Year 5 Presentation Night

In last year’s report, I noted a couple of things.  Firstly that I had to zoom in to the presentation night along with some students and families.  This year we were able to run an evening with students, teachers and families attending in person, which is always so much better. We did have one student zooming in and that was Grace Keleher who is now living in Cairns and it was lovely to witness her speech and realise her connection to her friends and her school. Well done Grace.

Secondly I wrote last year “This year was a another challenging year for adults and children alike, but the grade five students rose to the occasion as we have come to expect from this school and I congratulate each and every student for their ownership of this program and for creating an environment of learning”.  This certainly applies again this year, the students had many teachers along the way, had production to contend with and to top it all off the only way we could fit the Youth Leadership Program in was to condense the dates.  This Program is already an accelerated learning program and we were able to schedule the eight classes into under five weeks.

It was clear to me from the start that the students were under enormous pressure with some being overwhelmed by the expectations of public speaking, and without mentioning any names, we had tears in both of the classes.  After discussing this with the students and teachers we decided this year to do away with the trophies and thus the speech contest which was a great relief, especially as this year we only had 24 hours between the last lesson and the rehearsals where normally we have seven days.

St Mary’s Hampton you are the most amazing school with strong leadership and the most resilient Grade Five students. Again students rose to the occasion and performed their speeches, Off the Cuff speeches and evaluations with great confidence and flair.  To entertain the audience Zale performed a magic trick and 5D “busted a move” dancing to “I’m Still Standing”.  I was particularly moved by the two original poems delivered as part of the Thank you speeches.  Well done Erica and Georgia.

Congratulations to each and every student for their ownership of this program and showing enormous personal growth and confidence.  How lovely it was to witness the looks of pride on the mums and dad’s faces.  All students were awarded their certificates of completion. 

Special thanks to both the Master of Ceremonies, Felix Arnott and Thomas Hart for their fine efforts, and to the Off the Cuff Presenters Jesicca Taylor and Ruiben Kolimackovski for their excellent work.  A very big thank you to Mr Sweeney for attending both of the meetings, for responding to Off the Cuff Questions and for all of his work behind the scenes.  An even bigger thank you to the teachers for their support of the students, Mrs Bohan, Ms Moxon and Mrs Biffin. 

Last but not least a huge thank you to all the parents for supporting their students throughout the term and for your attendance.  Without you we would not have an audience.  Some of the students had netball gradings and then attended the later presentation – thank you for your dedication.  Your time and your support is much appreciated.

Your school certainly has lots of talented and dedicated students and I think you will have some excellent leaders next year. 

Well done everybody.

Sandra de Geest

Advanced Presentation Skills