The Canterbury Readers Cup has been running for three years, but this is the first year Hagley has entered a team.

The competition is for Year 9s only, and each team of 4-5 has to read a total of 6 books. This year the team read five novels and a graphic novel, the 2020 Margaret Mahy Book of the Year, Mophead.

The competition was held at Tūranga on 12 August, with a smaller audience than usual to meet Covid-19 requirements. Nine schools sent a team to answer 8 questions on each book in a Cantamath kind of format, and Cashmere came out on top.

Reading five long texts in two months was quite an achievement and the team also had to meet several times to practise answering questions about the books. Hagley’s team of four, Jesse Easterbrook, Piki Kotuku Aumua-Carrick, Eve Tonascia and Annabelle Johnston, came fourth which was very exciting and a real achievement for our first time against extremely competitive teams.

I’d like to say a great time was had by all, but although it was a fun evening, the students did find it rather stressful! Nonetheless, they were a great credit to the school and themselves.