Term 3, Week 10B- Monday 22 September, 2025

What's On This Week

Principal's Report

Dear Parents and Carers, 

Today, as we gathered to celebrate Heritage Day, we honour the extraordinary legacy of St. Raphael’s Catholic School—a cornerstone of Catholic education in Cowra for over 150 years. Its true centre lies in the generations of students, teachers, and families who have shaped its story.

Catholic education in Cowra began in 1870, when Miss Martin and later Miss Purcell laid the foundation for what would become a thriving educational community. In 1878, the Sisters of St. Joseph from Perthville took up the mission, followed in 1894 by six Brigidine Sisters from Coonamble, who infused the school with the Brigidine Charism—strength and gentleness—that continues to guide us today.

The boarding section opened in 1895, and as enrolments grew, new buildings were added in 1902 and again in 1912, officially opened by Dr Dunne. By the mid-1930s, the school was home to 450 pupils, and in 1938, the present convent chapel and classrooms were completed, marking a new era of spiritual and academic growth.

The primary school, facing Liverpool Street, was officially opened in 1965 by Bishop Thomas, and the following year, the boarding school was closed. Secondary classrooms were added in 1968, and a new administration block was completed in 1987. In 1988, the Brigidine Sisters handed leadership to the first lay principal, Mrs Gene Smith, ushering in a new chapter of stewardship.

A major refurbishment in 2000 transformed the former convent and boarding buildings into vibrant learning spaces, including our library, Heritage Centre, domestic kitchen, and curriculum offices. Jubilee Park and St. Raphael’s Hall were also revitalized, enhancing our sporting and community facilities.

In 2016, St. Raphael’s proudly became a K–12 school, offering Catholic education from Kindergarten through Year 12—an achievement that reflects our commitment to lifelong learning and faith formation.

Today, our curriculum is anchored in strong literacy and numeracy foundations, with excellent outcomes across all levels. Our culture of Strength and Gentleness ensures that every student is nurtured, challenged, and prepared for a bright future.

As we celebrate Heritage Day, we honour the visionaries, educators, and families who built this legacy. We celebrate the enduring connection between school, parish, and the Cowra community. And most of all, we recommit ourselves to the values that have carried us through generations: faith, compassion, resilience, and excellence.

Here’s to the past that shaped us—and the future we continue to build together.

God Bless, 

Michelle Deschamps - Principal

From the Desk of the Assistant Principal

This newsletter is all about endings and beginnings. We are coming to the end of Term 3 and I wish everyone a great and well deserved holiday!

It is also the end of 13 years of schooling for our lovely Year 12 students. We will celebrate with them on Tuesday at our Graduation Assembly and acknowledge the contribution they have made to our school.

Year 11 is coming to the end of their Preliminary study and will start their HSC year from the start of Term 4. It is also the beginning of a path for our senior students as they start to make their way in the world. As we all know the world and life can be hard full of decisions and obstacles to navigate.

We are blessed at St Raphael’s to have such a caring and loving culture through our faith and community that we build within each of our students the resilience and respect that will enable them to thrive. Each family sets out to build a strong foundation for their children with boundaries and care and try to establish guidelines for our loved ones to follow.

At St Raphael’s through our faith development we build on this foundation, through our Catholic identity. Our staff continually model behaviours and attitudes that will help our students grow and develop. Our masses, prayer, retreats all build this strong foundation of making decisions that are based on kindness and respect.

In short, as our Year 12 leave our school through the guard of honour tomorrow, I will wish them well knowing they have received an amazing holistic education that will allow them to thrive in the world and to make an impact that will benefit not only themselves but the people around them..

David Wickham - Assistant Principal

Faith, Mission & Learning

Heritage Day

Today, we celebrate our heritage. 

Our founder, Daniel Delany was the Bishop of Kildare in Ireland during the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Bishop Delaney was known for his strong devotion to St. Brigid of Kildare, he sought to revive her legacy and spirituality. Our school motto, ‘Strength and Gentleness’, was the motto of our Founder, Daniel Delany. The motto sets before us the virtues of strength and gentleness, so characteristic of Brigid of Kildare. 

Heritage Day is an opportunity to learn about and celebrate what we have always been, a strong school community supported by the Brigidine motto of ‘Strength and Gentleness’ by raising much needed funds for our local St Vincent De Paul. As a community we need to follow in St Brigid’s footsteps. ‘St Brigid was a woman of healing who cared for justice, equality, peace and reconciliation’.  

As we are celebrating our heritage today, it is important to acknowledge where our house names have come from:

• Kilbreda, means ‘community of St Brigid’. The qualities that represent the Community of St Brigid are acceptance, gentleness, loyalty. 
• Xavier, the Patron saint of Roman Catholic Missionaries. The qualities that represent St Xavier are empathy, innovation, and idealism. 
• Raphael, is from the Patron saint of Youth and Healing. The qualities that represent St Raphael are independence, strength and respect. 

Through this annual initiative, we seek to learn from our history and follow in St Brigid’s footsteps by caring deeply for creation, seeking justice, equality, peace and reconciliation. 

Gabrielle Bruin - Leader of Faith, Mission & Learning

Key Notices

Morning Delivery of Children
Safe morning delivery of your children needs consideration and co-operation among all motorists.  Please take note of the following points:

• Till 9:30am the drop-off zone out the front of the school is “No Parking” so you cannot leave your car. It is literally, 'Stop, Drop and Go'!
• Please drive to the front of the available drop-off zone to enable others to pull up and deliver their children behind you
  
• Deliver your children and move away from the drop-off  zone carefully and promptly.
  
• It’s illegal to park in the Bus Zone outside the hours of 9:30am and 2:30pm
• It is illegal to park across the driveway
• If you wish to walk your child to the school gates, please park outside the zone and walk to the front of the school with your child, making sure to use the pedestrian crossing on Liverpool Street if required.

Library News

Book Returns

Please keep up the search for those missing Library Books and return them by this Wednesday. 

Year 11 students are welcome to return their Prelim Texts to the Library when they are finished with them. Year 12 students are also able to keep their text books for their HSC exams but they must be returned by their last exam day. Thanks in advance.

Premier’s Reading Challenge

The 2025 Premier’s Reading challenge is now closed. Miss Pearce and I are extremely proud of the students who completed the challenge successfully this year. Certificates will be handed out next term.

Book Fair

We are hosting the Scholastic Book Fair this year. The Book Fair is a great opportunity to do some Christmas shopping. It also is great for our School Library as we get new books for our Library from the sales we make. The Book Fair will take place in Weeks 1 & 2 of next term. All Primary students will be able to window shop during Week 1 either during their Library Lessons or at other designated times to create a wish list. During Week 2, Primary students will be able to purchase books once again during their Library Lesson or other designated times. This year, we also requested books suitable for our Secondary students too. Secondary students are most welcome to come to the Library and browse the Book Fair and purchase books too. If any parents or carers would like to come and purchase books, they may do so before or after school until 4pm in Week 2. There will be eftpos facilities available too. A promotional flyer is being sent home with each family this week. 

Year 11 Prelim Exams

Just a reminder that while the Yr 11 Prelim Exams are taking place, students in Yr11 are most welcome to use the Senior Study area in the Library to study and prepare for their exams. Mrs Scott will have some treats available to help with motivation and energy levels.

iSTEM Challenges for Years 7 & 8

Secondary iSTEM is a small group of dedicated students who are coming together to explore iSTEM challenges. Our goal is to further expand out abilities in; critical thinking, communication, creativity and collaboration.

We engage in new challenges that require us to delve into our already known math and science skills while exposing us to next level content.We aim to continue to grow and learn; leading up to some exciting inter-school challenges next year and beyond.

Any students from year 7 and 8 are welcome to join. We hope to expand this into other year groups as interest increases.

Primary Sport

Todd Woodbridge Cup Tennis

Third time lucky for our Stage 3 tennis players. Last Wednesday, our 24 players finally had the chance to play their tennis after two wash-outs had caused postponements. Lovely weather conditions greeted us, with a full day of play planned for our eager students. Our three teams were up against some very strong opposition, with students from St. Edward's Canowindra, Grenfell P.S., Parkes Christian School and Cowra P.S. all competing on the day. Our students performed admirably, with improved skills evident. Most pleasing was seeing the smiles on their faces throughout the day, displaying obvious enjoyment in the days activities. Ruben received an award at the presentation at the end of the day for his effort shown throughout the day. Our number 2 team finished the day in 3rd place, with our number 1 team winning the day overall. They now go on to play in Sydney on Monday 10th November which is a big accomplishment. The team heading onto the next level in Sydney consists of Rosemary Bennett, Ashley Kang, Vivienne Graham, Sarah Langfield, Josh Launders, Sam Launders, Will Buik and Henry Mitchell. Well done to all 24 students though on how well you represented our school on the day.

Polding Athletics Carnival

We had three girls travel to Newcastle two Fridays ago to compete in the Polding Athletics Carnival. Lexie Kennedy, Ebony Whitton and Addison Longhurst had qualified from the Diocesan Trials earlier in the term at Dubbo. Whilst the competition was obviously very tough at this high level, the top half of the state of Catholic students, the girls all said that they enjoyed the experience. Personal bests were even achieved which is what it is all about. Well done girls.

Primary Sport Choices

We are now up to our last week of Sport Choices for the Primary students. An enjoyable time has been had across the sports of Park Run, Netball, Tennis, Soccer and Touch Footy. This Thursday is the last day for our Sport Choices.

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Infants Tennis

As part of the Sporting Schools Funding, Helen Garratt has been coming into the school every Thursday for lessons with our Infants K-2 students. Our little ones have had a great time chasing tennis balls around the playground. Thank you Helen for providing our students with this opportunity.

Term 4 Sport

We have nine straight days of Intensive Swimming coming up in Term 4 in Weeks 8 + 9. Parents will be asked to fill in information regarding swimming levels early next term. This program is such a worthwhile experience and necessary for instilling swim and survive skills into our K-6 students.

Grahame Statham - Primary Sports Coordinator

Secondary Sport

Netball NSW Schools Cup (Region Final)

The St Raphael’s Catholic School Stage 4 & 5 netball teams competed in the Regional Final of the Netball NSW Schools Cup at Orange PCYC on Thursday 4th September. Both teams had a fun day developing their skills and mixing with students from other schools across the region. A big thank you to our umpires Deenita Mitchell and Claire Phelan (Year 8).

NSWCCC Athletics Championships

Eight of our secondary students represented the Bathurst Diocese at the NSWCCC Athletics Championships at Sydney Olympic Park Athletics Centre (SOPAC) on Monday 15th September.

Laura Price was given the honour of being named as the Flag Bearer for the Bathurst Diocese in the Opening Ceremony. We had a big day of fine performances and PB’s and managed to bring in a big haul of medals. Laura Price (silver medal in Javelin and bronze medal in discus), Samuel Tydd (silver medal in triple jump and bronze medal in javelin) and Karly Woods (bronze medal in High Jump). Well done to all athletes on your performances. Hunter Robins-Sirol (Year 7), Thomas Phelan (Year 8), Joshua Morrison, Samuel Tydd (Year 9), Sophie Phelan, Laura Bennett (Year 10), Laura Price, Karly Woods (Year 12).

Donna Lane Squash Tournament 

Well done to the four Year 8 boys who represented St Raphael’s Catholic School in the Donna Lane Squash Tournament in Parkes on Friday 12th September. This is the second year that most of the boys have participated in this open age competition and are showing big improvement. We can’t wait to see how they perform next year! Congratulations Aiden Rayner, Aiden Gundersen, Angus Anning, Conner Moriarty.

Attendance, Wellbeing, Curriculum & Enrichment

SILVER LEVEL

Harvey Woods, Willow O’Connor, Bentley Atkins, Kaisey Atkins, Ryder Nelson-Collett, Ellie Hudson, Raoul Piloiu, Kymon Collett, Alexander Dunlop, Rohan Meyers, Levi Thompson, Mitchell Holmes, James Beath-Pearce, Henry Mitchell, Gus Osborne, Maddison Thomas, Rory Rue, Beau Tremble, Stewart Overman

St Raph's P&F

Canteen

Community Connections

Alpha at St Raphael’s – Explore Life, Faith, and Meaning
St Raphael’s Catholic Parish invites you to come along to Alpha. It begins with an introductory video on Thursday, 18 September at 6.00pm in the Catholic Hall – a welcoming and safe space for anyone curious about life, faith, and meaning.  Alpha is for people of all ages and backgrounds who want to explore life’s big questions in an open and relaxed environment. We’ll share a meal, watch a short video, and enjoy conversation where no question is too simple or too challenging. You don’t need to have been to church recently – or at all – to feel at home at Alpha. Whether you’re searching for purpose, wanting to connect with others, or simply curious about Christianity, Alpha is the perfect place to start the conversation. To register, contact the Parish Office on (02) 6342 1369.  Everyone is welcome – come and see!