Principal's Comment

Kia Ora Kevinians and Supporters of the College,

I thought I would post this gorgeous picture of our junior Equestrian class which was taken by Kara Cox earlier this week. This class is taught by the lovely Ingela Anklew who also coaches our International students. It has been fabulous to have our International students return to the school and to see our arena start to get busy again as the term kicks off. Ingela and Jamie (who teaches our NCEA course) make incredible contributions to our College as do the team of people behind them who are happy to lend us horses for our teen riders and who encourage our riders to challenge themselves in this difficult sport.

Our sports teams have been doing exceptionally well in recent weeks, including our cricket players, rowers and all of our students who took part in our Athletics activities. Sport is a wonderful thing for teaching our young people skills in teamwork, resilience and goal setting as well as the obvious spin off it has for physical and mental health. As we gear up for winter sports trials, please encourage your young person to consider playing a sport.

Sadly, winter will soon be upon us and whilst this may seem like long range thinking I do need to indicate that winter illness, including Covid 19, as well as industrial action in the education sector may see us needing to rotate classes of students home. I am issuing this early warning so that whānau consider the importance of ensuring that their students are at school on the days when they can be. Consistent attendance now may help to mitigate any disruptions that might occur later in the year.

Have a great weekend

God Bless

Jo

Principal's Comment

 Kia Ora Kevinians and Supporters of the College,

As we move into the swing of the school year, things should be starting to come together in terms of our students adjusting to the new timetable and routines. Please encourage your young person to use the MUSAC app to help them stay ahead of what is happening. Important notices about events are posted on the MUSAC app 'notices' section. Notifications include things like sports sign ups, changes to the day or one off events like school photographs.

'Managing Self' is one of the Key Competencies in the New Zealand Curriculum and is an important part of growing up for our students. 'Managing self' skills include interpersonal skills such as working in a team or controlling your temper or day to day executive functioning skills such as checking time tables and being prepared with the correct tools. You can help your young person to achieve in this space by supporting them to use our SKC Diary, Google classrooms, email system and even just making good old fashioned lists of things to check before setting off out the gate.

 

A huge part of the success of young people moving through secondary school is having a good relationships with the teaching staff. On Tuesday night we had an excellent turn out of parents and caregivers at our 'Meet the teachers' event. I would like to thank all of you who attended. It was great to reconnect with some old faces and meet so many of our new SKC family.

Have a great weekend - Go The Highlanders!

God Bless Jo

Principal's Comment

Kia Ora Kevinians and Supporters of the College,

It has been wonderful having all of our students back this week, buzzing with news from their holidays and keen to reconnect with friends. Every year when our seniors come back, it is quite amazing how much they seem to grow and change over the holiday period. Looking up at some of the boys I swear were only at my shoulder last term helps to reinforce how quickly this precious time at secondary school goes. It is our real privilege as staff to witness the changes in our young people as they grow from nervous Year 9's into awesome, self possessed, courageous young leaders.

We celebrated that today as we held our Prefect Induction Mass. Despite the incredible heat and the sound of the very large fans we installed in the chapel, the Mass was very special. As part of the Mass, we ask that the prefects take an oath to support the students in our school, that the teachers take a similar oath and finally we ask that the school support our leaders, both staff and students. This concept of mutual respect, dependance and support is the cornerstone of a functioning community. This moment helps us to remember that not one of us can build this community by ourselves, we all bring our own unique contribution.

Head Students Shreysh and MacKenzie

We also celebrated the donation of a beautiful kahu rāki (decorated cloak) by Ms Sara Plunkett to the leadership (both students and teachers) of the school. Sara made this beautiful traditional taonga by harvesting and weaving all of the materials together, researching the patterns and studying local customs. Nola Tippa and David Higgins from Moeraki Rūnanga provided support to Sara on this journey and Nola took part in the celebration of its official welcome today. We thank Sara for this incredible gift.

Have a happy long weekend!

God Bless

Jo