From the Acting Principal Kite ingoa o te Atua, o te Tamaiti, o te Wairua Tapu. Amene.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank the many parents, staff and friends of St Bernard’s College who have contributed to our co-curricular activities. You have given

generously of your time and other resources so that our students have been able to play sport, compete in inter-school competitions and perform in the arts. The list of activities available to our boys is growing every year and we are one of the schools with the most sporting involvement by students in the Wellington region. Thank you also to the parents who have supported teams on the side-lines or who have helped with travel. You are affirming your son’s participation while at the same time building a very positive relationship with him. We are always trying to enhance the academic skills of St Bernard’s men and are targetting our students’ literacy and numeracy. Are there parents or grandparents in the community who might be able to assist with some reading or mathematics remedial work? If you have some spare time during the day and are interested, we would be very grateful. Please contact Mrs Johnson 560 9250 ext 886 or sjohnson@sbc.school.nz. I wish students a well-deserved break these holidays. Seniors will need to make time to do some revision. Their reports will indicate where extra effort is needed. Families please support your sons by insisting that they put time aside to do this. They will thank you for this …. all be it in the long term. David Sefton Acting Principal

Achieve @ St Bernard’s

September 2013

Retreats

Wow, what a result! Year 10 retreat was held at Camp Wellesley in the Akatarawa Valley. The theme of this retreat was Moral Compass and working out what is the right direction in our lives. The activities of orienteering and obstacle course reinforced the themes of team work and finding our way, with the reflection tie looking at our life journey so far and how to orientate ourselves to the values we find in the Gospels. Year 7/8 retreat was held at the Silverstream Retreat Centre. Our focus was on the brotherhood —Tuakana Teina. It was a great day where we spent time working on what the brotherhood is, the importance of it and how we understand the concept of Tuakana Teina. We spent some time reflecting on who are tuakana to us and on how we wanted to be as we emerge as young teina in our school.

A huge thanks to our senior students who were tuakana on the day and to the amazing Marcellin staff.

Congratulations The last ball has been kicked in another successful football season. Of the 6 teams eligible for finals we had three teams get there. Of the 3 teams in the finals we had 3 teams pick up winners medals. This is an excellent achievement and the players, parents and coaching staff can justifiably be very proud.

Our 1st XI were victorious 3-2 over HIBS 1 (Div1 title), the 3rd XI were 3-1 victors over Wgtn High School 4 (Div 10 title) and our Junior 1 team (U15) were 2-1 victors over Newlands College 1 (Div 2 title). Fantastic work teams! Final results for our other 3 college sport teams were: 2nd XI, 3rd in division 5, 4th XI, 4th in division 12, and the Junior 2 team, 5th in division 5. Our Hutt Valley 13th grade team finished 2nd in their grade.

Science

A convoy of Year 9 students headed for Wellington Museum of City and Sea and the famous Beehive. As the heavens opened up the great people at Wellington Museum of City and Sea welcomed us into their warm and dry building. We were given an escorted tour of the museum and a detailed account of Kupe and his arrival in Aotearoa. Then we were given a 3D presentation of Maui. It was quite an original and interesting morning

and the time passed quickly. A big thanks to Rachel Ingram and the museum for their efforts. We headed to McDonald’s for lunch, then it was on to Parliament where we were greeted by security guards who scanned us and our bags. It really was a surprise. We were led to the room where John Key has his news interviews, then we were taken to another room that was laid out like a small parliament debating chamber. Trevor Mallard, our local MP for Hutt South, met us there. He answered a lot of question about his job as an MP. We then moved up to the debating chamber just as Parliament was beginning. It was question time in the debating chamber. We witnessed a lot of politicians shouting at each other.

It was soon time to leave, and as we made our way back to the bus we saw the television cameras recording Bill English.

All in all a great day. A big thanks to the parents who helped us, the teachers and educators and Trevor Mallard, but most of all, a big thank you to Mr McKay for organising the amazing trip.

Jack Marra and Elisha Alasdair Day

ICAS All the participants can be extremely proud of their achievements. Everyone gets a certificate as well as a very detailed analysis of how they scored in each of the science skills being examined. The aspects being examined were observation and measurement, interpreting, predicting/conclusion, investigating and reasoning/problem solving. The analysis is an excellent tool for parents and teachers to use to determine the extent of students learning.

These are very encouraging results and we would like to thank all the parents for encouraging their son to enter. Please keep the certificates and analysis sheets safe because they form an important component of your son’s CV.

No. of No. of

studentsstudents

DistinctionsDistinctions Top 10%Top 10%

CreditsCredits Top 30%Top 30%

Top 50% NZ Top 50% NZ

& Pacific & Pacific regionregion

Total in top 50% in Total in top 50% in

NZ & PacificNZ & Pacific

121 6 32 20 58

Year Year LevelLevel

Distinction Distinction Top 10% Top 10% NZNZ

Credit Credit Top 30% NZTop 30% NZ

7 Oliver Burton, William Johnson

8 Caleb Carrasco, Gianpaolo Cigaral, Thomas

Mingins, Scott Rozenburg

9

Chenchen Huang

Juan Paolo Lopez Matthew Mann

Finn Anderson, Elisha Day, Ben Ernst, Sam Kong,

Marcus Manning, Michael McLean, James Missen, Josh Peckston, Elliott Thorn, Conrad Weatherall, Declan Wilcock

10

Rewiti Ross-Hotene Nathaniel Russell Aidan Watson

Aidan Almand, Jack Baucke, Nathan Chan,

Bernard Devine, Adam Hebbend, Guy Hogan, Bradley Searle, Ethan Smith, Danny Ward

11 Jacob Egan, Aaron Marshall,

David Woodman-Smith

12 Andy Su, Ben Duthie-Jung

13 David Smith

Y9 Social Studies

Science Fair We had 20 exhibitors representing us at the Wellington Regional Science and Technology Fair. It was held at Victoria University and was very kindly hosted by the Physical and Chemical Sciences Faculty. Two of our students received prizes. Congratulations to Paolo Lopez who picked up second place in Y9 and a special prize from the Wellington Medical Research Foundation. His research was titled “Isolation of bacteria on phones”. Paolo received $150 for his 2nd place and $60 from the medical foundation. There was a great deal of excellent practical investigative work complet-ed. Congratulations also to Mackenzie Georgeson who gained a special prize from the NZ Baking Industry Research Trust. His investigation was on the effect of white bread and grain bread on blood glucose. Mackenzie’s work illustrated the value of having a great aim to base your work around and then to collecting very worthwhile and useful data. Tutorials These are being offered each night after school and are open to all students and provide a good opportunity to review trial exam answers, and learn how to improve on them. They run from 3.30pm to 5.30pm in C6. Consistent attendance at tutorials

greatly improves your chances of success in the November examinations. Study Guides These are still available from Mr Higson for most of the science subjects. There are also AME guides for about $5 less than the retail price.

Attendance Dues September 2013 At the beginning of September you would have received your final Attendance Dues invoice for 2013. So far this year efforts from many families has been fantastic, and CSBL would like to thank everyone who has already paid their accounts or set up regular payments to do so. To find out some of the exciting projects being funded by Attendance Dues, take a look at the website www.csbl.co.nz or CSBL Facebook page.

If there is still an outstanding balance on your account, please remember the final due by date for 2013 is 30 September, unless you are paying by regular weekly, fortnightly or monthly payments, in which case CSBL ask that you ensure that the amount you are paying will clear your balance by 31 December. If you are experiencing financial hardship and will be unable to meet these obligations by the dates above, please contact your parish, school or CSBL and we will be happy to set up a manageable payment plan.

Sport Māori

Judo Success Congratulations to Luke Pynenburg who recently competed at the North Island Judo Championships. Luke won the Gold Medal in both his competitions. He is now the North Island Champion in both the Open and his weight grade.

Jonathan Collins Memorial Cup

St Bernard’s College teamed up with the netball girls from Ss Peter & Paul School to win the annual “Jonathan Collins Memorial Cup”. The girls won all their matches while SBC rugby boys only lost the one game against Sacred Heart, Petone, but it was enough to claim the high-ly sought-after cup. Jonathan Collins died in 1999 while a pupil, and 1st XV player, at St Bernard’s College.

Football Prizegiving This was held at the Angus Inn on 4 September. Each team was acknowledged with individual medals and there were at least three awards given for each team. Special awards were: Tyler Saggers - Played 101 games for SBC , Jack Marra with 25 goals — Golden Boot Award, Matthew Logan — Service to SBC football. College Futsal. This has run each lunch time for the past six weeks. At the time of writing the winners have not be found. Boys have played out on the field or the asphalt and the standard of play has been very good. There are certainly some brilliant footballers at SBC. We also have a huge number of exciting prospects. Thanks I want to sincerely thank the numerous mums, dads, nanas, granddads, aunties, uncles and friends who have turned up Saturday after Saturday and sometimes at 8.30pm on a Friday night to support, encourage, and believe not only in their own family, but also all the other players involved in the game. You are giving the best possible reason for your son to enjoy football. Keep believing in your son. A very special acknowledgement to Pak’n’Save Petone for the sponsorship of our football club and especially our prizegiving.

Trip to Kāpiti Island, 19-20 September Four teachers and one parent are scheduled to make the trip with 25 students. The trip will involve staying on the island for a night in the second to last Thursday and Friday of this term.

Trip down the Whanganui River Planning is currently underway for two trips down the Whanganui River at the end of Term 1 and start of Term 2 in 2014. Already over 30 boys have expressed interest in going on these trips.

Both trips will be for those students learning te reo Māori during the year. Each trip will take in the history, marae, tikanga, kōrero of the upper reaches of this 290 km long river.

Many thanks to Mr Wilson for co-ordinating a group of Y10 boys who were given the opportunity to sail a pirate ship on the high seas (well, Wellington harbour). On Friday 23 August, whilst the rest of the staff were hard at work on the MoE teacher only day, Mrs Pawson and Mr Harrison took the Y10 crew on a one-day sail with Spirit of Adventure NZ. It was a great chance for the boys to get a taste of life on-

board a square-rigged vessel. This once-in-a-lifetime experience gave the boys a hands-on appreciation of the effort and team-work required to haul ropes and raise the sails. They got stuck in and could see for themselves what they could look forward to if they signed up for the longer 10 day trip that develops skills of communication, self-reliance, self-discipline, self-

esteem, resilence, confidence and leadership. The public sailing helped to fundraise for

Trust’s mission of youth character development aboard the topsail schooner Spirit of Adventure.

Feedback from the boys: Regan: “it was an exciting experience that I enjoyed so much. The highlight for me was seeing how the ship worked and it was fun helping out tugging ropes. I would have liked to have had the chance to climb the rigging, but we didn’t have time for that. Would I go for the 10 day trip? Oh yeah – that’d be cool. I’d like my friends to come too. They should check out: www.spiritofadventure.org.nz “

Ship shape students

Coming Up

20 Sep Senior Volleyball starts, sports photos 26 Oct Rugby League Finals 1 Nov St Bernard’s Sports Awards 6 Nov Y7/8 Touch Tournament

Upcoming event: Y7/8s can look forward to their second Ki-o-Rahi day on Wednesday 4 December or Thursday 5 December 2013. These days coincide with the second to last week of term 4. It promises to be another very exciting and fun day.

Waterpolo Congratulations to the 2013 Senior Water Polo team on winning the Hutt Valley Schools competition by a stunning 10 goals to 2 over HIBS. This ends a great year for the team who also won the Wellington competition in Term 1 and followed up with a 5th placing at “North Islands” and a 7th placing at “Nationals”. A special thanks to coach, Craig McGuinness and the management team who have a done a fabulous job with this team.

2013 Term Dates Term 3 29 July to 27 September Term 4 14 October to 6 December (Please note change of date)

Important Dates 2013

Contact Details

p 04 560 9250 f 04 560 9251 e office@sbc.school.nz w www.sbc.school.nz

Physical/Postal Address 183 Waterloo Road Lower Hutt 5010 New Zealand

September 21 PFS Quiz Night, Y13 PED Trip 23 Y7-10 Badge Ceremony, 26 School Mass 11.15am 27 Last day of Term 3 October 14 Term 4 commences 8.40am 28 Labour Day — no school November 1 All Saints Day 1 Sports Awards

Sponsors of the St Bernard’s College Newsletter

Free Doctor’s consultation at St Bernard’s College

Plan to be as fit and healthy as you can be!!

Clinic Open Tuesday 8.30—11.30am

Thursday 12—3pm

Alex Ferrier-Kerr is our school health nurse. Dr Beena Hegde will be in attendance at the

Thursday Clinic

570-0883 or 560-9250 (College office)

Free Dental Treatment offered by

Graeme Yee Dental Care, 66 Bloomfield Terrace, Lower Hutt,

566-1119.

This free treatment is available to all secondary students until their 18th birthday. All new patients, students and parents are welcome. If

you have any questions please feel free to call on the above number.

Uniform Shop Normal Opening Hours Monday 8.15 to 9.00am Wednesday 10.30 to11am Thursday 12.30 to 1.30pm

Uniform on AP

Uniform purchases may be charged to your AP with the consent of the college on a case-by-case basis. Boys need to bring a signed note from parents. Please email accounts@sbc.school.nz or phone the accounts office ext 861.

Second Hand Uniform

If your son has grown out of some uniform items that are in good condition please consider donating them to the school or we can sell on your behalf less a commission. All sales from second hand school uniforms go to the library to purchase new books.

If you have items to donate or sell, please leave them at the school office or if you have any queries, please contact Tania on

587-0024.

Preferred method of payment school fees The school prefers all school fees to be paid directly to our bank account. This is a safer means of payment

that provides a reliable trail. Our bank account is ASB Queensgate 12-3142-0164653-00. Please include your son’s first name and surname, and your phone number in the reference fields. Receipts are issued for all payments and given to students in class. If you are facing financial difficulties please see the Principal. Thank you.

Important Reminders

PFS News

6 Last Day Y11-13 Leavers’ Mass & Dinner 7 Junior exams commence 8 NCEA examinations commence 15 Y7-9 2014 Orientation 20-22 Junior Camp 25-27 Junior Camp December 2 Award Giving Ceremony 4 Alternative Programme commences 6 Last Day for 2013

PFS Christmas

basket raffle It may seem a long way off but the end of school year will be here before we know it! As usual we will have Christmas themed

raffles available to purchase at the garage sale and prizegiving. Donations of non perishable items to be included in the basket can be dropped off at the school office.

If anyone would like to buy Event Cinema movie tickets to support the O’Shea Shield

Team Trip to Hastings next year please email Nick Wilson nwilson@sbc.school.nz . They are $15 each and can be used in any Event Cinema in NZ and expire in March 2014. These adult tickets are cheaper than buying them at the counter. Thanks for supporting our team.

The Greater Wellington Young Vinnies are holding a book sale to raise funds for

charitable projects overseen by the St Vincent de Paul Society, which is one of the charitable agencies of the Catholic Church. If you have any books that you might like to donate to this drive, can you please send them to school with your son. He can bring them to Mr Wilson in H6.

The Regional St Vincent de Paul Society Feast Day Mass will be held at St Anthony’s

Catholic Church in Seatoun on 26 September at 7pm. There are nibbles after.

Saturday 2 November

G ARAGE

SALE Start cleaning out that garage and

storage area for our annual garage sale which will be held on

We require good quality used items (no TV’s).

We are able to collect or store. Enquiries Elizabeth 971 4408.