Outreach Activities

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Schools are a place of connection and relationship. As a Marist Catholic school, we encourage connection with a wide range of social justice services. It is about awareness of the issues and the authentic and rich experience.
Some students choose to help with the St Vincent De Paul group or with Project Compassion. Other students choose to physically help volunteer in our Outreach services with gardening or home maintenance. We have Immersions and Awareness Programs to some of the most disadvantaged areas of Australia. Recently, our College has sent staff overseas to begin a new connection with our Marist sister school in Gyasnogor, Bangladesh.

Outreach programs are not meant to be easy or a holiday. They are meant to challenge and to inspire hearts and minds. This is why our students are empowered to be a voice for what is right and just in our society.

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Our College has three main programs or immersions held through each year. Students are encouraged to apply for the immersion in order to:

• Deepen an awareness and understanding of the Marist Charism

• Enable participants to achieve greater spiritual insight and personal development that will assist them in the future

• Foster an enhanced sense of Marist identity as “Marist Family”

• Greater understanding of the various Marist organisations which “Make Jesus Christ Known and Loved”

• To represent the student body of Red Bend Catholic College

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Santa Teresa Immersion Experience (Established 2010)

The Immersion experience involves visiting the Marist Community at Santa Teresa. Santa Teresa is an indigenous community of about 400 people, 80km from Alice Springs. The Marist Brothers run a school within this community. Whilst on immersion the RBCC staff and Yr 11 students gain deepen an awareness and understanding of economic, spiritual and cultural aspiration of people who live simply and enter into a partnership with them, to work for Justice and Sustainability. Students experience the realities of life for members of the Santa Teresa Indigenous Community for a period of 8 days

 

Marist Awareness Program  (Established 2017)

The Sydney Marist Awareness Program began in 2017. The program allows a group of Year 11 students in their school holidays to visit services provided by Marists in the Western Sydney region. These services include Marist Schools, Marist Youth Ministry, LaValla200, Marist Learning Zone and Marist 180.

Such programs at our College are an integral aspect of our Solidarity program. This program enables Marist staff and students to practice St. Marcellin Champagnat’s pedagogy, “to be with the young, to love them, to teach them the basics, to lead them to Jesus, to form them to be good Christians and to form them to be good citizens.”

Bangladesh Immersion (Established 2018)

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Our College has a proud connection to St Marcellin School, Giasnogor, Moulouvibazar (Bangladesh).

Background of the School:

The school provides free education to the children of the tea garden workers. The Marist Brothers hope that this will help the children to break the cycle of poverty and rise above the bonded life that they were
born into. The school employs members of the local community who are of different religious backgrounds. St Marcellin staff are paid above the minimum wage allowing them to improve their quality of life.

Immersion Purpose:

Students from Year 10 and 11 will be immersing themselves in the culture and Marist Charism of St Marcellin School. The aims of the immersion are to deepen students awareness and understanding of the Marist Charism in a developing country, enable them to achieve greater spiritual insight and personal development, foster an enhanced sense of Marist identity as ‘Marist Family’ and allow them the opportunity to represent the student body of Red Bend Catholic College.

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