Newsletter, Term 3, 25 August 2023

Year 10 History Excursion Bonegilla • Monday 28 August

Pre-Kindergarten and Kindergarten Swim Program starts • Monday 28 August

HSC Trials continue • Monday 28 August

Year 9&10 Ski Day • Tuesday 29 August

Pipe Band Returns • Tuesday 29 August @ 2pm

Campus Masterplan Community Consultation • Wednesday 30 August @ 2.30pm, JET. All Welcome

Year 3-6 Hockey Gala Day • Thursday 31 August @ Albury Hockey Centre

Father's Day Coffee and Egg & Bacon Breakfast • Friday 1 September @ 7.30am

Year 9 2024 Information Session • Friday 1 September, Chapel Hall @ 2.20pm

History Week • Monday 4 September to Friday 8 September

Snowsports Interschools National Championships • Tuesday 5 September to Sunday 10 September

Year 6 Exhibition open to the community • Tuesday 5 September @ 3.30pm

Year 12 2024 Melbourne Camp & University experience • Tuesday 5 September to Friday 8 September

Year 10 Dance • Wednesday 6 September @ 6.30pm

Year 7 AFL Gala Day • Thursday 7 September, Jelbart Park

Year 5 & 6 Ski Day • Friday 8 September

Year 8 e-health Careers Day • Monday 11 September

Wakakirri State Selection Performance Night • Tuesday 12 September

Art and Technology Exhibition • Wednesday 13 September to Friday 15 September

Henty Field Days • Tuesday 19 September to Thursday 21 September

Year 12 Final Chapel • Wednesday 20 September @ 8.45am, Chapel Hall. All Welcome

Year 12 Final Assembly and Awards • Thursday 21 September, Chapel Hall @ 2pm. All Welcome

Term 3 ends • Friday 22 September

Year 7-10 Parent Teacher Interviews • Monday 9 October

Boarders Return • Monday 9 October from 3pm

Term 4 begins • Tuesday 10 October

HSC Exams start • Wednesday 11 October

At 5.25pm on a balmy Monday evening, Xy Beale (Year 12) threw her way to a silver medal in the Women’s Shot Put at the Commonwealth Youth Games in Trinidad and Tobago.
It was 7 August and Xy was at her first international event on her first overseas journey and fulfilling her first Australian representation.

Xy went with the well wishes of everyone at Scots and a small group of her Year 12 cohort, boarders and staff watched the event unfold on the live stream early on Tuesday morning, Australian time.
We saw Xy take out the silver medal with a throw of 16.3m, behind a Commonwealth Youth Games record throw from the South African athlete of 17.97m. It wasn’t Xy’s personal best and she was initially disappointed, but with the maturity that only comes from competing at the big events, she has come to realise that it was her best on the day and she’s proud of what she did achieve.
Xy is now amid HSC trial exams and will operate a reduced training schedule until after her final HSC exams.
Her coach, Gus Puopolo, is eyeing the World Junior Championships, future Commonwealth Games and the Olympics for Xy, but needs to transform her first. He describes Xy as "a good thrower in a weak body" and wants Xy to focus on building the “right” muscles.
Gus competed in the 1978 and 1982 Games and he’s coached an athlete at every Commonwealth Games since. Xy started training with him last November when she “hit a wall” with her results. She was training hard but her performances had plateaued. In four months, Gus had taken her from a 14.5m thrower to consistently recording around 16.5m. Their goal is for Xy to be throwing over 18m and to hold the Under-18 Australian record by the end of the year.
In her own words, here’s how Xy’s big day on the world stage unfolded.
Monday 7 August 2023
I woke up really late - I’d slept in mostly because I could. I went down to brekky and had some orange juice, eggs, bacon and pastries. It’s not what I’d normally have but it was what was there.
Then I went back to my room and chilled for a while before some of my teammates joined me in the hotel hallway and we sat around on the floor talking, on our phones or playing games on our phones. We went to the pool for a while and started to play UNO but there weren’t enough cards for all of us so we gave that away. I did some schoolwork for about an hour, but it was chemistry and there was no one there to assist with some questions I had, so once I’d done all I could I packed that up too.
By then it was lunchtime and I had chicken and rice, which we had nearly every day, and I went to pack my bag and get changed into my competition gear.
I have a list to pack my bag but I always seem to overpack, and still manage to leave something important behind. On this day I forgot my drink bottle and snacks (fortunately I could get those at the track), but I did pack my throwing shoes, my wristwraps and Xenokrates my Ringtail Possum puppet. His name is a play on the spelling of Kratos, the Greek God of great power and strength and the puppet has become a superstition of sorts. Any time I’ve thrown well, he’s in my bag.
I caught the bus to the track around 2.30pm and left my bag in the Australian tent on the warmup track so that I could go and support my friends in their events. I watched George Wells win the Men’s Discus and then it was time to report to the Call Room.
The Call Room is where they check that everyone who is supposed to be there for the event is there. Then we were taken across to the main track to do our warm up throws and be ready to start exactly at the scheduled time of 5.25pm.
Throw 1: For my first throw, I focused on just getting one in to secure a spot. I threw 16.1m but I didn’t feel like I was giving it everything so I made sure to prepare better for the second throw.
Throw 2: When I threw 16.3m at my second throw, it really put me off because it had felt good and I thought I should have done better, but it just wasn’t very far. Then Alicia threw her record of 17.97m and after that I was mentally defeated.
Throw 3: I fouled my next throw - I released it wrong and slipped out the front of the box.
Throws 4, 5 and 6: Throws four, five and six were below my best and I was upset obviously.
But, you know what? I can’t complain; I walked away with a silver medal and I’m not ungrateful. There are plenty of people who would love to have been in my spot. Everything is on the day; and if that was my best, I can’t be mad.
I was proud that I’d made everyone else proud and when I got the flag and ran around the track and saw Dad, I was really quite emotional. He was trying not to cry but I was. That part made me happy with myself - that I’d made my dad proud.
We had to wait about an hour for the medal ceremony and by the time that was over it was about 9.30pm so I went back to the hotel, had something to eat and went to bed.
All the throwers celebrated the next day by eating cake. Heaps of it!

Year 12 student Lylah Ellao has been named a Top 50 Trailblazer in the NSW-wide Trailblazer Awards, which identifies and celebrates students who contribute to their school, communities and society.

The awards are conducted by Art of Smart Education, a tutoring and mentoring organisation that aims to help students maximise their options for life after school.

As part of her award, Lylah will be mentored on achieving HSC success, she will have access to open chat with other students in similar situations, given advice on university applications and, probably most importantly, her profile will be on the Art of Smart Education website and distributed to more than 50,000 start-up and established businesses.

Lylah was acknowledged in the Social Impact and Change category of the awards which recognises, in part, her strong leadership in the Social Justice and Equity portfolio at Scots this year. She sees her future in some sort of social justice role when she leaves school and is currently thinking a double degree in Arts and Science will set her on the right path.

Lylah has never been one to shy away from a challenge and in addition to being the recipient of the Young Future Leaders Award, volunteering for Refugee Homework Help and finessing her skills with the guitar and piano, Lylah has taken on three HSC portfolio subjects this year.

She has a body of work in Visual Arts, she wrote a research paper on refugee integration in regional Australia and is developing her performance poetry portfolio; including writing the script, staging and filming her performance.

Lylah admits it’s been a busy year but she’s thankful for the support her peers have provided alongside her teachers.

“We are a really tight cohort, so it’s made this whole process much easier,” Lylah says. “And portfolios do take the pressure off the final exams. You just have to be organised and disciplined and of course, manage the times when everything is inevitably due at once.”

Lylah has led Scots’ involvement in social justice issues and awareness days like Harmony Day in her role as portfolio prefect.

She’s proud that she has positively influenced awareness among younger students.

“I think it’s what I have done for others that makes me most satisfied,” Lylah said. “I’ve enlightened them to what can be achieved and I’ve made connections to organisations that will make it easier for students in the future to pursue social justice. Through these connections, it will seem less daunting for younger students to follow this path.”

Smyan Hegde (Year 6) has his eyes set on one of the biggest tennis challenges in his fledgling - but hugely successful - tennis career when he competes in the Rafa Nadal Tour in Canberra next month.

Smyan has had a stellar winter season of wins and placings in some of the region’s biggest junior tournaments, but the youngster is now travelling further afield to take on highly skilled metropolitan players - and holding his own.

He recently represented the South West region in the 2023 NSW Regional State League finals in Newcastle and will contest other regional events throughout September culminating in the Rafa Nadal Tour at the end of the month.

He has ambitions of a professional career in the game that he loves and Scots coach Brock Dixon notes that it is his coachability and dedication that sets him apart.

And yet, just a few years ago, Smyan’s parents knew nothing of his interest or potential in the sport. They only became aware when they received an invoice for lessons from the Scots coach of the time - Smyan having enrolled himself in private lessons in Year 3!

He played his first tennis match at Ulver Park Tennis Club in West Albury and won, setting his family on a tennis journey they could never have imagined. He started private lessons with Phil Shanahan at Margaret Court Tennis Academy and has continued lessons with Brock at Scots. Smyan now trains five days a week.

Since 2022, Smyan has won seven gold and five silver trophies in singles in Tennis Australia-verified events. Playing up an age group, he was the runner-up at the Rex Hartwig Cup for two consecutive years (2022 and 2023). He won the Bluewall Davis Cup event in the mixed singles in 2022 and the Junior Boys MIA Open Griffith this year.

He has represented the South-West region in NSW State events on multiple occasions including the Tony Roche Cup; and North East Victoria, all invitation-only events.

He was selected to play in the NSW Champions of Champions tournament as one of the top four South West regional players in under-12s last year and he has represented Scots at CIS trials.

Smyan said the challenge of playing the highly-skilled metropolitan players in the bigger tournaments pushes his own tennis to new levels but at each tournament, he tries to focus on remaining calm and being consistent. Their ability to play long rallies means he is gaining experience and stamina to stick with, and often beat them.

The Under-12 player is most proud of his success playing up an age group to be a finalist in the Under-14 singles and doubles at the Rex Hartwig Cup but his favourite tournament success was his win at the Junior Boys MIA Open in Griffith this year.

Water Polo

Callum Cooper, (Year 11), was selected in both the NSW and Victorian under-18 water polo squads this year but chose to play for Victoria and will represent the State in the National Championships in Sydney next month.

It is the fourth year Callum has been named in the NSW squad and the second time he’s been selected in the Victorian squad. At Nationals, he will play against other Australian states and the New Zealand national team.

Callum travels to Melbourne every Wednesday to play in the Men’s Division 1 League and returns again on Saturday for training.

Equestrian

Sarah Wicks (Year 6) has been selected to represent NSW at the Victorian Hub of the 2023 Pony Club Australia National Championships in September.

The Nationals will go ahead in Perth, but Pony Club Australia has created a hub at the Woodlands Pony Club grounds near Sunbury to enable more riders to compete. Riders will jump an identical showjumping course at both venues.

Sarah has been transitioning from her childhood pony, Burrowa Blisse, to her homebred Warmblood x Stockhorse, Saxonvale Ziva for the past year, but has had great success on Saxonvale Ziva recently and will ride her at nationals.

Tennis

Georgie Barber (Year 4) won a team gold medal representing North-East Victoria at the Victorian Country Tennis Championships in Shepparton recently, and followed up that win by coming second in her age group in the Tennis NSW South West Region RMS mixed singles tournament in Albury.

Georgie started her tennis career under the guidance of her dad, Keiran, who played State Juniors and now coaches professionally. As her love for the game grew, so did her entourage of coaches at the Margaret Court Tennis Academy where she attends three lessons a week, supplemented by hitting time with Dad. Her first tournament was in Albury at a competition run by Scots tennis coach Brock Dixon last year. She entered and won the under-10s competition - the start of a love affair with the sport that she sees herself playing as a professional one day.

Hockey

Congratulations to Jenna Dickins (Year 8) who recently has been selected in the Under 13 ACT State Hockey Team. She participated in two trials in Canberra, with a total of 65 players trying out.

Sixteen players were eventually selected in the Canberra State Team. Jenna and her family have also been involved in a gruelling training schedule, travelling to Canberra every Monday and Wednesday.

She also has had two intensive sessions on Sundays that have gone for four hours! We wish Jenna all the best in her carnival at Newcastle which happens in the first week of the school holidays.

Cricket

In the cricket off-season, Tilly Tainton (Year 10) has been working hard on her cricket skills and fitness at the Riverina Girls Youth Academy. The academy trains in various venues throughout the Riverina and is for 13-17 year old girls who excel in cricket in the area.

Cricket scouts have been watching the squad of 25 girls closely at this training and have selected a side of 12 players who will represent the Riverina at the NSW Youth Championships in Sydney from 26-28 September.

Tilly has been selected in the Under 19 team to play in this carnival.

Music

Billy Stewart (Year 9) blew the opposition away to be named the Victorian State Champion in the Under-15 Cornet and Under-15 Flugelhorn before going on to win Juvenile Brass Champion of Champions in Melbourne recently.

His State success comes on the heels of a fantastic result at Nationals at Easter where he was second in the Under-19 Cornet, and fresh from winning the Kate Davis Award for Excellence at the Border Music Camp where he was First Trumpet in Davis, the top ensemble at the camp.

Last term, students in Year 12 Standard English wrote a discursive piece in response to the question: How does failure promote success? In the rush of term and the impending trial examinations looming around the corner, this article by Daphne Fisher (Year 12) is an important reminder of how failure drives us, whether muggle or wizard, to embrace our challenges and capture the golden snitch.

Sitting back in the crowded, nervous, Alchemy class, full of racing heartbeats, I knew that as soon as that page covered in crossed-out potion equations was plastered with a big fat ‘F’, it would define me as a failure. Little did I realise; failure is the key to success.

Success is the outcome of our mistakes. And those mistakes teach us something - to push for success. Failure enables us, whether you're a muggle, wizard or witch, to grow our resilience and motivation to learn to push against those challenges.

Failure sucks the motivation and resilience out of us, like a dementor, they drain our feelings of happiness and confidence.

How do our perceptions of failure shift? Do you let Voldemort take you down or will you be the one to take him down? Failure makes us stronger and resilient; it boosts our motivation to acknowledge that there is room and time for success.

Success is like a game of quidditch. Imagine flying above the luminous green pitch and looking down over your failures, although some might say those failures are Slytherins. Looking down on those failures with glee - nearly touching the quaffle, or even better - the golden snitch; weaving amongst the goal posts and dodging the bludges. That is success. Well, at least to Harry Potter it is.

Failure unlocks the third floor corridor to your strengths and boosts your motivation for success. In fact, the fear of failure and the resilience one gains from the haunting atmosphere of failure motivates us to destroy the dementors and summon them with happy memories.

So how does failure promote success? Failure allows us to re-examine our mistakes, to progress forward down the secrets of the corridor, enabling us to redirect ourselves and try again, just as J.K. Rowling did with her Harry Potter book series. J.K. shifted her perception of failure and turned her many encounters with disappointment into encounters with success. She went from zero to hero, from an unpublished author to the publisher of over 500 million copies. J.K. Rowling once quoted in her Harvard Convention speech, “And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.”. J.K. used her failures for motivation and determination to find a way to succeed.

An endeavour of self-confidence and motivation helps individuals to grow by taking a failure and turning it into a spell for success. Failure is ego threatening; it puts us down. Failure deteriorates our motivation and rips away our resilience, like a bludger in a game of quidditch. It knocks us off our broomstick.

In a survey, it was found that one in four Australian men reported they feel like ‘failures’, amongst 1500 other people. When we are pursuing what we want the most in life, whether that be to win the quidditch cup, pass your OWL exam or be elected as head girl or boy. The fear of failure has the ability to rip those desires away from us.

However, when it comes to failure, we have a choice. We can let failure prevent us from weaving through the air above the quidditch field and pushing through the Slytherin nemesis’s to capture the golden snitch; or we can use it as a learning curve and a tool for bringing home the Griffendor glory.

Sometimes our ego is vulnerable when dealing with that cursed and reckless feeling of failure and it seems that no matter what, failure is the worst thing that could possibly happen, just like being sorted into Hufflepuff.

The dread that comes as a package with failure, causes our doubts and fears of vulnerability to cause us to fall into a continuous spiral of barriers, inescapable walls and endless corridors. After an encounter with a dementor and failing at destroying them, some decide to give up, to fall off their quidditch stick and let it fly away into the Forbidden Forest, forgotten forever.

What do I think failure can do to a person? I believe that an individual has the opportunity to pick their own door, down the unfamiliar corridor to overcome failure. Passing the endless terrain of olive-green grass, herds of cows, lined with everlasting trees as I made the move to Hogwarts. Sixteen-year-old me, raging with thoughts of ending friendships, leaving the safe halls of my old school and leaving a familiar city. I really thought I had failed in my teenage years.

Months later, walking down the seventh floor corridor, wishing I had been sorted into Hogwarts all along, I realised just how I took a time-turning situation and turned it into a successful one. I excelled in my learning and flourished - I had friends, books and wands of my own kind. I took a risk on the moving staircase and waltzed down the unknown corridor.

An individual can either choose to put on their invisibility cloak and overcome their mistakes to progress towards success. Or, you can choose what we deem the easy way out, and let our mind get lost in the Forbidden Forest and flood with the thought that failing your OWL’s means you may never graduate from Hogwarts.

Whether it be getting a Troll on your potions quiz (our equivalent of an F), not making the quidditch team, being sorted into Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw or even not even being a wizard at all, failure still lurks down the corridor, and it’s your choice, as a muggle, witch, or wizard, whether you chase that failure or let it hunt you down. What corridor do you choose?

This term in Year 8 English students are studying the unit, Unique and Distinctive Voices. Students were asked to compose a small piece of imaginative writing, capturing the essence of unique and distinctive voices from their worlds. Happy reading!

By Emily Moar (Year 8)

The fresh pages of the book crinkled as they turned in my hands. The words crafted new ideas around me, blossoming beautiful flowers of inspiration into my mind. They grew with each turn of the page, all unique flowers with exotic colours.

Each whispered word planted in my mind, as they echoed around me it felt like I could reach out and touch the words, secure them, keep them.

My fingers tapped on the iPad, clicking the letters like bubbles popping at the slightest touch. Once more click. There. Her voice surrounded my ears, blaring through the crackling speakers of the device, strong and defiant.

The words grasped my mind like a strangler vine wrapping around it firmly. Her passionate voice nourished the soils of young minds, filling the silence of the room with a forest of ideas. Even once the voice died, and the room was left silent, the words' power and the force of the speech never ended. They drifted like the leaves of tall oaks above my head; took root in my mind refusing to be shaken.

They were her words that she spoke, thought of, but they were also mine; mine to use, mine to do something about. Mine, they would always be hers, mine and everyones.

By Henry Tainton (Year 8)

Defeated. Depleted. Exhausted. These emotions scream at me. First half of “state soccer” if that’s what you want to call that abysmal performance.

Squirting myself with water to slowly wash away the horrors of the first half. The other team were strutting around the pitch with their backs straight and their necks up like a strong, united pack of lions. Until. Our coach crawled us into a huddle and took the speech by the scruff of the neck: “Wash it off, that half is in the past, if you guys back each other and your abilities and are willing to work hard for each other, this game would be blown out of the park. So shake it off and go out there and fight for each other and yourself.”

Refreshed. Captivated. Energised. That’s the new found hope we believed we had and could take into the second half. We were ready. The whistle blew. The second half was underway.

Our newfound confidence and swagger made the opposition no match for us, it was as if we were one mind, one player and knew where we were going. Fluid. Goals flurried in our favour and this wasn’t even a contest anymore. The whistle blew. Full time. The other team were a pack of weakened lions after we were through with them.

We had done it and it was all because of the half time talk. Proud. Confident. Succeeded.

A week of scientific wonder and exploration unfolded during Weeks 5 and 6 for Science Week 2023. During this event our whole community of students embarked on an immersive journey of discovery and curiosity. The campus was abuzz with excitement as Preschool and Junior School classes engaged in a range of captivating activities led by their senior school peers. Overall, Science Week was a resounding success, marked by collaborative learning, hands-on exploration, and the thrill of scientific discovery.

Let's take a closer look at the highlights of this enriching event.

Preschool: Exploring Rainbows and Colour

Under the guidance of Mr Hartshorn and Ms Workman, our youngest scientists in Preschool embarked on a colourful adventure. They learned about the formation of rainbows and delved into the concept of colour. Through exciting practical activities, where they split white light, combined coloured light and explored colour wheels, students uncovered the science of rainbows.

Kinder: Embracing the Scientist Within

Led by the dynamic duo of Mr Murphy and Ms Workman from Stage 5 Forensics, Kinder students delved into the world of scientific inquiry. They pondered the question: "What is a scientist? What do they do?" Through engaging activities, students tried their hands at fingerprinting and chromatography, stepping into the shoes of investigators and unravelling the mysteries of science.

Year 1: Types of Lifeforms

Year 7 students, along with Mr Hartshorn and Mr Murphy, guided our Year 1 learners on a captivating exploration of living things. The topic, "Living things grow and change," came to life as students peered through magnifying glasses to observe intricate plant and animal species models. This hands-on experience left them with a deeper understanding of the marvels of the natural world and the use of scientific classification and naming systems.

Year 2: Energizing the Imagination

With the expertise of Year 8 students and the guidance of Ms McNamara and Ms Clancy, Year 2 students delved into the fascinating realm of energy. They discovered the existence of various energy types and forms, with a thrilling practical activity involving the creation of Robocopters. Engaging in experimental design and exploring variables ignited their creativity and critical thinking.

Year 3: Unveiling Animal Adaptations

Year 9 students, led by Ms Workman and Ms McNamara, introduced Year 3 students to the concept of animal adaptations. Through a hands-on activity involving mixed-up animals, our budding biologists delved into the wonders of nature's ingenuity, witnessing first-hand the incredible ways animals adapt to their environments.

Year 4: Harnessing Energy's Power

Year 10 students, under the guidance of Ms Clancy and Mr Barrows, guided Year 4 students through the captivating world of energy transfer and transformation. With the creation of balloon racers, students witnessed Newton's third law of motion in action, gaining insights into the transformative power of energy.

Year 5: A Dive into Medical Science

Stage 5 elective Medical Science students, along with Mr Hartshorn and Ms McNamara, led Year 5 students through a fascinating exploration of the human heart and blood. Unique practical activities involving blood separation via centrifuging and blood groups showcased the marvels of the human body and medical science.

Year 6: Solving Scientific Mysteries

Under the guidance of Stage 5 Forensic Science students and Ms Workman, Year 6 students embraced the challenges of High School science. They entered a thrilling crime scene escape room, where they applied DNA blood typing and hair sample analysis to solve a scientific mystery, experiencing the excitement of forensic investigation first-hand.

Science Week 2023 was an extraordinary journey that ignited curiosity, sparked imaginations and fostered a deep appreciation for the wonders of the natural world. We extend our heartfelt gratitude to our dedicated educators and enthusiastic students for making this week a resounding success.

Cricket NSW Blitz Player Visit

On Tuesday 22 August, we were very lucky to have Claire Moore (CNSW Breakers), Ebony Hoskin (CNSW Breakers) and Ollie Davies (Sydney Thunder) speak to our Year 3-6 students about their professional cricket journey.

They are currently on the road promoting Woolworths Blast and the Big Bash game between the Thunder and the Stars that happens locally on 23 December.

It was amazing to have such great young role models to inspire our Junior School students. A big thank you to Jerim Hayes (Riverina Cricket Co-ordinator) for his work in organising this visit for us.

Sam McDonald Under 12’s National AFL Carnival

On Thursday 10 August, the Year 6 cohort went to support Sam McDonald (Year 6) at the Under 12 National AFL Carnival. Sam was playing for NSW and they came up against a very strong team in South Australia.

He played a great game and his cheer squad got behind his every possession. Well done to Sam on this fantastic achievement and well done to his classmates for getting there to support him!

NSWCIS Netball

On Monday 14 August, select Scots students were at Sydney Olympic Park representing Riverina Associated Schools (RAS) at the NSWCIS Netball Challenge. Across the Independent Schools in our region, we had five representatives from Scots.

Phoebe (Year 10) and Charlotte Packer (Year 8) were in the Under 15s team while Olivia Maguire (Year 12), Audrey Adams (Year 12) and Hayley Whitsed (Year 10) were competing in the Open side.

It was a massive day of games and great competition playing against other talented netballers from across the state. Ms Clancy also was there coaching the Open side. While there weren’t too many wins, it was a wonderful experience for all.