The Gazette - sgghs.com.au

1 PPaarreennttss && CCiittiizzeennss AAssssoocciiaattiioonn MMeeeettiinngg Thursday 22 March Staff Common Room 7pm MMootthheerrss CCoommmmiitttteeee MMeeeettiinngg Wednesday 4 April Library 10am PPaarreenntt TTeeaacchheerr EEvveenniinngg YYeeaarrss 77 aanndd 1122 Tuesday 10 April Assembly Hall 3:30pm 6:30pm SStt GGeeoorrggee GGiirrllss HHiigghh SScchhooool Telephone: 9587 5902 Facsimile: 9553 8043 Email: Website: The Gazette Monthly Bulletin March 2018 Vol. 23 No. 2 PPrriinncciippaall ss MMeessssaaggee Dear Parents and Students, The first half of the term has been very eventful with a range of important and exciting activities and events held at St George Girls High School over the past month. CCoonnggrraattuullaattiioonnss MMiissss QQuuaahh I would like to begin my correspondence by formally congratulating Miss Jenny Quah on her successful permanent appointment to the position of Technological and Applied Studies (TAS) teacher, following a rigorous merit selection process.

2 I know Miss Quah will continue to make a valuable contribution to the school and the TAS faculty. This is a well-deserved appointment for a very talented and engaging teacher, St George Girls is certainly very fortunate to have secured such a quality educator as a now permanent member of the teaching staff. YYeeaarr 77 CCaammpp The Year 7 Camp held at Vision Valley was a great success this year. The staff and students departed on Monday 26 February and safely returned on Wednesday 28 February. This annual camp is such a valued wellbeing initiative that facilitates and supports the student s transition into High School. I had the pleasure of visiting the camp on the Monday and I was so impressed to witness the students enthusiastically embracing each of the planned activities and events, often pushing themselves outside of their own natural comfort zones.

3 What I was equally impressed to see was how the students encouraged their peers through all the varied activities. I would like to acknowledge the work of our Year 7 Year Adviser Mr Charbel Rahmi and Assistant Adviser Ms Kate Di Leo, who did a fabulous job in organising the camp. I also would like to thank the dedicated team of staff who volunteered to attend the camp over the three days, Ms Abson, Mr Bowen, Mrs Williamson, Ms Dwyer, Ms Mileski, Miss Wetmore, Ms Torrisi and Miss Hamilton. Without the good will of staff volunteering their own time, events such as these camps are not possible and we are grateful for their continued support. 22001188 TTEEXXSSTTYYLLEE EExxhhiibbiittiioonn On Thursday 8 March, I had the pleasure of attending the Texstyle exhibition at Rosehill Racecourse with Mrs Kaye Williamson and Miss Kristi Stiskala.

4 We attended to celebrate the selection of Ivy Chen s HSC Major Texstyle Project into this prestigious exhibition. It is a real honour to be selected for inclusion into this exhibition and it was lovely to celebrate this tremendous achievement with Ivy and the teachers. I was inspired to see the creativity and skill of students from a range of schools and students across NSW on display and it was a very proud moment to hear Ivy s name and the name of the school called out and celebrated on the evening. CClleeaann UUpp AAuussttrraalliiaa DDaayy On Friday 9 March our students participated in the Annual Youth Clean Up Day that features as part of the annual Clean Up Australia Day campaign. Clean Up Australia Day is held annually in March and over the past 27 years, Australians have devoted more than 32 million hours towards the environment through Clean Up Australia Day and collected over 344 thousand tonnes of rubbish.

5 I am pleased to report that our school and students have also contributed to this worthwhile and valuable national initiative. I would like to thank Ms Greenaway for her organisation of this afternoon and to students who spent the afternoon cleaning up the school and the surrounding local area. It is always great to see our students acting locally to promote the importance of looking after and caring for the environment. HHSSCC EExxcceelllleennccee CCeerreemmoonnyy On Thursday 22 February, we had the opportunity as a school community to celebrate and publicly acknowledge the impressive individual achievements from class of 2017 at the HSC Excellence Ceremony. It was a real honour to invite back the top performing students who achieved personal excellence, along with their very proud parents and family members.

6 All of our students have made us very proud and I know that the class of 2018 are so fortunate to have this wonderful group of peer role models to learn from and aspire to. We are looking forward to hearing all about the future successes of our graduating students and we welcome them to return back to St George as very proud Alumni in the years to come. I would like to the thank Mrs Kim Archibald, President of the St Georgians, Mrs Hall, Ms Horley and Mrs Barry representatives from the St Georgians Class of 1967, who made the special effort to join us as special guests to make presentations to our Award recipients. The students have now commenced their tertiary studies in exciting areas such as Medicine, Sociology, Science, International and Global Studies, Education, Engineering, Law, Media, Pharmacy, Music, Architecture, Commerce, Design and the Liberal Arts - the list is comprehensive and reflects the character and diversity of our most recent graduates.

7 It was great to have the students return back not only to celebrate their success but to also to wish them all the best for their promising and exciting futures ahead. SSwwiimmmmiinngg aanndd ZZoonnee CCaarrnniivvaall UUppddaattee As I reported last month, the 2018 Swimming Carnival was a great whole-school event. I am pleased to report that the winning House for this year s swimming carnival was Allunga and it was great to see the impressive levels of student participation in both championship and novelty events on the day. I would like to thank Miss Papas who has compiled the results from the carnival to report to the school community. The talented students certainly displayed their swimming skills on the day and I would like to congratulate the following Age Champions and Runner Ups for 2018.

8 12 Years Age Champion Selsabeel Al Hariri 12 Years Runner Up Gabrielle Ciu 13 Years Age Champion Chloe Xu 13 Years Runner Up Kayla Huang 14 Years Age Champion Celine Tang 14 Years Runner Up Mindy Liu 15 Years Age Champion Laetitia Cooper 15 Years Runner Up Catherine Weng 16 Years Age Champion Sophia Li 16 Years Runner Up Arkie Zhang-Langley 17 Years Age Champion Erica Li 17 Years Runner Up Helen Chen A very strong St George Girls swimming team attended the Zone Swimming Carnival on Friday 2 March and Monday 5 March held at Roselands Swimming Pool. The Zone carnival allows all our talented school swimmers to compete amongst all the other schools in the St George Zone. It was a highly successful day for our school as the winning Girls High School, with all of our relay teams also successfully qualifying through to the upcoming Regional Swimming Carnival to be held on Tuesday 20 March.

9 The Relay Teams to participate in the Regional Carnival include: 12 Years 4x50m Freestyle 13 Years 4x50m Freestyle 14 Years 4x50m Freestyle 15 Years 4x50m Freestyle 16 Years 4x50m Freestyle 17 Years 4x50m Freestyle Opens 4x50m Medley All Age Relay Team 6x50m Freestyle Congratulations to the following students who were either the Zone Age Champions or the Zone Runner Up for 2018: 17 Years Age Champion Erica Li 16 Years Age Champion Sophia Li 16 Years Runner Up Arkie Zhang-Langley 15 years Age Champion Laetitia Cooper 13 Years Runner Up Chloe Xu Congratulations to Erica Li who also received the Female Athlete of the Meet Award as she accumulated 76 Individual points, more than any other female competitor did over the two-day carnival. We wish all of our swimmers the best of luck at the Regional Carnival and I look forward to hearing about and celebrating their success.

10 SSRRCC EExxeeccuuttiivvee aanndd RReepprreesseennttaattiivveess 22001188 On Monday 5 March, our newly elected SRC Executive and Year representatives participated in their Leadership training day organised by SRC Coordinator Ms Tina Whitehead. The students engaged in a range of activities and discussions throughout the day and I know they have begun to plan a suite of great initiatives to enhance the quality of school life for the students. I was so impressed to see the level of enthusiasm and engagement on display by the students and I am looking forward to working together with the students to support some of their creative and cleaver ideas over the year. It is with great pleasure that I officially announce that the following students have been elected into the SRC Executive positions for 2018; President: Lily Chen Vice-President: Alice Wang Treasurer: Michelle Lieng Secretary: Anuki Jayawardana New Student Representative: Eesha Ahmed I would like to thank the outgoing Executive (Nuzhat Anjum, Isabelle Laxamana, Angela Tran, Jenny He, Lillian Li and Ilma Akhtar) for doing such a wonderful job in each of their respective roles over 2017.