Kia ora koutou. Talofa. Kia Orana. Malo e lelei. Bula. Fakaalofa atu. Namaste. Kumusta. Haere mai ki Te Kura Huruhuru Ao o Horomaka. Warm greetings to the Hornby High School community.

Hornby High School is a school based on values. I would venture the opinion that most successful schools are. Our values, our interpretation of the values taken from the front end of the New Zealand Curriculum, are Commitment, Achievement, Resilience, and Respect, and they are plain for all to see when they enter the school, writ large on the wall in our brand new Learning Commons.

These aren’t some sort of linear progression. That is, they don’t occur in order, one after the other. It might however be fair to say that Achievement comes from Commitment, Resilience, and Respect.

And achievement, arguably the end goal of all of this, is different things to different people. Getting up in front of your class may be an amazing achievement for some, while for others performing in front of the whole school may the achievement of note. In the senior school gaining an Achieved grade may be an outstanding achievement for some, while for others nothing less than excellence will do. Our wonderful staff constantly challenge all rangatahi to achieve their best, whatever that may be. We will not settle for ‘Achieved’ if we think that Excellence is within the grasp of a student.

Over this last term we have seen some wonderful achievements. The Hockey team that fought hard in every game despite repeated losses. The student who tackled every assessment despite high levels of anxiety. Similarly for the student for whom simply being in class is a major achievement. These are all achievements worthy of celebration.

There have been some achievements that have warranted special mention, amongst the many wonderful things that have happened this term. Jorja Woodgate gained her Level 1 NCEA with Excellence in early September. I have never seen such an achievement in any school I have worked in. Then there is the senior girls’ basketball team that won the Division One Christchurch Interschools Competition. These are wonderful achievements of which everyone of us should be justifiably proud.

Last week we hosted a series of student presentations to other students titled ‘Student toolkits’ in which students from across our Uru Mānuka cluster presented digital skills and work to other students from across the cluster. The buzz amongst the students was excited, the animation, the engagement enough to warm the hearts of educators and whānau alike, as they taught and learned. Such tuakana teina is one of the amazing outcomes from the manaiakalani pedagogy. You can be justifiably proud of your tamariki, your rangatahi, because so many of them are doing a wonderful job of engaging in their learning.

We have much to celebrate, and we are still in term three. So while term 4 in the school year is a time for prize givings and celebrations of achievement, we happily celebrate the many fantastic achievements of our rangatahi throughout the year.

Such outstanding achievements would not be possible without Commitment to the goal, Resilience in the face of failure, and Respect for self and others.

Such outstanding achievements reflect the living presence of our school whakatauki:

‘Mā te huruhuru, ka rere te manu’
‘Feathers enable the bird to fly’
(Be prepared, have the right tools to achieve).

That is what we do, and preparing our students with a good values base with which to go out and engage with their world is vital.

Please do follow my thinking on issues that are both specific to Hornby High School and also of more general educational interest on my Principal’s blog “Whakatauki: He waka eke noa”, after all, we are indeed all in this together - https://whakataukihewakaekenoa.blogspot.co.nz/.

Ngā mihi nui

Robin Sutton

Principal