From our Captains

Hey all! Welcome back to the From the Captains page! We hope you all had a wonderful break and are so excited to update you on what's been going on with the leadership team.

So They Can Updates

The end of March marked the end of our 'So They Can' fundraiser, and with your help we were able to raise around $1400, which will fund the education of 4 young girls in Kenya, keeping them in school for the next 12 months. Thank you all so much for chipping in and helping us aid others, and stay tuned for the drawing of the Funfields raffle!

ANZAC Ceremonies

This week we have been busy attending various ANZAC ceremonies. Kicking these off was last Friday’s Annual ANZAC Ceramony for Victorian Students, which the leadership team attended together with hundreds of other students from across the state.

Held at the Shrine of Remembrance and attended by the Honourable Margaret Gardner AC, Governor of Victoria, these proceedings were a moving tribute to those who have lost their lives, and those who have been forever changed, in the name of our country.

On Wednesday we brought remembrance back to school with our own ceremonies that were attended by all students. Nathan (Vice Captain) spoke of the meaning of ANZAC Spirit, stating that “ANZAC day for me is an opportunity to remember my grandfather’s life, to remember all that he has given for me and to remember the horrors of war that have taken those we love away from us”. We would also like to thank Mr Bill Little from the Greensborough RSL, who came out to speak about the importance of ANZAC day and reflection on the past, and all the student body who showed incredible respect throughout – even when it started pouring down rain.

On ANZAC day, myself (Niamh), Nathan and Martina attended both the Eltham Dawn Service, and the Montmorency-Eltham Family Service to lay wreaths, and Nathan recited the poem “They will live on” by Nova Rae at the latter. These were again touching commemorations of those who have fought and died for our nation.

Upcoming Student Forum

Really excitingly, we have now set a date for our Student Forum!! On June 7th, we will be leading discussion with students on ways to improve our school, which we will use moving forward to advocate for the needs of the student body. Stay tuned for more info over the coming weeks as we will be reaching out to students to ensure we hear from as many people as possible.

New Contacts

Thanks to the advocacy of our wonderful Tech Captains, we now have new email addresses specific to our role as captains. Please feel free to use these at any time to voice any questions or requests that you have.

College Captains: College.Captains@sthelena.vic.edu.au

Vice Captains: Vice.Captains@sthelena.vic.edu.au

Technology Captains: Technology.Captains@sthelena.vic.edu.au

Sports Captains: Sport.Captains@sthelena.vic.edu.au

Music Captains: Music.Captains@sthelena.vic.edu.au

Dance Captains: Dance.Captains@sthelena.vic.edu.au

Performing Arts Captains: PerformingArts.Captains@sthelena.vic.edu.au

From the Performing Arts Captains

Get ready for a trip to Grover's Corners! Our 2024 school play of Thornton Wilder's classic, Our Town, opens in just TWO WEEKS!

The story is a masterpiece, focusing a lens on the simple, precious moments in life that come then go, and the endless questions that lie beyond the grave for us all. The simple design concept explores the poetic beauty of life's defining moments, and how we navigate the cycles of life and death and the notion we are constantly propelled forward, arriving at the next moment.

Set in the fictional town of Grover's Corners in 1909, the play is placed in a theatre, however to a modern audience could be perceived as a virtual dissection of a moment in time. A Stage Manager, narrates the story and leads us on the journey, as characters step in and out of character to answer questions, discovering and gathering information on this town, its characters and stories we recognise in ourselves.

For our amazing students, we've got a special deal! We are selling half-price tickets EVERY TUESDAY at lunchtime in front of the theatre for just $7.50 (cash only). ️

Otherwise, book your tickets through Trybooking at this link: https://www.trybooking.com/events/landing/1190779

We look forward to you joining us in Grover's Corners soon!

From the Sports Captains

Congratulations to the St Helena students who travelled to Adelaide from the 11th-19th of April to represent Victoria in the 2024 Australian Track and Field Championships. Students involved were Tara Smith (U20 hammer throw and javelin throw), Vanessa Smith (U18 hammer throw and javelin throw), Charlee Dickson (U20 400m hurdles), Toby Hamilton (U15 javelin throw and high jump) and Lucy Johns (U16 3000m race walk). Also want to mention St Helena alumni student Jaryd Clifford who competed in the Open age 1500m.

From the Technology Captains

MAKERSPACE

We have started, and begun running the MakerSpace club, along with Ms Churcher - where we teach a variety of workshops, as well as invite all to come along to get help with anything tech/craft (found in the Library (LIB 2), Tuesdays Lunch 1:15-1:45).

On the 5th and 12th of March we ran 3d modelling/design in preparation for the 19th where we ran a session using the 3d printers, and how to properly prepare a model to be printed. On the 26th of March we ran a workshop on making a basic custom questionnaire app in visual studio, that taught students the ropes on app development. We continued this first-week back on the 16th with a simple calculator program, and taught a laser cutting workshop on the 23rd.

Due to high popularity, we plan to teach CAD programs and skills in the coming weeks.

VICTORIAN CODING CHALLENGE

We would like to put out a call for the 2024 Victorian Coding challenge, by MAV. This is a great opportunity to increase your coding skills, and participate in a friendly competition, even possibly winning some prizes! There is a two-stage process to the competition:

In stage 1 students will receive a virtual kit with a series of fun and engaging coding tasks. Students will participate in these tasks via a user-friendly online platform – accessible from school or home. The challenges will require that students apply coding and algorithmic thinking in order to solve interesting problems. These tasks can be conducted either at school or during school holidays, at the student's pace. Scaffolding and coding resources will be provided in case students need some support along the way.

Stage 2 allows students to compete with others in a state-wide coding competition which will be a face-to-face event. In this competition, students will be competing in groups of 2-4, in many different challenges and games. This promises to be a fun-filled day, with challenge, excitement, friendly competition and prizes for the winning teams.

Categories are based on year levels: (And it is free to participate for public schools)

Years 7 & 8

Years 9 & 10

Students may form groups of 2 to 4 and contact us at Technology.Captains@sthelena.vic.edu.au to register interest.

REQUESTING UNBLOCKING WEBSITES

Given that you may want to have a website unblocked at school for educational purposes, there are channels to request this.

Your teacher may request IT directly, through an email to the Staff IT Support address, with the details of the Category and URL in the block message you have received (You can also take a screenshot of your browser and send it to the teacher and have them forward it on.)

For students with external subjects, or for educational apps/websites that don’t fall under a subject, the channel to have a website unblocked is through your year-level co-ordinator, following the same process as above.

Any queries about the system, or unusual requests can be emailed to ITHelp@sthelena.vic.edu.au or Technology.Captains@sthelena.vic.edu.au.

That’s all from us! We know this was a long one so thankyou for reading through it all.

As always reach out with any questions (see our cool new email addresses above)