Friday 5th December
Dear Parents and Guardians,
Today was a really lovely day in school with our enterprising Transition Year students’ Christmas Fair. Thank you to all the parents / Guardian who supported them and who visited school today to see the Fair. All our students passed through the doors of the Christmas Fair and there was lots of trading! The atmosphere is always lovely!!
The annual Christmas Doors Competition has taken place this week! We are looking forward to the judging taking place on Monday and announcing the winners on Tuesday. Well done to all the staff and students who worked together. The doors will be featured on our Instagram and as always, they are so creative and beautiful!
Next week, the Christmas celebrations continue! I have included as many details as possible below but if you have any queries, please reach out and get in touch with us!
Enjoy your evening, especially those who will be sitting down to watch the Toy Show – I know we had plenty of excited students in school today ahead of it! Best wishes, to you all for a lovely weekend,
Sarah Green
Principal
Christmas Celebration Week Arrangements – 8th – 12th December
There will be end of term Assemblies next week held by Year Heads for the presentation of positive behaviour certificates and end of term rewards.
📅 9th December – 1st Year Christmas Celebration – see notes below.
📅 10th December – Ice Skating Trip for 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th year and some 5th Year.
📅 11th December – Carol Service in Assumption Church at 12 noon. – All Welcome
📅 12th December – Christmas Exams Commence for 5th Years in PE Hall
📅Week 15th – 19th December – Christmas Exams in St Seton’s / Block Classes
Minding Their Mental Health at Christmas! – Support from Jigsaw / NEART.
Sometimes young people withdraw from their families when their mental health is suffering. We know Christmas can be a particularly challenging time for young people where they might feel isolated.
We want to make sure parents know what to look out for and how to support their children. Please click on the link below to sign up for a short email course from Jigsaw therapists and help parents/guardians be there for young people who need support with their mental health.
https://jigsaw.ie/supporting-your-child
1st Year Christmas Celebration – Tuesday 9th December – 1.45 – 3pm.
All 1st years will participate in the Christmas Celebration on Tuesday afternoon. Their families are invited to attend this Celebration too. Please see the invitation attached which has already been sent home.
Students can return home with their families once the event is finished. This will be a lovely event to celebrate how far our 1st Years have come since they started with us in late August.
Ice Skating – Wednesday, 10th December
The Ice Skating Trip to Dun Laoghaire will take place on Wednesday. All the places for the Trip have been allocated by those who booked by the deadline. Any student who is on a report card is not allowed to attend a school trip. Please note the following.
- All 1st Year students are going together on the 1st bus which leaves at 8.45am from the Junior Students. The 1st Year students return to school at 12.15pm and can go home once they are back.
- The 2nd, 3rd, TY and 5th year students will leave on the 2nd bus which leaves the Junior Campus at 9.45am. These students will return to school by 1.15pm and can return home once they are back.
- There will be no classes for 1st, 2nd or 4th Years.
- There is provision of Study for 3rd years not attending the trip and all 3rd years should attend school from 8.45am – 12.55.
- There is Classes as normal for all 5th and 6th years (LCA and LCE). We expect all 5th & 6th year students to attend school as normal.
Carol Service – Thursday, 11th December at 12pm in Assumption Parish
The Carol service will take place on Thursday at 12 o’clock in the Assumption Parish. The students will leave the junior and senior campuses from 11.45am and walk to the church under the supervision of teachers and SNAs. Students will be permitted to return home once the carol service has finished. Any parents / Guardians and family members are welcome to join us in this annual event which is always a lovely mix of students participation and music. We are looking forward to some beautiful festive performances from our Choir and school bands.
Vlogmas!
A special thanks to Ms Wyatt and all her Christmas helpers featuring in the Christmas videos on Instagram for 20days of Vlogmas! The School’s instagram is a really positive representation of our school so thank you to everyone who looks at the lighter side of school life in St Seton’s and has some fun with the videos! There is serious festive cheer to be seen at the moment!
Christmas Exams 2025
The Christmas Assessments are often a time of anxiety for students. Please remind your child that assessments in school are a normal part of life. Our brains can’t adapt to manage and deal with stress if we don’t experience any. Please encourage your child to be courageous with the Christmas Assessments and give them their best shot. If anyone is really expressing that they are experiencing great difficulty at home, please let us know. We can work together to support young people who are struggling.
- The exams begin on Friday, 12th December for 5th Year Leaving Certificate Established Students. All other students 1st, 2nd, TY and 5th LCA begin on Monday, 15th December.
- Block Class for 3rd and 6th Years will take place from Monday 15th December.
- The timetables for the exams and block classes can be accessed in this folder: Student Timetables for Christmas Assessments 2025 / Block Classes
- Please note the date for the completion of the Christmas Reports for 1st, 2nd, TY and 5th Years is 12th December. The exams will go live on Compass on 13th December.
An Tus Nua Group
I am including this information again as I didn’t get any interest shown last week. It would be important that there is representation from the Parents / Guardians on this new group being established. The first meeting will be in January.
As a school community, we are disappointed at the lack of timely progress being made in relation to the new school building for St Seton’s. We are establishing a new group, the Tús Nua group, to provide a coordinated, strategic, and united voice on behalf of the entire school community to advocate for the timely delivery of the school’s promised new building.
The group will ensure that communication with the Department of Education, public representatives, local agencies, and wider community stakeholders is well-organised, truthful, respectful, and aligned with the school’s mission and values.
I encourage all parents / guardians to read the terms of reference of this new group. The Terms of Reference of this new group can be viewed here. I will consult with the Family Association about representation of Parents / Guardians on this group. If you would like to get involved, please contact me directly – sgreen@stsetons.ie / 086 040 4411.
Anseo
As you may be aware, this year, St Seton’s was successful in taking on the new ‘Anseo’ programme to improve attendance in students. I want to express gratitude to Ms Sweeney for her leadership of the Attendance Monitoring and Tracking in St Seton’s. This week we introduced Anseo Clinic meetings. These are attendance meetings that Year Heads will lead with students who are identified as at-risk of having the quality of their learning impacted by their attendance. It is hoped these meetings will be another tool to try and improve our rates of attendance. Thank you to Ms Wyatt who, along with some super students, has coordinated a collection of Anseo videos to run alongside the Attendance Challenge campaign that wraps up on Tuesday. Our next Attendance Challenge will commence in January. Please keep Attendance at the forefront of your mind as parents / guardians and support your child to attend ‘Every Class, Every Day’!
St Seton’s ‘Suaimhneas’ Space for Parents / Guardians
St. Seton’s ‘Suaimhneas’ Space is now open to parents and guardians in the Library on the Junior Campus. Our HSCL teachers, Loretta and Noel, can’t wait to welcome you!
📅 Thursdays 14:00-16:00pm
📅 Fridays 10:00 – 12:00pm
Celebrating School Community Success
- Well done to our TY School Bank Team who finished training this week with Bank Of Ireland and our ready to launch our School Bank in January.
- Jack Lacey and Bronagh Redmond in TY both completed an AI product Management Worked Experience with Microsoft Ireland. What a wonderful opportunity for these deserving students.
- Science Club began this week on the JC! All students are welcome in attending and entering a project into SciFest!
- Congratulations to the Senior Music Students for their musical performance in TUD. They sounded fantastic and it was reported back that they were a credit to the school!
- Well done to all the sports teams who played this week! Our U15 boys soccer had a great win in extra time in a high scoring match where they finished victorious, 6-5. Hard luck to our U17 Boys Soccer team who had a tight 3-2 loss against St Killian’s CC under tough pitch conditions.
- Our Green Schools Team were working hard doing a major clean up on the Yard. We have some new plans for our Yard Space on the Junior Campus which we hope to unwrap in January but for now, our thanks to the students who keep the big open space tidy by picking up litter!
- A group of TY Students went to TUD this week for the first session of the TY STEM Passport. They learned coding using Microbit computers!
- Thanks to Nostra, Park West, for another really impactful Nostra Next Mentoring Session for our 5th year students. There was a great atmosphere in the canteen with conversation flying between our students and their individual mentors! Thanks to Ms Keeler for organising this programme.
- As the Extracurricular events slow down over the Christmas period, a big thank you to all the staff who give so generously of their time. A lot of school success happens in the time outside of the classroom so this Christmas, ask your son / daughter to say a special thank you to the teachers who go the extra mile to meet the needs of the fantastic students in our school.
Friday Reflection – Second Sunday of Advent: A Season of Peace
As we reach the Second Sunday of Advent, we are invited to slow down and welcome peace into our homes and hearts. In simple moments of kindness and understanding, peace takes root. We are reminded that, “The peace of God… will guard your hearts” (Philippians 4:7).
