Across Campus

DEBATING

We have completed the last round of the debating season at St Bernard's College.

Round 5 saw all five Academy teams win their debates, a first for this season!

It is especially exciting for our Year 10 Team as this is the first win for them this year after a very tough draw. As well as this, one of our Year 9 teams (Academy 2) finished on top of the ladder for their grade.

We now wait to hear about which teams will make the play offs, but congratulations to all our debaters for a very successful 2022 season!

Ms Fiona Tassone Public Speaking Coordinator

ACADEMY BE LIKE HER LIVE Program 2022

Twenty students from Years 7 to 11 were involved in the inaugural BE LIKE HER LIVE radio broadcast and podcast initiative on LIVE FM. 

‘BE LIKE HER aims to have our students explore and create their own narrative of the positive and powerful impact women have had on their community and the world’. 

The students had the opportunity to interview eleven women from our local community, hearing stories about their successes in a variety of fields and the challenges they have faced. The women graciously shared their experiences with our students, showing them the many and varied paths available to them after school. They empowered the girls to see possibilities in their passions, to seek opportunities, and to find the courage to overcome obstacles.  Listen to the interviews here.

Student Experiences

I learned that it is more important to listen to people then to speak about yourself.

… It was all about being there for each other and the person we were interviewing … to always find common understanding and believe that every person has something to offer. 

Rahel Abraham  11 Purple

The skills of being a radio host, or on the panel, can be used for all of one’s life as it encourages bravery, curiosity and quick-thinking. 

I also learnt about the many strong qualities of the guests. These women are hard-working, strong and intelligent and have defied the odds to find success in their chosen areas. I will continue to be inspired by them and their stories. 

Grace McKinnis 11 Silver

The ‘Be like her live’ project … I found some confidence in interviewing people … speaking up with my voice and collaborating.

Ellen Daffey 10 Green

The women we interviewed motivated me to have the courage to go after my passions and showed us that we can make a difference in this world, just like they have. 

Simone Jacklin 11 Red

…we were able to learn and think about how we could improve gender equality and female empowerment. … This experience has definitely made me think about how these women had to work very hard and had to overcome many barriers to be who they are today, which has certainly had an impact and changed my thinking.

Joaquina Fitzpatrick 9 Bryce

MRC

August has now arrived and in the world of libraries that means “Book Week”, the highlight of the year. Book Week started early for the Year 7s who were invited to our Author Visit on Thursday 4 August.  

Emily Gale has worked in the children’s book industry for 25 years in various roles: in-house editor, consultant to a literary agent, children’s book buyer, award judge, reviewer, freelance manuscript assessor, and as a writer-in-residence in a high school library. Emily’s writing includes Young Adult novels and books for late primary/early high school readers.

Emily was an engaging speaker who spoke about her writing process and where ideas for her stories come from. The Year 7s really enjoyed and gained much from listening and asking fantastic questions.

Dreaming with your eyes open is the 2022 Book Week theme nominated by the Children’s Book Council of Australia (CBCA).

During Book Week we will be having some special activities such as:

Starting the celebrations on 

• Monday 22 August: second hand book sale.  A gold coin donation will find you a treasure to take home. All money raised will go to the Indigenous Literacy Foundation.  If you have any books you wish to donate to the stall please drop them into the MRC.
• Tuesday 23 August: book folding sculptures. Library staff member Ms Salvo will be running a workshop on book folding sculptures. Many examples of these sculptures decorate the MRC already. Further art activities will be run during lunchtimes and participation in any activity earns you an entry into the raffle.
• Friday 26 August: “Read in” will be held in the MRC. Bring your lunch, blanket and a book and snuggle up for a quiet relaxing time reading. 

A very busy and exciting time in the MRC! Happy Reading.

Ms Anne Chowne & Ms Cathy Bennett 

MRC Co-Learning Leaders 

EARTH AT ACADEMY

Sustainable Food Workshop 

Earth at Academy was fortunate to have a talk on Sustainability presented to them by Yuna and Victor – two students from The University of Melbourne. 

Yuna & Victor talked to us about the UN’s Sustainability Development Goals, specifically Goal 12 which is on Responsible Consumption & Production.

They also addressed goal 12.3 – Cutting food waste by half.  We were given 3 rules to follow:

1. Eat more plants – eating plants is 35 times better for the environment than meat based protein.
2. Try new things – Biodiversity.  There are 30,000 edible plants and yet we only eat 150 – 200 of these.  We were challenged to try at least 1 new food per week for the rest of our lives.
3. Waste less food – 1/3 of all food produced is wasted.  The top foods that are wasted are bread – 43%, meal leftovers – 47%, fresh vegetables – 51% and fresh fruit – 34%.  We were asked to focus on cutting our food waste by half.

Tips to help us waste less food include:

1. Look what is in your fridge and use up the food that is there and make a shopping list before you go to the supermarket so that you only buy what you need.
2. Don’t be afraid to buy ‘ugly’ fruits and vegetables.  They taste the same and their nutritional value is the same as the regular shaped foods.
3. Make sure that they temperature inside of your fridge is right.  It should be set to 4°C.
4. A happy plate is an empty plate – finish your food.
5. Some foods are better off out of the fridge like bananas, pineapple and bread.

We did some group work and came up with suggestions of how to implement the food rules.  Some of the suggestions given by the students included having new recipes, eating more vegetarian foods, having compost bins at home.  When you waste food you also waste land, energy and water and we need to be mindful of this and all doing our best to follow sustainable practices.

Ms Mara Atkins Food Technology Learning Leader  

Ms Amy Prendergast Sustainability Leader

YR 10 WORK EXPERIENCE

In the last week of Term 2, we did work experience as part of the University of Melbourne Faculty of Science. Our discipline was Ecosystems and Forest Science and we got to spend a week at the different campuses at University of Melbourne with a group of 20 other like-minded students. It was a very rewarding experience and we got to travel to the Creswick campus and the Burnley campus as part of the program. We looked at green roofs, rain gardens, gum plantations and the way trees burn and bushfires spread. We highly recommend this program, for future year 10s as it was a unique and worthwhile experience!

Olivia Moffat & Ada Ryan 10G

All Year 10 Students will be taking up placements at the conclusion of Term 3 [12-16 September 2022].  We look forward to further stories and amazing experiences from many of our Year 10 students.

Mrs Anne Marie Allan Work Experience Coordinator  

Ms Lauren Sach Careers Practitioner