Department News
- Languages - China Language & Cultural Tour 2017
- Performing Arts - 'Boy Overboard' tickets now available
- Public Speaking and Debating
SPX College China Language & Cultural Tour 2017
Plans are underway with regards to a trip for students to China. At this stage, we are hoping to travel in the September/October school holidays this year. The dates are yet to be finalised; however we are hopeful of a departure close to 23 September 2017.
Students studying Chinese in Years 9, 10, 11 & 12 are invited to participate.
An information evening will be held at 6.30pm on Wednesday 15th March 2017 in the Sarto Centre.
Ms Kara Manga - Teacher in Charge LOTE
Performing Arts
BOY OVERBOARD: Boy Overboard will be staged in the Sarto Centre from Tuesday 28th – Thursday 30th March at 7.00pm. Tickets are NOW on sale. Please go to: https://www.trybooking.com/241016 Seating is limited and tickets will NOT be sold at the door.
PAPA will be hosting a light supper at intermission for a gold coin donation. Proceeds from intermission will be donated to the Edmund Rice Centre at Homebush to support the work they do with refugees and asylum seekers.
OPEN DAY: The following ensembles will be performing at Open Day this Saturday: Senior Jazz Band, Senior Guitar Ensemble and Senior String Quartet. All students are required at school no later than 9.30pm.
COLLEGE ORCHESTRA WORKSHOP: The Senior Strings only will be required THIS Sunday from 10.30 – 12.00pm.
ENCORE CONCERT: Students in Years 11 and 12 Music will be attending this concert of the best HSC Performances from 2016 NEXT Monday 20th March, 7.00pm at the Opera House. Students should be in their seats no later than 6.45pm.
MEET THE MUSIC CONCERT: Years 9, 10, 11 and 12 Elective Music students will attend a series of evening concerts throughout the year. The first is NEXT Thursday 23rd March, 6.30pm at the Opera House. A permission note has been sent home with all the details and students should be in their seats no later than 6.15pm.
JAZZ BAND WORKSHOPS: Workshops will be held for the Senior and Intermediate Jazz Bands on Sunday 2nd April in preparation for the Sydney Eisteddfod next term. A note will be sent home with the details before the end of the week.
Ms T Bates - Performing Arts Coordinator
Public Speaking & Debating
CSDA COMPETITION PUBLIC SPEAKING
Last Friday, 10th March Andrew Jackson competed in the CSDA Public Speaking Zone Final at Riverview. Andrew presented a brilliant speech (as he always does) but he did not move through to the Final.
CSDA DEBATE ADJUDICATOR SEMINAR
This Thursday, 16th March, the Year 11 and Year 12 debaters will be running the above seminar in the Blue Room. The evening commences at 6pm with Year 11 able to leave once they have presented their debate. Year 12 will stay on and complete their training session and should be leaving the school at around 8.30pm. All of our Year 12 debaters will be receiving their adjudicator training on Thursday night and will be qualified CSDA Adjudicators which means that they can work for St Pius X College in 2018 as coach/adjudicators if they so desire. Our Year 11 debaters are presenting the debate that will be used to train the adjudicators. We could not host this event without our Year 11’s support. Thank you to all of our Year 11 debaters.
CATHOLIC SCHOOLS’ DEBATING COMPETITION (CSDA)
Students have commenced training and we will all be training from 3.30 – 5pm this Friday afternoon. Students know the venue for their training sessions. Debaters need to read the Daily Notices to ensure that they keep up with the latest information. The CSDA competition dates are as follows. St Pius X College will be hosting 4 of these 11 events. The venues for each event will be published before the end of Term 1.
Term 2
Round 1 April 28
Round 2 May 5
Round 3 May 12
Round 4 May 19
Round 5 May 26
Round 6 June 2
Elimination Round 1 June 16
Elimination Round 2 June 23
Term 3
Quarterfinal July 21
Semi-final July 28
Grand Final August 3
Debaters need to attend ALL of the first six rounds. If your team makes it through to the Elimination round (and beyond) you also need to keep those dates free.
CSDA debates commence at 6pm and students and coaches either travel to venues at 5pm or, when hosting, students have a one hour dinner break before our guests arrive at the College for a 6pm competition commencement. SDN debates have a different, later running order.
Our senior students act as coaches/supporters for our junior teams. We are also lucky enough to have ex-students to work with the junior teams as the younger students really enjoy contact with our ex-debating “champions”.
SCHOOL’S DEBATING NETWORK
St Pius X participates in the School’s Debating Network (SDN) Competition. Schools include Abbotsleigh, Redlands, Riverview, Roseville College, Stella Maris, Monte & Wenona. This 7 round competition runs in Term 3 every Friday night from 21st July to 8th September. There will then be a Tiebreaker and Final round.
Round 1 - 21st July, Roseville College hosting St Pius X College
Round 2 - 28th July, Stella Maris hosting St Pius X College
Round 3 - 4th August, Riverview hosting St Pius X College
Round 4 - 11th August, St Pius X College hosting Wenona
Round 5 - 18th August, St Pius X College hosting Monte
Round 6 - 25th August, Abbotsleigh hosting St Pius X College
Round 7 - 2nd September, Redlands hosting St Pius X College
Tiebreaker - 8th September, hosted by St Pius X College
Final - 15th September, hosted by Monte
The fee for the CSDA extra-curricular activity is $105.00 which will be included in your Term Two school fees. This fee goes towards paying for Friday evening coach hiring in order to get to our away venues. We keep our fees as low as possible and have funding from the St Pius X College P & F to subsidise the cost of hiring coaches on Friday evenings.
Thank you on behalf of the brilliant Pius debating coaches and senior student mentors.
Mrs M Waterson - Debating and Public Speaking Convener