The Lion's Roar - 28 June 2023

KICKING GOALS

We are excited to share that Year 8 student, Caleb, has been chosen to represent his football academy to play and compete in a team that will be heading to Melbourne for a Premier Invitational - Diamond League Soccer Tournament. The tournament, now in its second year, has over 80 teams between the age groups of Under 8s to Under 13s competing during the July holidays over three locations.

Congratulations, Caleb, your training and hard work are paying off!

CALISTHENICS STAR

Congratulations to Bella in Year 7 on her selection in the Calisthenics Association of Western Australia’s (CAWA) State Team, competing in the Australian Calisthenic Federation’s 33rd National Championships being held in Brisbane in July.

Bella is one of 23 girls in the Junior Team aged 11 to 13 years, representing Western Australia.

Good luck, Bella and well done on your amazing achievements.

CRICKET CHAMP

Well done to Year 8 student, Leo, on his selection in the state team for the National Indoor Cricket Championships. Good luck with the tournament, Leo!

TRAIL STAR

Year 9 student Kobi recently completed the Transcend Trails 40km Hike Challenge on a course of continual elevation (up to 296m) and technical surfaces (think rock scrambling on all fours and slippery rock slopes). Despite being the youngest entrant, he managed to finish second overall, completing the trail in just 7 hours and 10 minutes.

What a legend, Kobi!

The Regional NIPSSA Interschool Cross Country Carnival took place at Mawson Park on Friday, 23 June, showcasing the top six finishers from the Interhouse Cross Country event in their respective age and gender categories. Despite challenging weather conditions, the students’ conduct throughout the day was exemplary, exhibiting remarkable support and enthusiasm for their school. The carnival created a fantastic atmosphere, and both participants and spectators greatly enjoyed the superb venue.

St Mark’s competed in the A division and secured a commendable third place out of twelve schools. Across all year groups, our school demonstrated remarkable consistency, achieving 4^th place in Year 3, 3^rd place in Year 4, 3^rd place in Year 5 and 3^rd place in Year 6. This consistency across different year levels is a testament to our outstanding performance.

Michael Barton,
Physical Education Teacher

As part of Arts Week and one of the highlights, our Secondary Art Department has had Artist in Residence, Katie Sharples, join them.

Katie is a super interesting contemporary multi-media artist who lives on a farm out of Toodyay. She spent the week with our students and us to work on her current body of work, run a community workshop Thursday night with 50 people, and also teach a few of our Art classes. She has introduced students to the world of printmaking, demonstrating various techniques and encouraging them to unleash their creativity.

Katie explores themes of hardship, drought, isolation, contemporary masculinity and the fragility of the land and the people who live on it. Her experiences and the way she makes comment through her work was invaluable insight for our students and for us all in the school community.

Our Year 9 and 10 Computer Science students recently headed to a taster session of computing and STEM activities at Curtin University, followed by an afternoon visit to Pawsey Supercomputing Centre. The excursion was designed to expose students to STEM-related future career and study options and the future of computing. Here's what our students had to say:

"Curtin University has a very wide array of opportunities and courses; we focused on the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Maths) courses. The university has a program where students can design, create and then race petroleum and electric-powered cars, another program offered is where select students are able to make a small cube that is sent into space and collects data. After we left the University, we went to Pawsey. Pawsey holds a Quantum Computer and a Supercomputer. The supercomputer has a value of over $40 million dollars and a limited ability for finding certain answers to problems; the quantum computer has an infinite amount of possibilities. This is an excursion definitely worth attending; it is interesting, and you will definitely learn something new." Nathan Year 9

"I enjoyed learning about the STEM activities you can partake in when you are at university and the hands-on STEM activity. My favourite part of the excursion was going to the Pawsey supercomputing centre and learning about everything it takes to keep it running and why it’s necessary for scientific purposes. I would recommend this excursion." Oscar Year 9

Last week, eighteen Year 8 students of Mandarin participated in an excursion to China Town in Northbridge organised by the Chinese Language Teachers Association of Western Australia.

They followed an itinerary and scavenger hunt activity along Williams Street and Roe Street in order to discover the Asian grocery stores, restaurants, bubble tea places, Asian butchers and so on.

Some time was also allocated for them to do a bit of shopping. Students love the variety of Chinese lollies available at the grocery stores.

The students then enjoyed a delicious meal of noodles, spring rolls, glutinous rice, pork and prawn dumplings and bbq pork bun at the ‘Dragon Palace’ with five other schools.

Each table had a mix of students from different schools learning Mandarin in order to be more sociable and meet new people.

Thank you to all the St Mark's IGNITE Students and the amazing parents from the School community who cooked meals for the Salvation Army last weekend. It was an awesome effort by all, cooking up and contributing a total of 410 x delicious meals (and a new record), for the Salvation Army.

Jason Reynolds from the Salvation Army was blown away by the level of commitment and the total number of meals cooked and donated. With more people in the community doing it tough than ever before, it is reassuring that every meal will be provided to someone in need and distributed to the following:

• Salvation Army Street to Home Program, clients who have transitioned from homelessness to secure accommodation, this is generally their first home on their own.

• Salvation Army Independent Community Living Program, clients with Mental Health who are moving into their own accommodation in the community.

• Safe Night Space for Women, is a service run by Ruah community services.

A SPECIAL shout out to the twelve IGNITE Students (from Year 5 to Year 8) who cooked and prepared 250 of these meals and accumulated “Volunteer Service Hours” the students require to complete a component of their IGNITE Award.

Thank you for your continued support.

We are fast approaching the end of Term 2 with the last day being Friday 30 June (normal finish time) for a three-week break. The first day of Term 3 is Tuesday 25 July.

We wish our families and wonderful and safe holiday break.

We would like to extend a big thank you to Coca Cola EuroPacific Partners (CCEP) for their very generous donation of 'Pump Water' to be used by our School for the various carnivals and events we hold. We know that these will be put to good use in keeping our staff and students hydrated!

We wish to inform our families that after a lengthy process in consultation with our Uniform Team, we will be outsourcing the management of our Uniform Shop to external supplier, Tara Uniforms (trading as Matrix Uniforms). We have a very good relationship with Tara Uniforms, who have been a long-standing supplier of St Mark's uniforms. As with all outsourcing opportunities, there will be some changes; however, we believe that these will benefit our School community greatly.

Here is a breakdown of the changes:

What will remain the same:

• The friendly uniform team will still be on hand to offer the fabulous assistance they always have
• Design and quality will remain the same
• Parent Commitment Hours for the uniform shop will still be in place
• The Uniform Shop will still be in the same location at school
• The Uniform Shop will still be open on Monday and Wednesday

What's changing:

• Tara Uniforms will supply and stock our uniform needs from 1 July 2023
• We will have online ordering available from Term 3 - more details to come
• Opening hours will change slightly to better accommodate peak morning trading
• There will be no capability for second-hand uniforms to be sold in the Uniform Shop

Second-Hand Uniforms

The Uniform Shop is no longer able to take second-hand uniforms. If you are chasing second-hand items, please join the Facebook group here.

Those families who have second-hand uniforms currently on consignment in the Uniform Shop will need to collect them before 30 June 2023. Any outstanding credits for items previously sold will be applied to your school account.

Those families who have items that haven't sold will be contacted, and the items will need to be collected before 30 June 2023.

Tara Uniforms will not have the option to sell second-hand uniforms on consignment.

Tara Uniforms will commence operation from 1 July 2023. We will have further information over the coming months.

You may also have heard that Lyn Waite, our Uniform Shop Manager, is currently on long service leave and on a segway to retirement, and Diana Kelly has been promoted to the position of Uniform Shop Manager to replace Lyn. If you missed your chance to wish Lyn well, we are pleased to advise that she is returning to the Shop from 15 - 24 May 2023 for staff holiday cover.

After over two years without a big musical, The St Mark’s Theatre Company is delighted to announce that ticket sales for our production of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s full Broadway Musical, School of Rock are open and available here.

Based on the hilarious hit movie, this new musical follows Dewey Finn, a failed, wannabe rock star who decides to earn a few extra bucks by posing as a substitute teacher at a prestigious prep school. There he turns a class of straight-A students into a guitar-shredding, bass-slapping, mind-blowing rock band – sensationally performed every night with roof-raising energy and fully live rock music. Featuring 57 of our students across Year 6 – Year 12, a fun PG family night is promised to all. If you remember Addams Family… yep, just like that, with the same great team!

When: Wednesday – Saturday, Term 3 Week 1 @ 7:00pm

Tickets are $25 this year, but we still have the $80 Family Discount for four.

Do get in soon, as this has every chance of selling out.

All instruments must be taken home from the Music Department by Thursday 29 June at the latest. The only instruments at school on Friday 30 June, should be String Orchestra members and students with music lessons that day, and they must be taken home at the conclusion of the day.

Please note that all students should be taking their instruments home the same day after lessons or rehearsals and should not be leaving their instruments at school all week or over the weekend. Regular practice is so important for musicians, and if students are not practising in between lessons, they are not getting the full value out of their lessons! Regular practice equals consistent improvement, which leads to greater student satisfaction and higher levels of engagement – positive reinforcement all round! We have sadly noticed an increase in instruments left forlornly in the storeroom and would love to see our storeroom empty at the end of each day and especially on Friday afternoons.

As the July holiday is a long one, we would love to encourage our children to continue reading.

The Junior School Library will be open on Wednesday 12 July from 11am until 1pm for children to come in and change their books over the holidays.

We would love to see lots of young readers borrow a lot of books.

Happy reading!

Our Languages Department is excited to bring you Languages Week in Week 2 of this term! They have lots of exciting things planned, but to entice you a little, here's a snippet of what's happening:

• Monday 31 July - Asian food van will be parked in the quadrangle (close to the coffee van) during the lunch break.
• Tuesday 1 August - French cartoon ‘Astérix et la potion magique’ showing in the PAC from 3.30pm to roughly 5.00pm. Open to all students. Students will need to be collected at 5.00pm.
• Wednesday 2 August - French crepe van will be parked in the quadrangle (close to the coffee van) during the lunch break.

Both of them accept cash or Eftpos payment.

Scholars 21 have a number of holiday workshops available for students in Years 1 - 7. For further information please see the image attached.

It was great to see so many of our members at last night’s General Meeting - thanks for braving the cold!

Big thanks to Nick Irwin (Head of OAS), our guest speaker, who talked us through the OAS program at St Mark’s - and what a fantastic program it is, delivered by a team of passionate educators. If anyone has any further questions for Nick, please reach out via email on nirwin@stmarks.wa.edu.au

We hope to be able to share his presentation with our community - and will publish details in The Lion’s Roar early next term.

Don’t forget to log your two-parent commitment hours for your attendance at this meeting.

We have our Quiz Night happening in Term 3; details are in the newsletter here. For further information, please follow this link.

Wishing everyone a safe and happy holiday.

Tracey Forder,
P&F President

The St Mark's P&F Association is delighted to confirm that they will be hosting a quiz night on Saturday, 9 September 2023 - book your tickets now!

There are sure to be plenty of opportunities to have some fun and showcase your outstanding general knowledge! Gather some friends, bring some snacks and enjoy an entertaining night out. There will be dancing and music after the Quiz.

Tickets are just $18 each (plus booking fees). Tables will seat groups of six. To purchase a table, please select 6 tickets.

BYO food and snacks but no BYO drinks. Drinks, including alcohol, will be available for purchase. Please note this event is for adults only (18+).

For more information, please contact Nirbhay Gupta on email nguptawork@gmail.com

Book your tickets here.

Parent volunteers are required for the following duties:

• Floor & Bar Setup
• Ticket checks & Raffle ticket sale at the entrance door
• Bar Duties
• Floor cleanup and packing up

If you can assist with any of the above volunteering duties, please contact Nirbhay Gupta on email nguptawork@gmail.com