Kia ora koutou

Well, spring weather keeps us on our toes and the winds of this week had our buses on high alert. With about 80% of our students using buses, it’s worth checking that you have your contact details up to date so we can text you an alert if needed.

The wind didn’t deter our William Pike Challenge year 7 students from testing their limits at The Groynes. It’s been a busy week for education outside the classroom, with more Year 7&8 students competing in The Huxter mountain biking challenge at McLean’s Island. Participation was the aim, with individual or team approaches, but it was also good to see some medals coming back with a 1st in mixed teams for Felix Gardner/Marlie McCaughan and a 3rd going to Trinity Wright/Liam Hitchcock. Further medals with 2nd for Maani Parsons-Riley/Maia Wakefield and 3rd for Izzy James/Anna Truscott.

The Zonta Awards are huge and highly sought after so we were very proud that Isla McPherson received a “Highly Commended award for valued contribution by a young woman as an administrator, coach or referee”. Isla’s support of sport all around has been amazing but her initiative around running really impressed me, even meeting with me to ensure she was doing the safety planning properly. Louis Ridgen collected the award for joint winner of the “Most innovative school sport or physical activity” on behalf of our sport in action leadership group who collectively researched student needs and the planned to address them - the basketball/streetball area for year 7&8 students was their first project and they successfully completed it, on time (plenty of need for project teams like that!!)

We also had an amazing evening of drama, with our year 13s producing an engaging evening performance, as well as a beautiful farewell for our manuhiri/ guests from Kagoshima school. There were plenty of tears as they said goodbye to their host families and I was proud of the work of our International team including our valued host families.

Ms Claudia Petrie, joining us next year for Outdoor Ed and Rural College, completed her last section with us this week and it was great to get the ball rolling. It’s with mixed emotions that I congratulate Mr Nathan Sandes on his appointment as Deputy Principal at Kaiapoi High School - Nathan has played a short but key role as LAL Technology as well as acting Assistant Principal and he will be missed. Josh Jackson will also move on, to Te Aratai College, next year and we wish him very well for his move closer to home.

More emotional speeches and a celebration of DHS journeys at our Leavers’ Dinner tonight, with Senior Prizegiving on Wednesday next week.

If you haven’t yet, please sign up an adult from your family for our parent/whānau evening on the topic of keeping our kids safe online with filmmaker and author Rob Cope. Register here- Our Kids Online

Ngā manaakitanga (with kindness/respect)

Andy England

Key dates:

See https://darfield.school.nz/calendar/

Final week for our Year 13 students