Celebrating Catholic Education Week

St Joseph’s School, Gayndah recently celebrated Catholic Education Week. This annual event is held to promote the special ethos of Catholic schools and to highlight the great things that take place in Queensland Catholic schools every day.  St Joseph’s School, Gayndah is one of 290 Catholic schools in Queensland that educate 135,000 students and employ more than 16,000 teachers and staff. The theme for Catholic Education Week 2011 was:  Excelling in education - heart, mind and spirit.

Catholic schools aim to provide a high quality, faith-based education that is responsive to the needs of all learners and provides opportunities for them to reach their full potential - spiritually, intellectually, physically, culturally, socially and emotionally. By working to engage the ‘heart’, ‘mind’ and ‘spirit’, Catholic schools strive to lead students to develop deeper understandings of the world and their place in it, and, by encouraging them to live out the Gospel message of Jesus Christ, trust they can live fulfilling lives.

An anonymous author described excelling as: caring more than others think is wise, risking more than others think is safe; dreaming more than others think is practical; and expecting more than others think is possible. In Excelling in Education, Catholic schools endeavour to lead out and go beyond expectations. In Catholic Education Week the St. Joseph’s School community reflected on the rich involvement the school has had in the Gayndah community since 1919 including social justice mission and fortnightly visits to Gunther retirement village.

Each St. Joseph’s class showcased their learning in shop windows. On Thursday students and staff travelled to Childers to join St. Joseph’s Childers staff and students for a day of celebratory activities, liturgy, BBQ lunch and Mammino ice-creams! On Friday Fr. John Khoai lead a special mass for the St. Joseph’s community citing St Luke’s account of a parable which offers an insight into the task of educators in Catholic schools suggesting “they are the sower of seeds offering something which has the potential to become amazingly fruitful and full of abundant life”.

St. Joseph’s School, Gayndah, sowing seeds of excellence: heart, mind and spirit!