WHS Newsletter | Issue 4.8 | 4 December 2020

Principal's Message

Kia ora, welcome to the Wakatipu High School newsletter at the end of Week 8 - our penultimate week. Another short piece from me this week as the end of the 2020 year approaches. NCEA exams continue with the final exams next week. Branches Camp has been in for a week now with four days to go - it has been a mixed week for them with events and some wild weather, but they had a good day yesterday and hopefully today’s rain is not too bad in there.

Last week of school for Junior students:

• Monday 7th - school as normal for Year 9s.
• Tuesday 8th
• Year 9 Programme - a special annual day for our Year 9s including a range of activities, a BBQ and Christmas Assembly. NB this is a mufti day.
• Year 10 - Branches Camp all out.
• Wednesday 9th
• Year 9 - School as normal from 9.10am. Prizegiving 11.45am, buses run from 1.15pm. This is the last day of school for Year 9s.
• Year 10 - Branches rest day.
• Thursday 10th - Year 10 - School as normal from 9.00am. Prizegiving 12.15pm, buses run from 1.45pm. This is the last day of school for Year 10s.

NB re Prizegivings - please note that: prizewinners and parents have been notified; these are very formal events and all students need to be in full uniform - including blazer and tie, and correct shoes and socks, and prizewinners must be in correct uniform to cross the stage.

The end of the year is nigh for students and, along with our Year 13 Graduation next Wednesday night, we are looking forward to celebrating with our students next week.

Despite the fact that we are now officially in summer, this very spring-like weather continues into the weekend with Sunday currently looking like the best chance for getting outdoors - fingers crossed.

Steve Hall
Principal

Branches Camp Photos

Branches Trust

BRANCHES BOOK
Now would be a great time to buy a copy of our wonderful “Long Drops and Hard Knocks” for your child.  Not only does it detail the history of the camp from the early days but it also has loads of anecdotes from the recent years, it talks about all the different activities that they do, there is a great topo map Ken McIntyre has written on showing where all the activities take place in relation to each other.  The chapter on the food is amazing, including a few recipes!  This book would be a great family moment of a unique and memorable school camp. 

The book is now $49.95 or 2 for $90 and is available from the following locations and also the Remarkables Park Market until Christmas .... WHS front desk, Summerfields Pharmacy, Arrowtown Museum, Halo, The Exchange, Odelay, Provisions, Dorothy Browns, Brandlands, Paper Plus, Bound and the Event Centre or online at www.branchestrust.co.nz.  

USBs
Photos from the 2020 Branches Camp will be available to order and purchase from the Branches Trust website. The collection of photos on a USB stick is a fantastic souvenir for you and your child of this iconic camp. Year 10s and parents will be notified by email of when and where the photos will be available for collection once they come home from camp. The cost of the USB stick will be $20.

Belinda Crichton
Branches Trust

Uniform Shop Open Hours

As we approach the end of the year, new students enrolled for 2021 will want to start organising their Wakatipu High School uniform. As some of you will already know, we have an in-house uniform shop at the school with a full range of WHS uniform items available for try-on purposes only.

Open hours for this will be:
3:15pm - 4:15pm Monday 7th December to Thursday 10th December 2020  
10:00am - 4:00pm Monday 18th January to Friday 22nd January 2021

If you are unable to come into the shop, there are sizing charts when you click on any item in the online shop and guidelines to help you with taking measurements.  We generally recommend when choosing a blazer to take into consideration upcoming growth spurts and to allow for approximately 2cms extra space in the shoulders.
Also, small items, such as socks, belts, jerseys, tights and ties, are available to buy at the uniform shop. 

Emily Ellice
Uniform Shop Manager

BYOD at WHS

Our minimum specifications for BYOD devices are published on our website and it's good to periodically check that your student's device is suitable and meeting our minimum standards, including battery life. Students should bring devices to school fully charged each day.

The end of the school year is a good time to check each device, make sure there is up to date anti-virus installed, clean up the machine by uninstalling unnecessary applications and running a Disk Cleanup routine to help optimise performance. A Disk Cleanup does things like deleting temporary files and old downloads and helps free up disk space and memory. 

A reminder that VPN software is not allowed on any device connected to the WHS network, and we also do not support Chromebooks.

We understand that on occasion families may need assistance in meeting the costs of various aspects of school life. If you need financial assistance in ensuring your student has a device for learning please read further here.

Andrea Wilton-Connell
Executive Officer

Thank you!

Thank you to Jo and the team at justcuts from the Queenstown Central shopping area!  
Recently justcuts offered a Wakatipu High School family a year of free haircuts given that it has been a difficult financial year for many Queenstown families.  This has been given to a deserving family and we wish to thank justcuts for their support of our school community.

Vicki Patton
Guidance Counsellor

Scout Success

Last week four Senior Scouts from Arrowtown Scout Group, all WHS Year 9 students, achieved their Chief Scout Awards - Josh May 13, Ellie Carter 14, Eva Hemingway 14 and Jess Cartman 14. For each of these Scouts, the Chief Scout Award is the culmination of up to seven years of Scouting, with specific work over the past three years.

Most memorable are two adventures, the New Zealand Scout Jamboree last summer holidays, which was a 10 day camp at Mystery Creek in Hamilton with 4000+ other Scouts from around New Zealand, Australia and the Pacific where they achieved several goals and learned many outdoor skills.  Most recently during the October school holidays together they completed their Explorer Challenge, where they were required to plan and complete their own solo trip including three days and nights, 150kms of travel using four modes of transport.  They completed this during extreme adverse weather - which included wind, rain and snow which required their willingness to persevere, work as a team and stay the course in challenging conditions.    Their contribution to our community over the past three years in working with younger Scouts, contributing to community projects and assisting their fellow Scouts to share their knowledge has been outstanding.

To use a Scouting term - we say 'BRAVO!'

Karen Iremonger

Sports News and Results

Canoe Junior Cricket Tournament
WHS was invited to compete for the first time at the Canoe Junior Cricket Tournament hosted by St Kevins in Oamaru which ran from Tuesday to Thursday this week. With the Year 10s at Branches we sent a solid group of keen Year 9 cricketers to play a range of schools in three 40 over matches. The team stayed on site at the St Kevin's hostel. A massive thank you to our wonderful coaches Matt Hollyer and Bevan Clarke who took the team away and made this awesome opportunity happen for our up and coming cricketers. The following report has been written by Matt Hollyer.

Day one vs Waitaki Boys, at Waitaki Boys
We batted first and put together a number of good partnerships, to set a strong target of 225. Xavier Small powerfully smashed 71 off 67 balls and Mason Clarke followed in similar form with 45 off 28 balls. Mason was then the main contributor with the ball with 5 for 18 as we demolished their batting line up to win by 100 runs.

Day two vs St Thomas's College of Christchurch at St Kevin's
We batted first again and had a tough start to our innings before Mason Clarke stepped up with 92 impressive runs to lead us to a total of 198. With a bit of luck for our bowlers early in St Thomas's run chase we could have defended the target, but we still pushed them deep into the game and St Thomas's got the winning runs with just 2.5 overs to spare. Xavier Small was the pick of our bowlers with 3 for 31.

Day three vs Southland Boys at St Kevin's
SBHS batted first and set an imposing total of 230/3 with an impressive century from their opener. The team kept good energy in tough conditions and fielded well. Ashton White, Matt Langford and Xavier Small made the strongest contributions with the bat and we batted out the 40 overs but couldn't match their total, losing by 80 runs.

The tournament was a well organised and nicely hosted event to which we have been asked to return. Tough windy and hot conditions, then cold temps tested the fielding and bowling especially. Everyone made a great contribution with their efforts as a team. All players were a credit to themselves and their school with their behaviour on and off the field.

U15 Boys Otago Country Cricket Reps
Congratulations to Mason Clarke, Xavier Small, Jack Trounce, Subath Wijerathna, Anthony Hollyer and Matt Langford who have all been recently named in the U15 Otago Country cricket team to compete in a pre-Christmas Otago regional tournament. So great to see so many Wakatipu High School students make this team. Well done boys!

Ignite Sevens Series
Olive Watherston has been selected into the Women's Power team for this weekend's Red Bull Ignite Sevens series. The four teams; Bolt, Inferno, Power and Surge will compete against each other in Tauranga over Saturday and Sunday. You can catch the action from 12:30pm on Sky Sport 1 on Sunday 6th December.

NZSS Athletic Champs
All the very best to the seven athletes representing Wakatipu High School at the New Zealand Secondary School Athletic Champs in Tauranga next weekend. The seven competitors are; Aleks Cheifetz, Eliana Collins, Louis Conway, Jude Deaker, Abby Fookes, Sammy Fookes and Jackson Rogers. These athletes have been training very hard over the past few months for this competition and we wish you well in each of your events!

Careers Department - Student Job Vacancies

We are looking for a mature animal loving senior student (with drivers licence) to assist us over the busy summer period.  Please contact Lyn  0272311197 or the website https://stardogwalks.co.nz

Key Dates

Community Notices