Newsletter Week 3, Term 4
A message from your captains of 2023
This week the SRC have been busy organising the Halloween mufti day, however the captains have also been hard at work creating our mission statement. The mission statement aims at communicating to the wider school community our goals and objectives as the captains of 2023. Our statement focused on the wellbeing of students, creating a fun, inclusive and united Rose Bay.
“We believe that a sense of connection between students should be integral to our community. We want to create a sense of pride and unity in every aspect of school life, so that students feel they truly belong at Rose Bay. We value a community where all students feel included and esteemed through a range of student-run opportunities. We believe in an united student body, where students feel empowered to speak up for themselves and others. We aim to make school a place where students enjoy themselves and feel motivated to succeed.”
As the captains of 2023, we promise to fulfill these beliefs for you, the school, and the entire RBSC community.
From the Senior Executive
The NSW Department of Education has launched a new campaign to promote teaching as a career. The 'Teaching Opens Doors' Campaign features teachers and students from a range of public schools across NSW, and seeks to attract and grow our workforce now and into the future. The hero video below showcases a number of talented teachers, and highlights how teaching 'opens doors' to opportunities within and outside of the classroom.
Year 12 – Class of 2023 Parent Information Webinar
Thank you to all parents and carers who attended the Year 12 – Class of 2023 Parent Information Webinar on Monday 24 October.
For anyone who missed the presentation, you can view the recording here at your own convenience.
If you have any questions, please email the school.
Changes - Uniform Shop Trading Hours
Girls Basketball Local Derby
The RBSC Racoons and RBSC Rebels played a tough match on Sunday. It was neck to neck the whole game. The Racoons had extremely good shot accuracy and the game had a lot of energy. The final score was 40 to 32, RBSC Rebels winning the game.
Pathway Program
RBSC has been lucky enough to be offered 3 places in an incredible 3 day Animation and Design program for Stage 5 students organised by RIEP (NSW Regional Industry and Education Pathways Program). This is a collaboration between TAFENSW Enmore Design College and Animal Logic (Animal Logic is an Australian animation and visual effects digital studio based at Disney Studios Australia). The first week students learnt about the varying styles and types of animation and then worked on creating their own 'personalities'. Week 2 has seen the students head off to Animal Logic, to see their sketches converted into simple animations and they had the opportunity to tour this incredible creative space. We are really looking forward to the last week back at Enmore Design School where we get to deepen our understanding of animation and share our successes.
IEF Garden
On Friday the IEF received the wonderful news that the IEF, Hardy Street Harvest garden has been shortlisted for the Waverly Garden Award. This Friday, the judging team will be visiting Rose Bay Secondary College IEF garden and on Saturday, the Waverley Mayor, Paula Masselos will be visiting for a guided tour. The IEF garden entry read as follows:
The Hardy Street Harvest Garden has been designed, planted, maintained, and harvested for the last 6 years by the students in the Support Class at Rose Bay Secondary College. The garden is ever-evolving and reflects the class cohort of the year.
In 2020 and 2021, due to Covid and El Nina the Hardy Street Harvest Garden fell into a state of disrepair. The garden became a jungle of weeds that dominated the vegetable beds, strawberry pots, the glass house, succulent beds, and worm farms.
2022 has seen our goal of surpassing the garden’s former splendor realised. The Support Unit has worked tirelessly to weed, prepare the soil, plant, and water the gardens. Additionally, the students created pathways and shoveled golden gravel to secure the longevity of them.
The garden sits on the edge of a busy playground and has been designed to combat stray balls and students playing during breaktimes. It has been planted with non-edibles around the edge, large dracaena marginatas, ficuses, Korean box hedges, photinias, banksias, birds of paradise, succulents and palms form a green barrier. The flowers of the plants attract bird life and bees, which creates a lovely ecosystem. Within the green walls are the edibles, carrots, potatoes, beans, snow peas, herbs, tomatoes, beetroots, spinach, rocket, and radishes. The location is sheltered from high winds, attracts the sunshine, and has easy access to water. We have committed ourselves to maintaining a pesticide free garden where all that we grow is uncertified organic.
The garden is an outdoor learning area where Science, Technology and Food Technology Life Skills outcomes are met. Students living with autism require breaks from the classroom and we have found learning in the garden to be rejuvenating and has given them something unique and tangible to be proud of. Students are known to harvest their produce and share it out in their lunch breaks and at home with their families.
Students have become acutely aware of the cradle to grave life cycle. They understand the planting and harvesting processes and how to recycle the waste or use it for the worms or compost. Our students enjoy cooking their produce and understand what works best in each recipe.
The Hardy Street Harvest Garden is a quintessential part of our daily routine and is multi-purposeful and we are very proud to submit our garden in the Dirt Kids category in the Waverley Garden Awards.
White Card Training
Twelve students across years 9, 10, and 11 completed their White Card training in the Lecture Theatre last week. The students asked questions, engaged with their educator, and supported each other's understanding. A few students were apprehensive about completing this training, but all pulled through with a positive attitude.
A huge thanks to Ms Lockton for her tireless organisation of this training, and various other opportunities that support our students.
Careers
InspirationED HSC November Kickstart Seminars
16 November 2022
Designed for both parents and students, this day of seminars will provide you with all the best tools and tips to help you achieve your best in the year ahead. Each attendee can join 3 seminars on the day :
- Session 1 (Parents & Students): Stress-Free HSC
- Session 2 (Students): English Common Module & Essay Writing, OR
- Session 2 (Parents): Parent-Student Communication & Emotional Support • Session 3 (Parents & Students): 5 Secrets to HSC Success
Library News and Reviews
Another week closer to the end of the year and Xmas fun and frolics. Is it too early to count down? Probably yes, so to while away time if there is any to spare at this time of year, open a book and read. After threatening for years, I finally picked up our library hard cover copy, with fabulous illustrations earlier this year and read the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings trilogy. Written from 1937 – 1949 these stories have stood the test of time and the series is the bestselling series ever written, selling over 150 million copies.
Considered by many to be the start of the genre known as high fantasy, these works have had an enormous influence of the genre as a whole.
My review wouldn’t do the tales as much justice as a review of this Trilogy, I came across some while back, by someone called "Floresiensis".
“Steeped in unrivalled magic and otherworldliness, its sweeping fantasy has touched the hearts of young and old alike. Written by Professor J.R.R. Tolkien and consisting of three separate books (The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers and The Return of the King) The Lord of the Rings was first published between 1954 and 1955.
And a magnificent achievement it is; an epic tale of friendship, love and heroism, a book that set the benchmark for all fantasy novels to come. Tolkien's descriptive narrative beautifully depicts Middle-earth and the journey that the Fellowship undertakes. It is hard to put into words the happiness that can be felt when reading a fantasy book as good as this and anybody who has never read it should set aside some time to do so.”
The magic, mystery, and fantasy flood through the pages and although the series has been developed for Radio, TV’s and Movies the richness of the writing is lost and should definitely be a series that should be on everyone’s to read list.
Reminder that the Homework Club is committed to assisting any student who requires help with their studies or just a place to complete it, every Monday and Wednesday in the Library after school.
Wishing all readers, a great week.
Library 2022
We would like to thank all parents and carers for their generous support financial of our Bob Bellear Memorial library. Alongside the impressive technology support provided for students, the library is the key repository for all digital and print resources in the school. Students in Year 7 have had regular fortnightly lessons addressing different aspects of the information fluency policy of the Department. Recently, this has focused on the use of citations and how to use these to create a bibliography. Senior students are able to access an amazing collection of digital references for inclusion in assignments and have been shown how to include academic citations in digital bibliographies.
Following an extensive "weeding" last year of the physical books in the library which were dispersed to local schools and charities, this year was focussed on building the collection with new fiction and non-fiction titles, often including the suggestions of students from the "Wish Wall". In particular, the school has contracted to an effective literacy program for Year 7, 2023, the Renaissance Reading (RR) program. This is designed to improve all reading skills for all students, beginning in Term 1 when they will be tested for their reading level and then matched with appropriate books.
This reading program addresses the learning targets of the school and is one of the Literacy Committee's initiatives.
After each book is read, a quiz will test comprehension, prediction and other reading skills. We will be expanding upon the bank of titles we already have on the RR list with additional titles recommended by the program. This will provide more choice for our students and significant improvement results are expected. We could not deliver this program based on the fine collection in this library without the generosity of our students' families and we are deeply grateful for that. Next year we are hoping to hold a morning tea for parents and/or grandparents to share and celebrate student achievement on this program. More details will appear in the e-News once reading results begin to appear late in Term 1 or early Term 2.
