Official page for the Catherine McAuley College Bendigo community to share news and celebrate the activities and achievements of our students and staff. Students in Years 7 – 9 study at our Coolock campus in Junortoun, and our Years 10 - 12 students at St Mary's in central Bendigo. Our learning community strives to provide each young person with the best educational opportunities to experience personal success. As a fully-sponsored Mercy College, we seek to live out the Mercy Education values of Compassion, Justice, Respect, Hospitality, Service and Courage. HISTORY OF CATHOLIC SECONDARY EDUCATION IN BENDIGO
Catholic Secondary Education in Bendigo began with the arrival of the Sisters of Mercy in 1876. High school education for boys and girls was offered by the Sisters at St Aloysius’ Select School and in 1897 the school was renamed St Mary's College after undergoing a major expansion. In 1893 the Marist Brothers arrived to provide education for boys. In the years that followed Religious and Lay teachers at St Mary’s College and Marist Brothers’ College continued to offer a Catholic education to many young people from Bendigo and its environs. In 1954 the Vincentian Fathers opened St Vincent's College as a boarding school for boys at Junortoun. In 1972 St Vincent's opened to day boys, due to declining boarding numbers. By 1977 further decline in numbers led the Vincentian Fathers to decide to leave Bendigo and concentrate on other ministries. The College was closed, and the site became an extension of Marist Brothers’ College. On September 23, 1982, it was announced by Bishop Daly, the Provincial Superior of the Marist Brothers and the Congregational Superior of the Sisters of Mercy that the existing Colleges in Bendigo, Marist Brothers’ College and St Mary’s College, would amalgamate from January 1, 1983, and would be known as Catholic College Bendigo. They anticipated that the transition to total amalgamation would be gradual and the merging of the administrative, educational and financial operations of the Colleges would be expected to take several years. In March 1985, the Governors decided that the College would move toward the development of a College on two locations by 1988 and that all classes would be co-educational in 1986.
1988 saw the implementation of this decision, as the year commenced with students at Years 7,8,9 at Junortoun (later known as La Valla and now Coolock), and students at Years 10,11,12 at Barkly Street (later known as Coolock and now St Mary's). On Thursday 1 November 2012, it was announced that from 1 January 2013 Catholic College Bendigo would be solely governed by the Sisters of Mercy. With the Marist Brothers focusing on the new Marist College Bendigo in Maiden Gully, Bishop Leslie Tomlinson agreed to hand Governance of Catholic College Bendigo to the Institute of the Sisters of Mercy of Australia and Papua New Guinea. Accordingly, since 1 January 2013, Catholic College Bendigo has rested under the sole governance of the Sisters of Mercy of Australia and Papua New Guinea, a Ministry of Mercy Education Limited - ABN 69 154 531 870. Since the commencement of the 2018 school year, the College has been called Catherine McAuley College. PRINCIPALS OF CATHOLIC COLLEGE BENDIGO/CATHERINE McAULEY COLLEGE
Sister Mary Duffy (1983 – 1989)
Brother Paul Kane (1998 – 2003)
Sister Sylvia Williams (1990 – 1997)
Mr Darren McGregor (2004 - 2013)
Mr Michael Chalkley (2014 - 2014)
Mr Brian Turner (2014 - current)
