People sometimes ask me what is the most important job a school does in the life of a young person. I am fairly quick to say that we are in the business of helping parents shape young people to be good adults, and in our case as a catholic school to be young people who have been given an opportunity to have developed a relationship with God.

I am very aware that in your time here at school that our role is about shaping you to being a person of integrity, with a notion that they are going to contribute and give to the people they are in contact with as they go into the world as adults.

When I meet old boys of St Bede’s, and I meet many. Men well known like Matt Henry and men less well known like Tom Williams from Whataroa to name a couple that I have bumped into in the last couple of months. Yes, I am keen to see what they are up to, what they have achieved etc, etc, but I also have my antenna up as to what type of person they have become, because that is the more important way a school measures itself. On the whole those old boys are grateful not necessarily for what they've done, but for the men they have become.

As a College this year we have a school goal to honour the school prayer, which has a component in it of being responsible for your own learning, but also a component about allowing others to learn…respecting the rights of others. It reminds us of the manner we are to conduct ourselves, and it helps shape you for the man you are becoming.

A code of conduct about the way we go about participating in co curricula activities that you are signing at the moment commits you to a way we do things, and in so doing we are forecasting the manner we want you to conduct yourselves when you leave here.

Listen to some of the things you are signing up to do.

You recognise that co curricular activities are not a right but a privilege and to participate in them you have to fulfill your obligations in the classroom. In other words....do your day job!

Recognise your commitment to the group and the team you are a part of. Never give up. It is a lesson once again for life. Other people you work and play with as an adult rely on you to front as part of that group and be the best you can be.

Being your best is not only about doing well. Being your best is also about the way you treat your teammates and the coaches who as I have said give up their time freely, but also in the manner you treat your competitors, whether you win or lose. We win well and we lose well. Hard and disappointing though it is, losing teaches us more in life than winning does.

When I troupe round the sports fields I am proud to support you but I am also looking for the manner in which you conduct ourselves, the way in which you deal with a ref’s decision, your reaction when you are down and losing, the graciousness you accept defeat, the humility and respect for an opposition you have just beaten. The code of conduct is a reminder as to the manner we are to play, perform and compete.

This has not only to do with sport but also with cultural activities. I missed the Polyfest this year because we were in Timaru for the Bishop Lyons Shield, but I had a couple of communications from people from other school communities praising our boys for the manner in which they conducted themselves on that day, the way they mixed and related. One said, while they performed well on the day, they were excellent ambassadors for your College.

I attended the Smoke Free Stage Challenge this week where we were competing for the first time since 2013. In a later assembly we will see the performance and tell you more about quite a unique and different experience for our boys, and what is more how our presence at this event is quite unique as well.

However, what I was "chuffed" about were a couple of phone calls from people outside of the community, one a Cashmere High parent, another a leader in Education, who spoke not just of the performance of our boys but the manner in which they had disported themselves, in the way they related to other schools they came into contact with. You created a favourable impression in not only what happened on the stage but off it...and that is my main point today.

The code you have signed is a "character former"...it forecasts the men we want you to become when you leave the gates. That must be practiced. Forming character doesn't happen overnight...it is a habit of doing the right thing often. The code is our reminder, the habit former...and it is a code that I hope will be written on your insides rather than on a piece of paper when you are adult men.

Similarly, at the Feast Day Mass next week you will be given the Bedean pledge the head students introduced last term and you recited. It also talks about the qualities of a Bedean, the ones you are forming now. How you conduct yourself, and how you treat others. The pledge is written and you will be given it on Feast Day. It forecasts the man you are becoming.

The PTEs for seniors are on at the moment. The first was last night the next on Thursday next week and I was pleased to see a good number of boys attending with their parents. I’d encourage this. Teacher, parent and student all hearing the same message sometimes can be uncomfortable, but sometimes a pleasant surprise. There were a number of discussions I had where I am sure the student thought they were going to get a message far worse than they actually received. As I have stated we are in the business of helping form good adult men. School can often be a time when you can discover the path that takes you to what you do as an adult as well and those discussions with your teachers and parents combined help shape those decisions, and help you form in your head what might be possible...

Until next week.
Justin Boyle

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