Here is some news on what some of the girls from Social Studies and History have been up to recently….

Congratulations go to Emily Gray, Chloe Alexander and Bella Bates from 9KA on coming 5th in the ODT Extra Current Events Quiz on Monday afternoon. 57 teams took part and Otago Girls’ were only 7 points away from the winning Year 10 team. This is an outstanding effort and we look forward to the girls competing again next year.

On September 19th we celebrate 125 years since New Zealand women gained the vote. As part of celebrating this, over the next few weeks all junior students will have an opportunity to visit Toitu and the Women’s Suffrage Exhibition in their Social Studies classes. On Wednesday there will be a mufti day for all juniors and a debate on the topic of how far we’ve come since we gained the vote.

Girls in Year 11 History have also been learning about Women’s Suffrage and the part that ordinary students, just like them have played in shaping our history. As part of their learning girls have discovered more about the efforts of Anna Stout (Logan) and Learmonth Dalrymple but have also been doing painstaking research to find out the names of any students from Otago Girls’ who may have signed the Women’s Suffrage Petition of 1892. This involves looking at the enrolment details that Mrs Smallfield has in the library from the 1870s, estimating birth dates, cross-referencing with any prize-giving results or other information from Papers Past to find first names, then finding out the name the ex-student changed to once she married and then finally searching the petition online. We can confirm (what we suspected) and that several ex-girls signed the petition.