Tag Archive for: TY

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Transition Year Sleep Out

Transition Year pupils will be taking part in the College’s first ‘Sleep Out’ in aid of the Peter McVerry Trust which works with the homeless population of Ireland. The Sleep Out will take place on the night of Thursday October 21st, 2021. We are appealing for generous donations to the Peter McVeery Trust, with all donations going directly to the charity. If you wish to donate please visit our iDonate page here.

Peter McVerry Trust is a national housing and homeless charity committed to reducing homelessness and the harm caused by substance misuse and social disadvantage.

The charity provides low-threshold entry services, primarily to younger people and vulnerable adults with complex needs, and offers pathways out of homelessness based on the principles of the Housing First model.

We look forward to reporting back on a successful event and fund-raising drive. Stay tuned to the College’s Twitter and Facebook pages.

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Transition Year News

Transition Year is like no other year in the Irish education system and even a global pandemic couldn’t stop it from delivering. How Ms Kilfeather and her team of minions managed to provide the vast array of meaningful activities for this Transition Year (TY) group, in these extraordinary circumstances, we are not quite sure. Impressively though, the pupils reacted accordingly and engaged fully right throughout the year, be in online or in person.

In this final term, our TY pupils continued their fine efforts in class but remained busy outside the class too. They kicked off the term by attending TYTalks21, a brilliant online conference organised by IBEC featuring talks on future careers, entrepreneurship, inclusion, diversity and much more. They also took two full days away from the classroom, participating in ‘Activities Days’. The first day saw them play hurling, bake brownies and cupcakes, experiment with tie-dye t-shirts, learn to knit and play petong and croquet. The final activities day wrapped up their year. There were speeches, awards, an ice-cream van, a drone video and games (even some “accidental” acrobatics from the staff).

The ‘Spirit of Transition Year’ Award aims to recognise the pupil who truly embraced the opportunities presented during TY and this year Marco Trolese received the trophy with Elys Walker a close second. Marco was due to spend his Transition Year in a school in South Africa but, due to the pandemic, his plans changed and he remained in Ireland. He dived head-first into everything; he leaned to cook, coached club hockey, trained as a lifeguard, lead the F1 in Schools team and earned his Silver Gaisce Award along the way. Congratulations to Marco!

Speaking of Gaisce Awards, congratulations to the fourteen TY pupils who received their medals from the President. Full details  about the Gaisce Awards here.

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Gaisce Awards 2021

Gaisce (meaning “great achievement”), The President’s Award, is a self-development programme for young people aged 15 to 25. There are three categories: Gold (for people aged above 17 years), Silver (16 years) and Bronze (15 years). To achieve a President’s Award, you set a demanding challenge for yourself in four different areas of activity:

  • Community involvement – for example, helping older people or learning first aid or lifesaving skills
  • Personal skill – for example, learning a musical instrument, computer skills or driving
  • Physical recreation – for example, swimming, football or tennis
  • Adventure journey – for example, a cycling, canoeing or hiking group trip

Congratulations to the following pupils who completed the programme during their Transition Year, both in the College and during lockdown, and will later receive their medal in a presentation box, a certificate signed by the President and a lapel pin. Well done to all! Hopefully some will decide to continue with the programme and achieve their gold medal in the coming years. Many thanks to Ms Lynch who coordinates the Gaisce Awards in the College.

Bronze Awards:

Hugh Bevan, Matilda Pringle, Nina O’Flynn and Elys Walker

Silver Awards:

Liam Campbell, Johanne Raitz, Nikolai Foster, Marco Trolese, Caleb Owen, Ellen Bevan, Elena O’Dowd, Kate Higgins, Isabel Warnock and Emily McCarthy.

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F1 in Schools Finals

We wish the best of luck to our F1 in Schools Team (Marco Trolese, Caleb Owen, Monty Walsh, Carl Krenski, and Florian Zitzmann) who take part in the Virtual National Finals this weekend. The competition is broadcasting on the F1 in school YouTube channel from 7PM on Thursday the 20th of May, Friday 21st of May, and Saturday the 22nd of May.

The team put in a great performance on Thursday evening at the time trials and you can watch their race in the video below.

On Saturday the 22nd of May, the winners of the following awards will be announced:

Best Engineered Car,

Fastest Car,

Best Social Media,

Best Newcomer,

Best Enterprise & Pit Display,

Innovation Award,

Women in Motorsport,

Best Team Identity,

Best Verbal Presentation and

Best Communicators.

On Sunday the 23rd of May, the televised National Finals will be broadcast on TG4 at 8:30PM where they will be announcing the National Champions 2021.

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Earth Day Photo Challenge

On Thursday 22nd April, pupils and staff shared photographs of what they were doing to celebrate Earth Day. Sharing photographs is a nice way to connect and check in with one another, especially during periods of distance learning. We celebrate Earth Day to continue promoting environmental awareness and to remind us that we can protect the earth in our everyday lives. “At the heart of Earth Day 2021 is optimism, a critically needed sentiment in a world ravaged by both climate change and the pandemic,” said Kathleen Rogers, president of EarthDay.org. We received wonderful entries from both pupils and staff including; small positive changes people made for Earth Day such as cycling, gardening, finding alternatives to single use plastics, and photographs capturing the beautiful landscapes, plants and animals of our Planet Earth. Thank you to all who entered. Entries can be seen in this album:

Earth Day 2021
Earth Day 2021
31 photos
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Bebras Computing Challenge

Bebras is an international initiative aiming to promote informatics and computational thinking among school students at all ages. It is run in over 50 countries and takes place every November. The aim is to get students all over the world to get excited about computing. The challenge introduces computational thinking to students where they are required to solve interactive tasks. These tasks can be answered without prior knowledge about computational thinking.

Forty two pupils from Forms II, III & IV entered the Bebras Computing Challenge in November 2020 in their respective age categories. Of there, nine pupils, listed below, have succeeded in gaining entry to the Bebras National Final based on their score from November. This is a fantastic achievement considering there was close to 6000 pupils who entered the competition in these two age categories. The finals will take place on Tuesday 20th April 2021 as part of Tech Week 2021. The pupils who made the final are:

Cadet Category (12-14)
Alexander Fought
Sean Lang
Manuel Montez Perez
Elliot Warnock Cadet

Junior Category (14-16)
Alison Coogan
Leonid Mylvaganam
Elena O’Down
Tyrone Shi
Ella Taylor

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Seachtain na Gaeilge

Táimid ag ceiliúradh Seachtain na Gaeilge ar aon leis an tír go léir. Ar ndóigh, caithfear na gníomhaíochtaí go léir a bheith déanta go fíorúil. Tá súil againn go nglacfaidh gach duine páirt – ní gá Gaeilge a bheith agat!

We are celebrating Seachtain na Gaeilge (“Irish week”, it actually lasts for two weeks!) along with the rest of the country. Obviously, all activities will have to be carried out virtually. We hope that everyone will take part –  you don’t need to know Irish!

  • Comórtas póstaeir: tarraing póstaer a leiríonn seanfhocal /
  • Toraíocht Taisce: faigh na rudaí ar an liosta agus déan colláis astu / Treasure Hunt: find the things on the list and make a collage from them.
  • Dialann Sheachtain na Gaeilge: tabhair faoi deara na focail agus nathanna nua a fheiceann tú, a fhoghlaimíonn tú, a chloiseann tú, a deir tú, a deir daoine eile, a sheolann tú / Seachtain na Gaeilge Diary: note down the new words you see, you learn, you hear, you say, others say, you send.
  • Focal an lae (15 Márta ar aghaidh): focail Gaeilge a choistear sa Bhéarla in Éirinn / Word of the Day (15 March onwards): Irish words that are heard in English in Ireland
  • Tráth na gCeist (sna ranganna Gaeilge idir an 1 agus an 17 Márta) / Table Quizzes (in Irish classes between the 1st and 17th March)
  • SCC Gaeilge ar Instagram: leathanach nua atá bunaithe againn chun an Ghaeilge a chur chun cinn mar theanga bheo, spraíúil, thaitneamhach, nua-aimseartha. Lean muid! Beimid ag lorg ealaíontóirí a bheadh sásta pictiúr próifíle a dhearadh dúinn le linn Sheachtain na Gaeilge. / SCC Gaeilge on Instagram: a new page we have set up to promote Irish as a language that is alive, fun, enjoyable and modern. Give us a follow! We will be looking for artists to design our profile picture during Seachtain na Gaeilge.
  • Among Us as Gaeilge: Beidh daltaí na tríú bliana ag cur liosta foclóra le chéile ionas go mbeidh sibh ábalta ‘Among Us’ a imirt trí mheán na Gaeilge / Among Us in Irish: Third Year pupils will be putting a list of vocabulary together so that you will be able to play ‘Among Us’ through Irish.

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Christmas Shoebox Appeal 2020

The College has a long tradition of working with the wonder Team Hope Christmas Shoe Box Appeal. Each year our pupils, mainly from Transition Year, and staff contribute hundreds of Christmas wrapped shoeboxes full of small but significant gifts for the poorest children around the world. The current pandemic has prevented our community from contributing in the normal way and indeed Team Hope are not accepted physical gift boxes this year; instead, they’ve moved online. Our pupils have been raising funds, through their various mini-companies, to donate to this wonderful charity and to build virtual boxes but, understandably, things have proven much more difficult this year.

We are asking all Columban families (and perhaps Old Columbans too), once they’re reunited back home this weekend, to consider building their own virtual box on the Team Hope website. For every €20 received, Team Hope can send a custom filled and personalised gift box to a needy child. Each box contains items from the 4 W’s – Wash, Write, Wear and Wow – a balance between essential items and some Christmas magic.

To build a box or donate to Team Hope’s Christmas Shoe Box Appeal please click here.

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Transition Year at Killruddery Estate ‘Alive Outside’

Our Transition Year pupils travelled to nearby Killruddery House & Estate on Wednesday for another scheduled ‘activities day’. The staff at Kilruddery provided them with an amazing programme of team building & leadership activities, physical and mental challenges, and much more, all safely managed under the current guidelines. Transition Year pupils Kamilla Murphy & Monty Walsh write these short reports on the day and below are some photos from the day.

After completing our exams, we were all delighted to have the opportunity to visit the Killruddery Estate in nearby Bray where we participated in various activities. We had the chance to take part in archery lessons, which many of us attempted for the first time, learn outdoor survival skills, including shelter building and fire lighting, as well as learn car essential skills, such as changing a tyre or using jump leads. On top of learning these useful life skills and attempting various new things, we had team-building exercises like solving riddles and codes or trying challenges as seen on the popular TV show “Ireland’s Fittest Family.” These activities challenged us in many ways but were undoubtedly a lot of fun and a great opportunity to bond with classmates. On behalf of my year, I would like to thank the wonderful staff at the estate as well as our teachers for organising such an event. I think I can safely say that everyone had a good time, became closer with their fellow classmates, and left with plenty of memories to look back on fondly. Kamilla Murphy

 

Recently, The SCC Transition Year group headed out to Killruddery Estate to visit the Alive Outside grounds in which we spent the day doing a number of activities which comprised of exciting things such as team building, bushcraft, archery, car maintenance and obstacles courses which some of which featured in the ‘Ireland’s fittest family’ TV series. Our day started by leaving the college on a chilly winter morning, not sure of what the day would hold, but excited nonetheless. After a short drive, we got into groups and began our day. My group was set straight to work on the obstacle course race. We split into two groups and did numerous challenging events. The highlight being the finale, in which we had to throw multiple water drums over two sets of hay bails, twice, and then build a tower once we had finished. This was a time trial and was a cause of great competition in our group. Secondly, we took part in a Car maintenance class which was although very educational, was still a lot of fun. We learnt how to change a car wheel in the event of a puncture or wheel failure. We also learnt how to make sure our engine oil was in good shape, and to conclude we learnt how to jumpstart a car. The final activity of the morning was archery. This brought out the competitive side in all of us and definitely was one of the highlights of the day. After lunch, we finished with team building and bushcraft, the team building was a real mental test which was a change from the physical effort of the obstacle course. The bushcraft was a really nice way to end the day as we built a shelter and learnt how to make fire from scratch. All in all, the day was a really nice break from the stress and worries you have in normal school life and I think that as a year group we would like to give massive thanks to the Columba’s and Alive outside staff that were involved, as it was an amazing experience despite the living with a global pandemic around us. Monty Walsh

Kilruddery House TY Day
Kilruddery House TY Day
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Science Week 2020 Round-Up

We would like to thank all pupils and teachers for embracing Science Week Nov 8th – 14th. We managed to incorporate an extensive variety of activities with plenty of fun and competitiveness.

Paper Airplane Challenge
Hugo Laurenceau won both Junior competitions with a distance of 23.45m and longest time in the air of 6.34 seconds. While Bruno Marti won the senior competition.

Junior Science Class Rocket Building Winners
A number of classes participate in the Film Canister rocket challenge, despite the weather we had numerous successful launches (and unsuccessful!). Notable rocketeers include Ivan Zhu and Harry Powell (2C), Elliot Warnock, Keelin Bradley-Brady and George Priestley (2B), Aeladh Bradley-Brady, Bella Fennell and Iona McCausland (2A), Sam Hayes, David Chukwueke, Ryan Ovenden (1A) and Matthew Houlihan and Oscar Liu (1B)

Poster Competition –‘Choose your Future’
Our poster competition entailed designing a poster to highlight this year theme – Choose your Future our Form 1 winner was Polly Pringle and the Form 2 winner was Hedley Butler

Junior Movie Night
Our Junior Movie night theme ‘Wear it – Eat it – Use It’ consisted of three short movies which the pupils watched during prep. The main objective to focus on sustainability. The best reflection was submitted by Sarah Cron, which can be read below. Our TY Pupils also got the opportunity to watch the latest David Attenborough Documentary – A life on our planet.

Senior Movie Night
On Friday night the senior pupils had the opportunity to watch the controversial documentary – Virunga. The story follows a small and embattled team of park rangers – including an ex-child soldier turned ranger, a caretaker of orphan gorillas and a dedicated conservationist – protecting this UNESCO world heritage site from armed militia, poachers and the dark forces struggling to control Congo’s rich natural resources. A very thought-provoking watch and definitely worth adding to your Netflix list! A huge thanks to those pupils who attended the event.

Science Riddle of the Day Winners

Monday: Kate Higgins, Avi Johnston, Jamie Casey
Tuesday: Joshua Chan, Calvin She, Rory O’Dowd
Wednesday: Solomon Babajide, Nikolai Foster, Alannah McKee
Thursday: Ciara Finn, Amaya Street, Carlotta Castagna
Friday: Keelin Bradley-Brady, Caleb Owen, George King
Saturday: Jemima Bunbury, Sinead Cleary, Yilong She
Teacher Winners Ms Kilfeather and Mr Canning

A shout out to some pupils who entered every day: Avi Johnston, Solomon Babajide, Nikolai Foster, Kate Higgins, Pascha Shvalov, Ciara Finn, Carlotta Castagna. A special mention to Mr McDonald and Ms McEeaneny for entering all riddles!

Science Kahoot Challenge
No science week would be complete without a Kahoot, we had a huge amount of entries with Amber Cotton winning the Junior Prize, Pavlov Shvalov winning the Senior Prize. A big shout out to Mrs Owen for winning the teachers’ Kahoot!!

Many thanks to our wonderful Science Department for organising the week’s event especially Ms Hennessy and Dr Rice.

Some Science Week Prize Winners!

Sarah Cron – A Reflection on Wear it –Eat it – Use it

On Wednesday 11th November as part of Science week we watched three short movies – the theme – Wear it –Eat it – Use it – looking at sustainability through the life cycle of tee-shirts, chocolate and plastic bottle.

Wear it – I had no idea how much water was required to produce one tee shirt and I also didn’t realise the impact the chemicals used have on rivers that affect ocean wildlife. The process of making a tee shirt is much longer than you’d think it is. It was also interesting to find out that the fashion industry has a serious effect on the environment as its generated a lot of greenhouse gases during its production and transportation of the millions of tee-shirts purchased each year. I also learned that cheap synthetic fibres emit gases like N2O, which is 300 times more damaging than CO2, is crazy to think about.

Eat it – This movie looked at the cocoa industry, from the cocoa plantations in Africa to the shelves in our shops. It’s unfortunate and unfair that the workers for the cocoa plants are under paid and don’t earn enough for basic needs. If chocolate is worth 4 billion pounds per year how is it fair for the cocoa farmers to live off £0.80 a day! Fairtrade is a great organisation, in my opinion, they are helping local farmers and their communities, helping to provide better farming technology, clean water and schools to advance their children’s education. In these cocoa-producing countries, women often have less access to land than men do so for a company being able to make a difference and give women their own independent income makes a huge difference. Buying Fairtrade products can really help people’s lives in the long term.

Use it – Our third movie looked at the life cycle of a plastic bottle. I never knew that it could take a water bottle 1000 years to decompose and I think it’s very sad that plastic pollution is having on a huge range of habitats around the globe. These three videos were all very interesting and definitely made me think.

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Transition Year Activities Day

Our Transition Year pupils took a day off class on Saturday last and instead engaged in a series of new activities to engage their creativity and challenge them physically. There was a wide range of activities on offer including yoga sessions, arts & crafts (including Christmas decoration making and book covering), Gaelic games (some promising “wristy” hurlers), baking and more. All activities took place in a socially distanced environment and we are grateful to members of the Parents’ Association for their help in facilitating some of the activities.

An album of photos from the Transition Year 2020 is below, including some new photos of the weekend’s events.

Transition Year 2020
Transition Year 2020
66 photos
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Transition Year Update

The current COVID-19 restrictions have meant the Transition Year Co-ordinator and her team have had to be more imaginative in their organisation of the year’s various activities. The Transition Year at St. Columba still places a strong focus on academic work but, like many other schools, there is a greater focus on community outreach, physical exertion, building a service culture, team building and extra-curricular activities. Catering for these activities is a challenge in the current climate, but not impossible.

We were delighted that our annual TY team building event at Causey Farm was still able to go ahead, with the Causey Farm team putting strong procedures in place to protect our pupils and staff. Elys Walker wrote a detail report on this last week which can be read here. Another great team building activity was the drone video where the Transition Year pupil paid tribute to the work of health workers across Ireland and Europe. It’s been viewed over 18,000 times on our Facebook page – click here to see it.

Another whole year event was a recent hike to Fairy Castle, the peak of the nearby mountain complex. Kate Higgins writes this report:

We left at 8:30 that morning and the mist was so heavy that it was difficult to see. We were lead by Mr. O’Shaughnessy, Miss.Lynch and Mme. DeFréin and left the College through the front gate. We turned left up Kilmashogue lane and walked up the surprisingly steep hill towards Ticknock. We were then on a forest trail and the trees looked eerie in the morning light with the heavy mist. It wasn’t too cold or windy when we were walking in the forest but once we got out into  the open to walk towards Fairy Castle it was freezing. The wind was  strong and the mist was still too thick to see very far. We came back down on a slightly different route over a path of rocks. Once we got back into the forestry we were sheltered from the wind again. We then made our way back to the college after a very fun and enjoyable walk on the mountain right at our doorstep. Many thanks to those who organised it and joined us. 

We were delighted to once again welcome John Lonergan, the former Governor of Mountjoy Prison, to speak with the Transition Year pupils recently about drugs, crime and his time in the prison. The pupils enjoyed John’s gentle tone in what was a wide-ranging talk. We thank him for his time.

Nikolai Foster reports on the recent series of litter clean-ups undertaken by the Transition Year pupils, who are taking part in the Gaisce challenge series.
“As part of the community involvement for Gaisce, we went litter picking. We went down the back entrance and into Marlay Park. We litter-picked along the paths as well as in the bushes, where a lot of stuff is dumped. We continued out of Marlay and went along the road, finding crisp packets and beer cans along the way.”
We are grateful to the Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown County Council for donating litter picking equipment to the TY.

Academic work continues but there is greater freedom to explore aspects of tradition subjects. Verlaine Bolger reports on an interesting activity in her Spanish lessons recently.

“Today in TY Spanish class we made “chocolate con churros”. We decided to research Spanish recipes and make this popular Spanish dessert. We split up into three groups, as we had to socially distance. One group started by melting the chocolate in the simmering cream, the second group weighed the flour, butter and mixed this with water and an egg, while the third group were taking care of heating the pans and adding the oil etc…. We ended up with the dough and then piped it into the hot oil. It quickly took shape and the final result, deliciously freshly made sugary churros!! We dipped the churros into melted chocolate and everyone really liked them. The churros were a great success, everyone participated and had a great time! This was my first time making churros and I was very proud of my efforts“.

There have also been opportunities to try new subjects this year, including our new formal lessons in Mandarin.

In summary, it’s already been a busy time for the Transition Year pupils and we have been delighted with their efforts to engage with the various activities, despite the challenging environment. Well done!

Below is a photo album of all Transition Year events which will be updated as the year progresses.

Transition Year 2020
Transition Year 2020
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TY Art Project – Virtual Wall of Tools

The Form IV Art set had a busy Trinity term. Alice Letort explains the work they undertook over the past 6 weeks. 

The Form IV distance learning project this term was to create a ‘Virtual Wall of Tools’. The project comprised a number of steps. We started by learning the shape of tools by doing some blind line drawings as well as positive and negative space drawing. Then we studied Jim Dine, and his tool drawings before moving to the experimental printing section of the project. Jim Dine is an American Pop Artist. We were able to take inspiration from his black and white tool drawings. We all had great fun composing and printing the tools with shoe polish, paint, and any other material we could find at home!  Next, we started focusing on one tool by doing a detailed observational drawing. 

Now we were ready to start the final part of the project which lasted 2 weeks. It consisted of creating  3D tools with cardboard. We first had to plan the construction and then build them. It was a challenge to make the mechanism of the tools function but many of us achieved it. I created pruning shears in which the hinge fully functions!  When all of them were done, Ms Cullen created the ‘Virtual Tool Wall’.

I had a lot of fun this term trying all these new techniques, especially the experimental printing because I never practised it before. I also enjoyed building the 3D tool, it was fun and complex.

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Transition Year Portrait Gallery

Form IV (Transition Year) Art pupils have been working on a portraiture-themed project throughout the Hilary Term. This began with a trip to the National Gallery of Ireland to see The Zurich Portrait Prize in late December. Pupils also researched a portrait artist of their choice and the range of artists chosen was wide and varied. This research, along with a number of drawing exercises, prompted and encouraged pupils through the concept and design phase of the creative process of portraiture. The pupils completed the final portrait in the medium of their choice. Enjoy the gallery below.

Transition Year Portraits 2020
Transition Year Portraits 2020
57 photos
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End of Term Sports Update

Basketball

In basketball, the Senior and Gadette Girls have reached the quarterfinal stages of the league while the Junior and Minor Girls have had great success in all their friendly games this term which is setting them up nicely for their leagues which will start in January. This term traditionally ends with the annual Christmas blitz; there was an abundance of colour, energy and sporting endeavour (oh, and silly hats and tinsel).

Hockey

The boys’ senior team have had a difficult season with a dismal return of only two draws in their 6 league matches.  They have played some good hockey at times but find it difficult to exert enough pressure on opposition defences. There have been some good individual performances along the way but perhaps not enough gelling as a team.

The Junior teams have shown some promise thus far this term. The Junior A team are on track for a playoff match in their league but they will need to win some crucial games against St Kilians and Sutton Park after Christmas. The Junior B team is effectively a Form III team and they are being primed for future success.  They have played five matches only losing one against a strong Newpark team.

The minor team have a lot of potential and they have played some excellent hockey at times. They are in a very tough pool in their league having to play against perennial winners of the league Wesley and St Andrew’s College.  As they continue to improve it will be interesting to see them challenge for the u14 cup.

The U13 team is possibly one of the stronger Form I teams we have had for a while. They had a narrow defeat against St Andrew’s College losing 1-2 in a match that could have gone either way. Their remaining matches are against teams sitting at the bottom of the table and wins over them would boost them into a playoff position. Special mention must go to Harry St Leger who has been playing some fantastic hockey. He also sets a good example in his attitude towards training. Most importantly he is eager to learn from his coaches in order to improve.

Rugby

The rugby teams have been training hard this term.  Even though we lost many sessions to the wettest November in recent history we still managed to play SCT and JCT cup games v Enniscorthy and Skerries respectively. We also played friendlies against Wilsons Hospital, Blackrock, Kings Hospital, Clongowes and Headfort.  Whilst we have struggled against the bigger schools we have performed well in all matches. We look forward to Shield competitions and league knockouts next term.

Judo

Well done to Kate Dementyeva and Georgy Dementiev who competed in the All Ireland Schools Judo Championship and had some good success. Kate won a Silver medal in the Junior Girls <52kg division, and Georgy got a win out of 4 tough matches in Junior Boys <50kg.

Golf

Once our Senior pupils play one of our ‘traditional team’ sports they can choose an additional sport or activity. This year a new initiative was introduced which is proving very popular. Hopefully, it will lead to more of our pupils taking up and playing golf on our nine-hole golf course in their free time. Nine pupils, five senior boys and four girls, are taking weekly golf lessons with Josh Adams a PGA professional in Stackstown golf club. When the weather is too poor be played outside they use an indoor facility featuring a Trackman golf simulator. Our Junior pupils were offered the same optional opportunity on Sundays but there was very little take-up. Perhaps there will be more interest when the weather improves and the days get longer.

Archery

Form IV pupil Avi Johnson reports on archery this term:

On Saturday mornings, we have five academic classes. After that most of us break off to play our respective sports and get some exercise. One sport that is more hidden than the mainstream is archery. Archery is a non-reflexive sport that is as skilled as it is difficult. At 3:30 pm after the mixed basketball is finished, the archery team flock into the Sportshall.

Our coach Pat McLoughlin is always there to greet us. We set up the stands and string up our bows and begin our training. Normally we have target faces to shoot at but this term we have refrained from using them. We do this so that we are not thinking about which coloured ring we are going to hit, but rather how our shooting feels. Without the distraction of the target, we can feel how good or bad our shots are. Our coach Pat will go even further and ask us to close our eyes ‘Star Wars’ style and really ‘feel’ the firing and ‘force’ of the arrow when shooting.

Our team, consisting of Iona Chavasse, Gioia Doenhoff, Zian Wang, Avi Johnston and the new recruits Tessa Pullman and Iris Foster have really improved. The training with no target faces means that we now know how to self improve our shots and fix small mistakes without guidance. Thanks to Pat’s training we are ready for the inter-school competitions coming in the new year.

We aim to repeat and improve on our successes from last year. Team Captain Avi Johnston is confident that her team will be ready when the competitive season hits.

Sports Photos

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Christmas Shoebox Appeal 2019

Team Hope’s Christmas Shoebox Appeal is a wonderful charity that provides shoeboxes full of toys, treats, school stationery, hygiene products and clothing for some of the poorest children in the world. The College has been involved with this amazing charity for over 15 years and this year, once again, the Transition Year pupils have been actively involved. Pupils have already created over 200 festively wrapped filled boxes to date and have also fundraised through their mini-companies. They have also visited the Team Hope warehouse over the past few weeks packing the filled boxes into the lorries destined for Eastern Europe and Africa. A particular thank you to Mr Cron who has been driving the College’s involvement in the charity from day one, and to the other staff who accompanied the pupils to the warehouse in the evenings. Team Hope is once again the Gywnn House charity in 2019/2020.

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Warden’s Thoughts … on Pupil Leadership

I have spoken a lot about service over the last three years and about how to develop an ethos of service amongst our pupils. I am not going to repeat myself now. What I have perhaps spoken about less is leadership, which is actually the other side of the same coin. It is certainly not contradictory or paradoxical to talk about service and leadership in the same breath, because the best leaders are also servants, prepared to sacrifice on behalf of their followers and determined to get the best out of other people. A good leader should not be afraid to empower others, to give opportunities to them and enjoy seeing them grow in confidence and stature. A poor leader will happily see his or her followers stay dependant on the boss and wait for instructions. Ultimately that style of leadership saps initiative and leads to resentment. Of course, giving people responsibility is risky, because they might fail, but there is nothing wrong with failure, as long as you pick yourself up, dust yourself down and learn from it.

When it comes to developing leaders I am thinking right now of the pupils, rather than the staff. How do we help our pupils to become leaders, to take initiative, to be prepared to stand up and not be afraid to fall down? My concern is that when it comes to choosing prefects, for example, those who will lead the pupil body in their final year, we go on hunches and pick those who we think will be good role models, but we have given them precious little in the way of actual training, or encouraged them to stretch themselves prior to their final year. Surely leadership training should not be something that begins in the 6th form, or at the end of the 5th form, but something, a bit like service, that we try and inculcate into our pupils from the 1st form onwards.

What do I actually mean by leadership, particularly in the school context? Well, let’s examine that by looking at what an aspiring young leader at school might look like, divided into being and doing, who they are first and what they do second:

So who are they?

  • They are prepared to stand up for others and to speak out when they see something that they think is wrong;
  • They are not easily influenced by the crowd or their peer group;
  • They don’t mind being a little bit different, because they are thinking about the bigger picture of who they want to become rather than being popular right now;
  • They lead when others are not looking, not just to get attention.

And what might they do?

  • They might volunteer to run or help run activities;
  • They might act as mentors for younger or new pupils;
  • They might put their hand up for jobs that are not very glamorous;
  • They will look out for those around them who are struggling and not be afraid to bring it to the attention of the appropriate people;
  • They might have a quiet word with someone who they think is behaving poorly or making someone’s life unpleasant;
  • They will take on tasks or responsibilities that stretch them, rather than always doing things with which they are comfortable.

And what should the teaching staff do?

  • Allow pupils, right from the earliest years, to take responsibility and then support them…and praise them and lift them up when they fall;
  • Encourage them to take initiative, rather than wait for a member of staff to suggest something.

These are just some initial thoughts and I am sure that it would be easy to flesh them out a lot more. Although prefects in the 6th form are necessary, actually all 6th formers should be leaders and, in fact, all pupils should be encouraged to see themselves as leaders, whatever year they are in. I want to see how we can do that better than we have done, so be prepared for me to be speaking a lot about leadership in the months to come.

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Warden’s Thoughts …. on Climate Action

I feel challenged by young people around the world marching in protest against world governments failing to take action to prevent or counter the environmental catastrophe that we are facing. I let pupils in our Transition Year go, with their parents’ permission, drawing the line there, since gathering written permission from parents at the last minute in a boarding school is potentially problematic. Whether they felt strongly about the issue or merely wanted a day off school, is not for me to judge but it seems to have been a big event and it will certainly have attracted the attention of politicians. Let’s hope they have the courage to act. Momentum is building and it is exciting to see young people at the heart of such a powerful and positive movement.

In reality, I do have a problem with the idea of pupils missing school to make such a protest because disrupting education is rarely the right thing to do, but if those in government sit up and take notice it may not be a bad thing. However, what our own pupils need to understand is that marching and waving banners is actually the easy bit because it places the responsibility on other people to affect change. The harder challenge is for us all to make the changes in our own lives and in our own community, which will, slowly but surely, start to make a difference right here at St. Columba’s College. We cannot wait for politicians to legislate.

Yesterday in assembly I threw out a challenge to the pupils, namely that they, as a pupil body, should come up with a pledge, a manifesto, if you like, something concrete and practical, as to how we can make a difference right here in our own backyard. It might be about recycling, electricity, litter, water, traffic, clothing, food. We all like the idea of making a difference until it affects what we put on our plates, don’t we? We would prefer, I suspect, to believe that it is up to others, to politicians, to Greta Thunberg, to fight the battle, to address the United Nations, while we stand in the wings and applaud. But ask us to make personal sacrifices for the future of our planet…that is another thing altogether!

Personally, I have started to think about these things a lot more. I remember when I was at school and we had a visiting speaker on the strange topic of ‘ecology.’ He had long hair and an earring (we all had crewcuts and tight trousers and jackets) and we sneered at him and thought he was a bit of a weirdo. He spoke about the need to live sustainably and to look after the resources of the planet and it made a lot of sense, but we were all too cool to admit it to each other. Shame on us, but rather than engage with him and take him seriously we preferred to laugh at him. I don’t think anyone is laughing any more.

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