School Newsletter

Keeping an Eternal Perspective

One of the big lessons I have learnt through my years of leadership is how our strengths have associated weaknesses. Some areas of leadership theory call them 'shadows'. You might have an excellent memory, which can be very helpful, yet at the same time, it may make forgiving people hard because you can vividly remember the pain and hurt you felt from someone’s actions. Perhaps your strength is working at high capacity – inadvertently, it may be that others feel intimidated around you because they think you expect them to work at that same level.

I think, in some ways, similar issues can exist with blessings. We experience many blessings, but they, too, may elicit challenges or 'shadows'. We have the blessing of living in a free and democratic society, where we are all given the opportunity to decide who our elected government is. Evidence suggests that some of us are apathetic towards this blessing, and either put in donkey votes or don’t vote at all.

I feel I have many blessings in my life, far too many to list here, but I sometimes feel one of the associated challenges is ensuring I keep an eternal perspective. I have read many accounts of people who have experienced incredible hardship in their lives and are genuinely yearning for the return of Jesus. In my blessed and comfortable life, I am sometimes concerned that I am too caught up in the things of this world and not appropriately focused on eternity.

For much of his adult life, the Apostle Paul experienced great hardship. He writes in 2 Corinthians 4:18, “We fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." He clearly had the correct perspective, recognising that this world will indeed pass us all by.

Many of us will be aware of stories of ministry work occurring in prisons and how successful it can be. As challenging as the inmates’ circumstances are, perhaps it helps them to realise that they are in need of a saviour and there is more to life than what they are experiencing now.

I often like to say to our staff, I believe we deal with things of eternal significance every day. However we manage to lift our eyes to Christ, if the outcome helps us to realise that this life really is temporary (Ecclesiastes refers to it as a mist that is soon gone) and that we should be storing up treasures in heaven where moth and rust can’t destroy, (Matthew 6:20) then surely that’s a good thing.

God bless,

ALADDIN JR. TICKETS ON SALE

We are so excited for our upcoming K-12 musical production of Aladdin JR.

Click here to purchase your tickets!

SCHOOL PHOTO DAY

School Photo Day will be held on Thursday 12th June (Week 7, Term 2). Families have received an email with information about ordering school photos.

EVERY TRIBE AND TONGUE EVENT

On Wednesday 11th June (Week 7, Term 2), we will be celebrating our diversity and uniqueness by gathering as a whole community. We are all part of God’s Big Family! The vision for this day, as part of our Wellbeing Week, is to provide an opportunity for students to interact with many people, from many cultures, and to learn more about their uniqueness and value. The inspiration for the name comes from Revelation 7:9 - a picture of God's children uniting in heaven.

HCZS NOW HCSZS

There has been another name change for our Zone Sport. Hunter Christian Zone Sports is now known as Hunter Christian Schools Zone Sports.

ELEVATE EDUCATION PARENT WEBINAR

Live Parent Webinar: How You Can Support Your Child During Exams

Wednesday 4th June 6:30-7:30pm (AEST)

Click here to register for free

Here’s what Elevate will be covering on the night:

• Helping your child prepare in the week before an exam
• Establishing a good routine for your child the night before
• Helping your child to optimise their exam performance

• Give thanks that the flood waters are receding and school is open again.
• Give thanks for all those who assist those in distress during the floods.
• Pray for God to comfort those who have lost loved ones, animals or homes over the last week.
• Pray for those on the Year 11 CMT Retreat in Week 5.

Greetings friends of Junior School, I pray the term is going well for you and your family.

We are welcoming back Mr Knibbs in Week 6 after his Long Service Leave and coaching the Australian Junior Futsal team in Europe. It is such a blessing to have an international-level coach in our community.

We have some people to thank for the events we have enjoyed this term.

MOTHER'S DAY

Our Mother’s Day stall and BBQ breakfast was a total success thanks to the dedication and excellence of Mrs Lynda Lucas and all of the wonderful parent volunteers and student helpers. It was funny to watch the mums, who were manning the stalls (pun intended), turn away when their children were purchasing their gifts. Too cute. Thanks for your generosity and graciousness.

GRANDPARENTS' MORNING

Grandparents’ morning was another outstanding success, even though the weather made parking a bit of a challenge. It is such a delight to be part of such a vibrant and supportive Christian community. There were so many Great Grandparents in attendance this year. For those of you who were unable to attend, we ran out of seats. Neil Higgins (our amazing retired Head of Grounds) told me that we have 600 seats and they were all in the MPC, so it was a popular event to be sure. Next time we will open up the Mezzanine and ask our more spritely guests to go upstairs.

Mr Darren Milligan preached an excellent message about the dangers of sitting on the fence regarding salvation and likened it to choosing Optus and Telstra in the old days. The kids were fascinated by the evolution of phones. We were delighted to have our founding Principal, Mrs Alison Graeve (Banister), in attendance too.

ALADDIN JR.

I am sure you are aware that Aladdin JR. the musical, is in full swing. Thanks so much to the families who volunteered their time and expertise at the working bee and preparation on Saturday 17th May.

KINDY STARTERS

Last week, we had the first of our Kindy Starters visits for our 2026 cohort. It is so exciting to have such growth in numbers that we can open another Kindergarten class next year. If the enrolments continue, it may even be necessary to open a fifth class. Wowsers, what a brilliant opportunity to partner with families and share the gospel with our new community members. With this continued growth, it makes our new 1 North Road Infants Campus even more important.

LOOKING AHEAD

We still have a stack of wonderful opportunities and events scheduled for the remainder of the term: Futsal, Cross Country, Soccer, Netball, Wellbeing Week (Every Tribe and Tongue Event), and School Photo Day.

YEAR 5 HILL END

The highlight for Year 5 will be the Hill End Field Trip. This one is bittersweet for us because our wonderful hostess is retiring and we will be her last school group. We have had such a beautiful relationship with Kerri Burns for as long as I can remember, right back to the Middle School days when Mr Alan Jones and Mrs Carolyn Webber took the Year 5 students to Hill End.

Interestingly many of those former students are now returning to our community as parents. Praise God for generational ministries.

GADAL GIRLS

Gadal is a Hebrew word meaning to grow, become great or important, promote, make powerful, praise, magnify, or do great things.

Gadal Girls is a fun, faith-focused group where students are deepening their understanding of our wonderful God and who He says we are. They meet weekly during Tuesday lunchtime in the Year 6 classroom. As the girls are in the last year of Junior School and preparing to transition to Secondary School, this is a significant time in their lives when they are forming their identity and ‘growing up’.

Last term, the theme was ‘We are God’s Masterpiece’. The girls explored scripture, played games, and did crafts to paint a picture of their identity through the eyes of Jesus. It is a joy to see the girls encouraging one another, building friendships as they grow together. We are all different, and yet we are all beautiful and unique because we are God's own masterpiece.

“For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago” Ephesians 2:10

Thank you to our Gadal Girls leaders: Mrs Annette Shorten, Mrs Naomi Vargas, Miss Alex Beck, Mrs Kerry Rutherford, Mrs Carly Thomson, Mrs Vanessa Bradford and Mrs Kristyn Herbert.

Chat soon,

Hello Secondary School families.

Week 4 certainly ended in an unexpected fashion! We want to thank our students and parents for their flexibility and for pivoting to online learning quickly because of the school closure due to all the rain we have had recently.

Despite the rain, the Secondary School has been a busy place with Elevate Study Sessions for Years 10-12, excursions, and groups of students representing the school in Mock Trial, the Da Vinci Decathlon and the Model United Nations Assembly. We are incredibly proud of how our students consistently represent our school with integrity, respect, compassion, a spirit of service, and a commitment to excellence.

As we approach the midpoint of the term, we are well into a busy season of assessments. We encourage students to practise effective time management and organisation so they can approach each task with the focus it deserves. It's equally important to maintain balance by making time for social connection, physical activity, and rest - key ingredients for supporting mental wellbeing. If students need support in managing their workload, they are encouraged to speak with their class teacher or Home Room teacher.

Looking ahead, a key event in Week 8 is our Subject Selection Evening for students in Years 8 and 10.

• Year 8 students will explore their options for Elective Subjects in 2026.

• Year 10 students will receive guidance on building a pattern of study and selecting subjects for Stage 6 (Years 11 and 12) in 2026–2027.

We strongly encourage both students and parents to attend this important evening. Please mark 5:30pm, Tuesday 17th June in your diary for the event. Further details will be shared shortly via an email to families.

As a community we will be gathering this Friday 30th May at 9am for our K-12 Combined Chapel. Families are welcome to join us as we praise and worship our amazing God.

We have now moved into winter uniform for the colder months. Please check the requirements in our School Information Handbook for details.

We would really appreciate everyone’s support in encouraging our students to ensure they are not adding mufti items like undershirts, hoodies and leggings. Please click here to view the Alinta Uniform Shop opening hours for the purchase of warmer layers.

As we did in our last newsletter, please enjoy getting to know our year teams and Home Room teachers through the profiles below. This time, we are focusing on Year 10, led by Year Advisors, Mrs Jaimie Bailey and Mrs Hannah Kelly.

God Bless,

One of the funniest questions I’ve ever been asked by a student was,

“Did Jesus have calves like Jack Grealish?”

Now, if you don’t know who Jack is or why his calves are so important, then the question would make no sense to you at all. However, all the students know I am a mad Liverpool fan and follow the English Premier League (EPL) closely enough to know who Jack Grealish is, even though he plays for Man City. And further to that, he wears the smallest shin pads on the market with his socks pulled low beneath his calves. It means he can be spotted anywhere on the field just by his calves alone. So, the connection point is the context of how the question was raised in class.

You see, we were talking about how far Jesus would have walked in His years of ministry and how fit He would have been. He and His disciples walked everywhere, hundreds of kilometres across Judea and its neighbouring regions. This followed years of being a carpenter or builder, trained up by His dad before, at about 30 years of age, He stopped that to become a wandering Rabbi (teacher). He would have been seriously fit and most likely quite physically strong. So, the question about Jesus and Jack Grealish’s calves was really quite insightful. For me, as a teacher, it also validated the historical Jesus in our class conversation as we compared two people from 2000 years apart. We concluded that both Jesus and Jack have great calves, but I said Jesus would have played football for Liverpool, as they are way better. There was some disagreement here, as you could imagine. Nonetheless, Jesus as a real historical figure was realised through this conversation, and the notion of Him being a made-up character was rightfully discarded. Jesus as a person interacted with many other people, and we can read multiple accounts of this that even atheist historians will tell you He existed. The evidence is overwhelming. The disagreements arise in whether people believe Jesus is who He claims to be, that is, the Son of God and Messiah.

I know what I believe about Jesus, how about you?

I also love that He promised that you’ll never walk alone! Check out Matthew 28:20 if you don’t believe me.

God bless,

MATHEMATICS COMPETITIONS

The Bebras Computational Thinking Challenge is always a highlight for our Mathematics Extension groups, and this year they have outdone themselves.
I am thrilled to announce that out of 37 participants in Years 3 to 6, these clever young mathematicians were awarded 2 Distinctions, 15 High Distinctions and 7 Certificates of Excellence (full marks). We look forward to celebrating these wonderful achievements at our Term 2 Celebration Assembly!

WRITING EXTENSION
Flowing from a desire to serve our community, our Years 3 and 4 Writing Extension students recently devoted themselves to writing letters to the residents at Warnervale Gardens Residential Aged Care. Our young writers were so very excited at the prospect of bringing a smile to someone’s face, and it was a delight to hear our students’ heartfelt prayers for the lovely residents who would be receiving their letters.

DA VINCI DECATHLON
Congratulations to our Years 5-9 teams who represented us so brilliantly at the State da Vinci Decathlon in Week 4. These students were such a credit to our school, in the way that they diligently trained for this challenging academic competition and then worked so well in their teams on the day. Thank you very much to the many teachers who came along to their training days as specialists, and thank you to Mr Johns, Mrs Holland and Mrs Brown who accompanied and supported the teams on the day.

ICAS
We are looking forward to once more offering our students the opportunity to further develop their higher-order thinking and problem-solving skills through ICAS, a highly acclaimed online academic competition. Every student who participates is celebrated and recognised with a printed certificate in each subject area, and a results report to track their development each year. Top performers are eligible for one of the highly coveted ICAS medals.

The dates of this year’s competitions are as follows:

• ICAS Digital Technologies Competition: Monday 4th - Friday 8th August (Years 2-7)

• ICAS Writing Competition: Monday 4th - Friday 8th August (Years 3-12)

• ICAS English competition: Monday 11th - Friday 15th August (Years 2-12)

• ICAS Spelling Competition: Monday 18th - Friday 22nd August (Years 2-12)

• ICAS Science competition: Monday 18th - Friday 22nd August (Years 2-12)

• ICAS Maths Competition: Monday 25th - Friday 29th August (Years 2-12)

  If you wish for your child to participate in ICAS this year, please complete the following steps:

• Read about ICAS subjects and prices here

• Visit the Parent Portal to sign up for the chosen subject areas here

• Enter your child’s details, select the subject areas your child would like to participate in, and then proceed to payment.  

• The last day to sign up will be Friday 25th July 2025.

Mrs Anne Livette-Vial | High Potential & Enrichment Teacher

CIS SWIMMING

Congratulations to our NSW CIS (Combined Independent Schools) Swim Team, who did us proud in their respective events at CIS level.

CIS PRIMARY BOYS RUGBY LEAGUE TRIALS

League superstar from Year 6, Noah M, recently competed in the CIS Rugby League trials alongside 155 other talented players from across the state. Trialling for the halfback position, with 17 others in the same role, Noah made it through to the Possibles vs Probables match, where the group was narrowed to just 28.

We’re pleased to share that Noah was selected as the starting halfback for the CIS team - an excellent achievement.

Congratulations, Noah! We wish you all the best as you represent CIS.

Mr Rob Higgins | Junior School Sport Teacher

Each term, students in Year 11 Christian Ministry and Theology (CMT) are required to present a seminar to their peers. In Term 1, they choose a Biblical issue, in Term 2, they choose a cultural issue, and in Term 3, a personal issue.

It has been a privilege this term to have two of those students, Joel A and Lily M, share in staff morning Devotions what they presented to their class in Term 1. They have shown an ability and keenness to engage at a deep level in their topics, which has been a blessing to staff.

Joshuah P also presented a summary of the class’s involvement in the Mission Aviation Fellowship's 80th birthday celebrations in Term 1. Josh put together a short video on what the day involved and shared with staff more about what MAF do in their mission work.

We love hearing from our students and seeing God at work in them, growing them in their faith and developing them in their confidence.

Mrs Glenys Drennan | CMT Coordinator

The Rotary Model United Nations Assembly (MUNA) is an experience that provides students with valuable skills in considering world issues from various perspectives, critical thinking, and public speaking. Seeing our students rise to this challenge with such enthusiasm, commitment and reliance on God to help them was a reminder of the values held within our school community.

We proudly sent three Year 10 students as representatives of the United Kingdom: Harper C, Olivia C, and Simon C. From the preparation phase through to the individual final debates, this trio demonstrated exceptional teamwork. The weeks of research and planning were evident as they addressed the assembly on three UN resolutions covering forestation, nuclear-free zones, and technological privacy rights.

As a bonus, our team's attention to detail earned them Third Place in the costume competition, bringing authentic flair to their representation of the UK. A special mention goes to Archie H, whose behind-the-scenes research and organisational efforts helped bring the team together.

Mrs Andrea McKeown | Secondary School HSIE Teacher