Message from the Director of Schools

Dear Colleagues,

Welcome to the 2025 school year. 

As we begin the year, we acknowledge the significant challenges facing our world, from cost-of-living pressures to global conflicts, racial and religious intolerance, and the impact of natural disasters. These challenges impact our communities, our classrooms, and the lives of our students and families, making our role as Catholic educators even more essential. 

As a community of Catholic schools, we are called to respond to these challenges with faith, wisdom, and hope. In this Jubilee Year, “Pilgrims of Hope”, Pope Francis reminds us that “hope does not disappoint”. He urges us to look for signs of hope in the world around us and to work for peace and justice. As bearers of Christ’s love, this has always been our calling and let us keep this focus central to who we are and the work we accomplish together. We offer a vision that nurtures faith, fosters learning, and empowers students to thrive in communities where they are known, valued, and loved both as person and learner. 

Continuing our shared pilgrimage

As we begin another year, we continue our improvement journey—our shared pilgrimage—to fulfil the aspirations outlined in Lighting The Way. By pursuing our five focus areas, we will ensure our schools are places where students can explore complex questions, develop critical thinking, and grow in faith, preparing them to apply a Catholic worldview as agents of positive change in the world. Our strategic priorities require persistent and conscientious effort and relentless determination, because the problems they represent are likely to have resisted previous efforts to solve them.   

Each of you, through your school’s Annual Improvement Plan (AIP), will play a crucial role in bringing Lighting The Way to life in your local context. AIPs are more than just a process or a box to be ticked. A clear AIP provides the focus we need to ensure we are pulling in the same direction and our collective efforts have the greatest possible impact. If you are not familiar with your school’s AIP, I encourage you to reach out to your principal or a member of the school leadership team.

Catholic Education Office 2025 Objectives

Our Connected Autonomy strategy acknowledges that the best way to realise our mission is for schools to lead the improvement process, because it is ultimately in the day-to-day—often unseen—actions of teachers, support staff, principals, and school leaders that our mission rises or falls. 

The Catholic Education Office (CEO) has a crucial responsibility in this, to do all we can to provide the time, resources, and support you need. In our 2025 CEO Objectives, we have outlined three major priorities that will further this aim: (1) Using data more effectively, (2) Embedding connected autonomy, and (3) Driving growth and sustainability. 

While schools continue to drive improvement through School Strategic Improvement Plans (SSIPs) and AIPs, the CEO's strategic objectives are our way of contributing to the aim and ambitions of Lighting The Way. I invite you to take a moment to explore the objectives, and the supporting initiatives, in more detail here.

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