the annual Ecumenical Service. There were about 400 people attending the service from all the independent schools on the Sunshine Coast. It was a good service and I was very proud of how our student leaders represented the College.

Bus Zone

Please remember that the bus zone is for buses. I know that some people use this zone to quickly drop off their children before or after the buses have used the zone but buses have the right of way at all times.

Some parents have parked their cars in the bus zone and gone to look for their children and this is not acceptable. It may look clear with no buses in sight when you pull up but within minutes there can be four or five buses and they all rely on being able to use the bus zone to pull in and out safely. When a car is parked in the bus zone, buses can’t pull into it and this blocks all the traffic on the ring road and then into Roberts Road.

When you park your car in the bus zone you are potentially holding up hundreds of students and parents and this soon escalates into terrible traffic problems as well as increasing the danger to our students.

The Kiss and Go zone is particularly for those parents who want to quickly pick up or drop off their child. Please use this instead of the bus zone.

Mike Curtis
Principal