From the Rector

Congratulations to Mr Roger van Booma who has been appointed as the new Deputy Rector. As many will know Roger has been an Assistant Rector here for the past 4 years and he will continue with his ‘portfolio’ around student welfare along with taking on responsibility for the ‘day to day’ running of the school. With his undoubted passion for the school and unstinting support of both students and staff I know Roger will do a fantastic job for our school and look forward to working with him even more closely in the future.

Over the last holiday’s a number of students achieved success in their sporting endeavours. Year 13 student Stuart Beattie continues to excel at the highest level in his chosen sport of western horse riding. Stuart represented NZ in a trans-Tasman competition in Taupo where he did extremely well. We had a large team attend the national trapshooting championships. The highlight was Year 12 student Josef Sullivan being selected to represent the Central South Island region. A huge thank you to Ray Boswell for managing the team. At the national mountain biking championships in Dunedin the highlight was Luke Hayman (Year 12) placing 3rd overall in the Under 17 grade, which included a 2nd in the downhill event. Mention needs to also be made of Taz Selfe (Year 12) who would have been a strong contender for a medal but suffered a serious training accident which led to him being helicoptered to Burwood Hospital in Christchurch. Fortunately, he was cleared of any major damage and we are pleased that Taz returned safely to school for the start of the term. Thanks to all the parents and supporters who helped with the mountain biking team.

During this past week we have celebrated our red and black awards which recognise sporting achievement. I would like to share with you my address from Monday’s assembly during which the focus was on the school value of resilience and what sport can teach us about building our resilience.

Sport has so much to teach us – life values like commitment, integrity, leadership, reliability – all those values that make us a good person and will ensure we make a positive contribution to society. This morning I would like to focus on the value of resilience. Sport provides a fantastic opportunity to build resilience while doing something that you generally enjoy. In modern society where at times it seems like everyone is a winner, this is not what the real world is like. The real world is about winning and losing ……like sport. You have to go to through failure to be any good. Personally, I have learnt far more from my failures than I’ve ever learnt from any success. Last term we focused on lessons from the greatest basketballer – Michael Jordan. He said “I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed”

It was extremely reassuring to see 141 boys being awarded “Top” fortnightly notes for their effort in class throughout Term 3. This is our largest number to date and has grown steadily from the 55 boys who received this recognition back in Term 1 2017. This number represents 37% of our students achieving 4.0 or more for their effort through the term and reflects the hardworking ‘culture’ we are all striving for. Well done, boys!!

I would like to congratulate Harry Wilson (Year 11) and Ethan Reille (Year 10) for participating in the Robert Falcon Scott memorial speech competition this week. The history of this award has a significant place at WBHS and it was great to see both boy’s show so much respect for this tradition not withstanding the courage to speak in front of the whole school.

Many of you would have taken interest in the conversation around schools, kura choosing to ‘opt in’ or not to the proposed donations scheme. There are points both for and against what decision to make and you will see in this newsletter an information sheet from the ministry for families, whanau. If you have any feedback regarding the donations scheme could you please pass this on to the Board of Trustees by emailing the board chairperson.

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Before the next newsletter the Senior school prizegiving would have been held – this is on Wednesday 9th November. This is always a highlight (if not the highlight) of our school year and we encourage you to attend. I would remind you that this ceremony is open to all of our school community.

Thanks for your on-going support of the school. Hope you all enjoyed the long weekend.

Ma whero ma ponga ka oti

Floreat Waitakia

Darryl Paterson

Rector