From the Principal
Our ‘Arts House’ is on the drawing board!
The Spring Dinner last week offered the perfect opportunity to launch our major fundraising drive for a space the School has long dreamed of having – an Arts House. The announcement was met with the genuine excitement that I am confident will drive this project. The Spring Dinner raised over $20,000 – a beginning!
“There is immense power when a group of people with similar interests gets together to work toward the same goals.” - Idowu Koyenikan
The Blackhall Kalimna campus needs a large flexible space – a centre where our art program, music and performance can flourish.
Just as the Kevin Borland Hall is the heart and lungs of Arlington – an ever-changing and adaptive space that represents the life and ethos of the School, so too we need our own hall at the Secondary School.
A space which enables us to:
- gather, as a whole school for forums, presentations and orations
- run student conferences – such as the Philosophy Conference
- use as a gallery space for exhibitions
- use for performances, musical and dramatic, of all sizes
- house large-scale orchestral rehearsals and performances
- host international events, such as IB Professional Development
- run parent forums and community gatherings for genuine community consultation
- accommodate Alumni reunions.
Over the last eight years our small community has built a new Library, carried out a significant renovation of the Kalimna building, the senior Art spaces and Science laboratories, completely refurbished Arlington House, completely rebuilt the treasured ‘Fives’ classroom and secured generous funding to construct an innovative passage and stairway to connect the Kindergarten to the Garden Room. Currently, we are finalising plans to have The Cage basketball/tennis court transformed with the construction of a roof to turn it into an all weather court.
In Term Four we will have a workshop to begin in earnest and we invite you, our students and our community to participate in this opportunity for the School to develop a brief so we can move forward with a long-term plan to raise the necessary funds to realise this vision by 2023. Invitations will be sent out early next term.
I have no doubt that we can build a beautiful, inspiring space that gives expression to our enduring philosophy of collaboration, performance and community.
Marilyn Smith
Principal