13 History hit the capital for two full days of...HISTORY!

Year 13 History had a brilliant trip to the capital city last week, the highlight being our tour of parliament with Labour MP Rachel Brooking (a London flatmate of Ms Evans from the dawn of the new millennium). Trevor Mallard gate-crashed the tour unexpectedly and whipped us up to the apartment of the Speaker of the House where he invited the girls to try on the Speaker's wigs. We also went out on to the first floor balustraded balcony of Parliament House and felt a bit like royalty. He talked about the changes he has brought to parliament to make it more accessible for women to become MPs, such as a toddler swim class and free travel for their children. We then attended Question Time which was a fascinating look into how parliament functions.

We are currently exploring the theme of colonialism in our research, which took us to the National Library and the National Archives for independent evidence gathering. The students had a tour of Victoria University and were lucky enough to have a personalised lecture on different aspects of colonialism by Prof. Charlotte Macdonald and Dr. Adrian Muckle. We also went to the Holocaust Centre for a morning to meet a Holocaust survivor and to find out more about the Shoah for our focus later in the year. Finally, we managed to squeeze in Judas and the Black Messiah at the Lighthouse Cinema, Cuba. The trip was made extra special with Mrs Jenness Riethmaier accompanying Ms Andrew and Ms Evans for many of the activities. It was a History fest and the students were an absolute delight and credit to Columba College.