A busy Term 3 is underway and Year 7 has involved a lot of extra curricular activities. The end of the winter sports season saw a number of boys involved in the Rugby League and Football (soccer) finals. There have also been a number of our boys performing at both the SCS Estiedford and the Ryde Estiedford. It isimpressive to see so many of our youngest students of the College getting involved in the cultural life of the school. Additionally, 13 of our young men received 100% Attendance Awards at a recent Year Assembly. This is an impressive number and shows the dedication and commitment that these boys have. 

Last Friday, Year 7 engaged in a Pastoral Lesson that was focused on building strategies to deal with negative interactions that can escalate to bullying. The lesson was built from the Bullying is Never Ok! resources and aims to help students identify situations that they can deal with themselves and know when they need to seek help from a trusted adult. Some homerooms were acting out situations with role plays, while others engaged in some story telling or just had a good chat about the issues. The goal of the lesson was to provide the students with actionable real world strategies that can help them deescalate a situation. There are a range of phrases and actions that minimise the impact that the bully feels they have. This can be as simple as ignoring them or telling them to stop and then removing yourself from the situation. However, often the hardest part is keeping your cool and not using language that bites back and escalates the problem. We will follow this up in Week 6, when Year 7 and 8 are visited by Backlip Against Bullying during our Pastoral Lesson. 

The College will be sharpening our focus on grooming and uniform over the second half of this term. A reminder that if your son is missing a piece of uniform, they need to see me before school to get a uniform pass. If they have a note from home explaining the reason why, they will face no further consequences. What we want to avoid is students making the conscious decision to not conform with uniform and grooming standards. 

Thank you for your ongoing support.

Phil Hammond 
YEAR 7 COORDINATOR