Success at the Annual Zonta Secondary School Awards.

Congratulations to our Students, their hard mahi has been rewarded.

The Zonta Club of Christchurch South organises these awards as a service and advocacy project to support and recognise the young sports women and men in Canterbury.

We we joint winners with St Thomas' of Canterbury for the Most innovative school sport or physical activity programme to engage non-participating students

Through the Voice of Rangatahi survey, a group of Darfield High School students from years 9 to 13 worked on a project on how they could increase physical activity within their school. With basketball becoming one of our fastest growing and popular sports and observing that there was not enough space to accommodate seniors and juniors on the existing courts, the team chose to implement a basketball court somewhere in the school just for the year 7 and 8s. As this is a student lead project, the team had to work together on how to achieve this vision, overseen by Sport Canterbury, Selwyn Sports Trust and Pip Deans, DHS Sport Coordinator. Then came the project planning phase working, getting BOT signoff, identify the steps of what actually needed to be done, who needed to be involved in the project, approaching contractors for pricing, then sourcing funding, and working on a timeline and organising the work to be done.

Fantastic team effort, well done everyone in the Insight to Action Group.

Isla McPherson received a 'Highly Commended' award for valued contribution by a young woman as an administrator, coach, umpire or referee.

Isla’s dedication, work ethic, determination and commitment is truly amazing for someone so young. As Head of Sport, Isla is involved in nearly every aspect of our sports program, from year 7 students through to year 13 students. A talented sports person herself, playing for the Coastal Spirit team and a representative of the Canterbury U18 Women's Youth Team, as well as being selected to take part in the Canterbury Sports Academy this year. She coaches school football and helps out at inter school events, runs weekly sport sessions every Friday during lunchtimes and has a weekly after school run club on Tuesdays. Prior to this year's School Cross Country Championships, she developed a training plan and sought approval for students to train at lunchtimes offsite. She is involved with the Schools Multisport Squad, having competed in the Coast to Coast this year herself, in the 3 person 2 day team, finishing 3rd. Currently she has setup a training program to support the 2 teams we have entered in 2024. She has won the SISS Junior and Senior Duathlon for the past 3 years and won the Darfield High School Cross Country and the Duathlon championships in her grades over the past 5 years.

Recently, Isla was nominated for a Selwyn Award, Young Achievers category for which she received a Silver Award in the Selwyn Awards - a very deserving award for all the hard work and effort she puts in.

Isla faces all things head on, she is full of ideas and enthusiasm. The Insight to Action group, formed at the beginning of this year, is about bringing together a group of students from across year groups to look into enhancing our sport facilities and increasing participation and opportunities for our students. The project the team decided to tackle was to create a specific space for our year 7 and 8 students to play basketball. The project is completely run by the group, they have to plan, implement and fund the project with the consultation of BOT, Principal, Grounds people, outside organisations and of course the students. This has been a great learning curve for everyone involved to the point of putting a hold on the project and replanning parts of it due to the time of year, draining and accessibility.

Isla has also been the School Lead for the 40 hour famine for the past two years, and a participant for two years prior to that - helping to raise over $9000 over that period. The SI Schools Manager personally wrote a letter of thanks to our principal outlining Islas' valued commitment over the years, which also identified Darfield High School as one of the Top Performing World Vision Schools. In true fashion, to help support the cause - Isla organised a fun physical event at school for all our students to participate in it. She set up an obstacle course on our Athletics field using tyres, flags, hoops, football goals, sacks and much more. Students sought sponsorship through either an outright donation or pledges per lap. This event was a great success.

A truly exceptional and selfless individual, always willing to help others, whether that is through raising funds for world vision, or supporting our students with their sporting activities. All this while studying Level 3 Maths with Statistics, Biology, PE, Accounting and Geography. She is playing high level Football for Canterbury and having made the Development Academy required additional training and mentoring. Isla gets on well with everyone and has a great rapport with her peers. An amazing individual with a lot of energy and alot to give others. Isla is a high achiever and works extremely hard both academically and physically. She is a natural leader and an outstanding role model to all our students.

Isla is 100% focused on increasing participation in sport and making it accessible to everyone. Her own successes and achievements encourage others to push themselves and try to reach their own personal goals.

Congratulations to everyone involved, we are extremely proud of their achievements and look forward to 2024.

A beautiful day to practice tī rākau for 8DK.