Term 3 Week 7 (05/09/2025)
HAPPY FATHER'S DAY
What is On?
Tuesday 9th September - Public Speaking School Finals in hall
Tuesday 9th September - Community Conversation (see below for link and details)
Wednesday 10th September - Colour Fun Run- Stage 3 Fundraiser (See below)
Wednesday 17th September- Netball School Cup Finals- Lismore
Friday 19th September- Touch Football Gala Day S2 & S3
Monday 22nd September - Public Speaking Finals in Coffs
Tuesday 23rd September - Book Parade
Wednesday 24th September- DIO Netball & Football Finals - Grafton
Thursday 25th September - Last Day Term 3 for Students
Friday 26th September - Staff Professional Learning Day - Curriculum - Pupil Free Day
Term 4 2025
Monday 13th October - First Day Term 4 for Students and Staff
Monday 3rd – Friday 7th November - Stage 3 Camp- Canberra
End of Year Final Awards Assembly - Thursday 11th December - Yamba Bowling Club 10:00 – 11:00am
Tuesday 16th December - Graduation Dinner
Wednesday 17th December - Last Day Term 4 for Students and Staff
Dear Parents and Carers
I think we are on community watch at St James Yamba this week! Let's do the count!
Last Saturday, 12 children from Saint James Primary made their First Holy Communion. Community event number 1- joining with the Parish of Saint James Yamba to welcome the students as they completed their sacramental journey.
Tuesday "On Country" with the wonderful Yaegl elders and community. From the Lookout in Maclean to Green Point and down to Mara Creek we certainly enjoyed our day of learning and growing our connection -number 2.
Tuesday night, Little J's who are starting kindergarten in 2026 and their families came into school to begin to build the kindergarten community. We had the obligatory pizza dinner– always dinner always babysitting, 28 pizzas later! What was most important on Tuesday night was for families to start connecting with one another. Next year’s kindergarten classes (and I say classes because we have two) contain a lot of existing families or families returning who have been with us for a long time. A night like Tuesday helps these families to welcome new families and to connect with one another to build that community. Number 3
On Wednesday our senior children were out playing netball and soccer in the Clarence Zone soccer/netball Knockout where they competed amazingly well and our senior boys soccer team was successful, which is a bit exciting. Thanks Tash and Marty for running that event for the whole of our cluster. Number 4
So to this morning. Our Father's Day Breakfast
I’ve lost my job on the barbecue! Best job in the morning and funnily enough for the first time after 11 years I was on chat mode, not cooking. A lovely morning to get to talk to so many families, dads, grandads, uncles, significant others, mums and grandmas too. Thank you to Ella and Carly who did the prior leg work, and all the staff for making themselves available early, making sure this event ran smoothly. Without the community we are lesser as a school. Our school thrives when we come together with a meal, talk and meet up with friends. This one is more than meeting up with the teachers even though we love to chat! It’s about the community of people coming together from all different jobs, places, spaces and towns and being here as one in our school. Just want to remind you All Are Welcome (all Belong). Number 5
We have a group of children in Grafton today with Mr Dougherty playing tennis ... no results yet but ...number 6.
I listened to the radio program today as I drove around town picking up parcels and such.
Don’t know about this?
Our S3 children have been hosting a one hour St James news program since 2000 at TLC 93.5 FM. The children move around the school and interview the classes to find out what’s happening and then write a script which they present from 11 am until midday each Friday. 3 disc jockeys spin the tunes!
If you want to know what we’re doing at school, it’s a great way to hear. In fact I enjoyed the script so much this morning as the children practice on the “radio drive” with Mrs Howland and myself, that I am reproducing the whole script in this newsletter. You can all hear about our week from the children’s perspective. They take requests and shout outs, meaning you can ring in and "request your favourite song from the 80's, 90's and today." American Pie may be the final song playing today as I wait and I may be singing along in the car! Not sure of the decade but...Number 7
Happy Father’s Day and have a great weekend.
See you next week for event number 8 ( if we keep counting!) The Colour Run.
Ann
Pastoral Care & Wellbeing News
Tue, 9 Sep, 7pm - 8pm AEST
Link to register-
In my early years as a parenting educator, I rarely saw dads at seminars. Nowadays, we can have up to 40% dads in the audience, and they tell me that they are coming willingly, not being dragged along!
Even though there are still some pretty deep cultural norms around the importance of mothers, there is such a seismic shift happening around the perception of how valuable fathering is. I was very blessed that, even back in the 1950s when fathers tended to be quite remote, I had a loving dad who was my securely attached parent.
I have had so many incredibly deep conversations with worried fathers that show how concerned many of them are about being good-enough parents.
To continue reading, please click the link- https://www.maggiedent.com/blog/what-i-have-learnt-about-fatherhood-from-some-good-enough-dads/
Renee Howland
Assistant Principal Mission
Sport News
Tennis
Good luck to Jake, Jarrah, Maeve and Hope who will be representing St James at the Dudley Jones Tennis Tournament in Grafton today. They will be playing against teams from across the Clarence Valley and we look forward to hearing about their day.
Soccer
Congratulations to our St James Soccer team who won the Clarence Zone Carnival on Wednesday in Yamba. The team went through their pool games and semi final undefeated and met a strong St Augustines Coffs Harbour team in the final. After being under pressure for the majority of the first half, some great defending from our backs, along with a couple of great saves from Ashton in goals, kept us in the game. Against the run of play just before half time, Duke was able to pounce on a mistake from an opposition defender and tap home the opening goal to give us a 1 nil lead at halftime. The boys started the second half full of confidence and with the wind at their backs played some great soccer to dominate the second half and run away with the game. Some great individual goals to Harlan and Joe were capped off with a piece of bicycle kick brilliance from Duke that sealed a dominant 4 nil win.
The boys now head to the Diocesan finals in a couple of weeks in Grafton, to play against the 3 other winning schools from the Tweed, Richmond and Hastings Zones to vie for the title of Diocesan Champions. This is the first time our school has ever reached this level so we are very excited for the boys and looking forward to the finals!
Netball
Congratulations as well to our St James Netball team who also took to the court in Yamba on Wednesday for the Zone Netball Carnival. The girls started the day playing some great Netball and managed to win 4 out of their 5 pool games with their only loss coming against a very fast and well drilled St Augustines Coffs Harbour side. This placed them 2nd on the pointscore and qualified them for the final against St Augustines. The girls lifted their level in the final and pushed their opposition right from the start. With only 2 goals difference at halftime the girls knew they had their opposition worried and were keen to push hard and try and chase them down in the second half. Unfortunately things didn't quite go to plan and they ran out of steam and St Augustines were clinical with their shooting to extend the lead late in the game for a scoreline of 14-6, which didn't reflect the closeness of the game. A great effort from the girls and they should be very proud of their efforts and the way they played on the day.
Colour Fun Run Day Information
Our Colour Fun Run is on Wednesday 10th September and we are super excited! Families are invited to attend this fun filled afternoon. Kick off is at 12:30pm.
Please see below some important information about our day.
A huge thank you to all of those who have volunteered to help out on the day, it is going to be a blast!
- Students can wear mufti to school on Wednesday. Make sure they have a white t-shirt for the run.
- Our Stage 3 families will be running a BBQ (sausage sizzle) for lunch on the day for all. Pre-orders are available via COMPASS TIX, otherwise CASH ONLY on the day. We will also be selling Juice Bombs, Snap Stick Icy Poles and Poppers (please see menu below). CANTEEN LINK https://compasstix.com/e/
jvhmb99w3a - An email will be sent out to all families after the run advising when the prize selection is open. Remember, the more you raise the better the prizes.
- The highest fundraisers from each class will get to slime the teachers.
- The highest fundraiser in the whole school will get to pour slime over Ms Dawson!
Below is a runschedule for the big day! If you would like to volunteer and be a colour blaster or slime extraordinaire please email yamp@lism.catholic.edu.au
Community Conversation #13
#CC13 is on Tuesday evening.
Please join us to continue the conversation with a focus on "friend raising"
Link to register
School Awards Assembly
St James' Award – Slater
Values – Layla, Siaan, Cleo, Henrietta, Ziggy, Roscoe, Sophia
Sport – Fionn, Liam, Hudson, Billy, Tasman, Asher, Fletcher
Achievement – Arabella, Ella, Ralph, Declan, Nicholas, Noah, Julian, Koa, Harvey, Navah, Taylah
Encouragement – Christopher, Jett, Sebastian, Ivy, Isla, Layla, Vincent, Willow, Rhys, Lily, Ned
Stage 2 News
This week we have let Stage 2 write the news! Please enjoy reading, we have a lot we want to share.
On Country NAIDOC Excursion
Stage 2 had a great time learning on Country on Tuesday the 2nd of September. We were lucky to have Grant, a local Yaegl person, to show us around and teach us about the area. Here are some of the things we learnt.
- Yaegl people used to tell the time by using the sun.
- When a black cockatoo flies over, we are going to get rain. The number of black cockatoos tells us how many rain days we will have.
- How to find bush tucker and the importance of planting seeds.
- The different parts of the pigface plant, the seeds and the part we can eat, It grows in the sand along the coast. It is great for hydration and is full of nutrients.
- Ferns have been around since dinosaurs were around and they have been sustained by fire.
- The water at Mara Creek looks dirty but it isn't, it is just discoloured from the coffee rock.
- How to identify different plants based on their names, especially the different types of Banksias.
- When wattle is in bloom the mullet are swimming in our area.
- How fish traps are made and how they were used.
- How fire is used as a tool and bushfires have affected the area, and how plants have regenerated.
- How smoke signals were used to notify people in Iluka that mullet were heading their way.
- Lots of the plants around Mara creek are endangered.
- Norfolk pines were planted along the coastline before lighthouses were around to notify boats that there was land.
- The Lamandra helps to maintain the bank from the effects of sandmining and helps to prevent further erosion.
Science
In Science, we are learning about weathering and erosion. Last week, we used oreos to represent the tectonic plates and the magma inside the mantle. The best part of the lesson was eating the tectonic plates as part of the Earth’s crust and magma (oreos).
English
In English, we have started a new unit and get to read some new books. Fire by Jackie French is about the impact, devastation and regeneration of bush fires, from the perspective of a cockatoo. We are also reading the story Piano Fingers by Caroline Magerl which is about a young girl Bea, who comes from a BIG musical family and can’t find her instrument, but eventually finds a piano and discovers it is HER instrument.
Birthdays
Kade 7/9, Nicholas 9/9, James 9/9, Lola 10/9, Leah 12/9, Hailey 12/9, Billie 13/9, Willa 13/9, Slater 14/9, Ziggy 18/9, Everly 19/9
Vacation Care Booking Form
Booking form and the full program below
Attendance
