Thursday, February 28 marked the first late start of the school year. Every second Thursday morning, College staff attend professional learning development sessions where the prefects take control and organise fun events for the Year 7 and Year 8 students.
While it is not compulsory for the junior students to come to school early, many Year 7 and Year 8 students partake in a variety of activities that the prefects run. The academic, sport, performing arts, cultural and well-being prefects are in charge of running the activities. The international, service and student ambassador prefects helped monitor the study rooms, and the house captains helped assist with running the activities. The deputy’s and head prefects ensured that all students were either at an activity or in a study classroom.
The academic prefects started off their session by playing the dictionary game. Josh McCarthy and Danica Loulie-Wijtenburg (academic prefects) then tried to get the students to interact with each other by playing a jeopardy game. They did this by creating mixed teams of Year 7 and Year 8s and focussed on fun categories like Disney, trends, and famous people. They finished off the morning by bringing all students together as one to spell out words with their bodies.
The sports prefects set up dodgeball in the gym for the Year 7 and Year 8 students to play. Graham Remedios and Holly Maunsell-Young (sports prefects) are also in charge of the sports committee, a group of students in Year 11 and Year 12, who help run the sports events for late start. The sports prefects affirmed that the morning was enjoyable for the students and everyone participated and had a really good time.
Ella Flores and Anna Nguyen, the performing arts prefects, organised drama games for the students to play. These games consisted of playing space jump, wink murderer and I am Mr Hit.
The cultural prefects, Shawna Stowers, Patrick Florendo and Bo Min Cho focussed on embracing the cultural side of the school. They got one of the Year 13 students to play guitar, while the cultural prefects taught the students the school song ‘Tenei Te Whanau’. They then played pukana, a
rhythmical game that is enjoyable for all who play. They finished by playing another game called ‘so makolo.’
Katrina Chan, Megan Noronha and Ellen Fromont are the well-being prefects. The three of them planned an activity where the students write down affirming and positive things about themselves on a piece of paper. They then were to fold this piece of paper into a paper plane, emphasising the vibe of creating a friendly and confortable environment. One of the well-being prefects said this activity, “lets the students know that their aspirations and hopes and dreams can become reality.” After this, they played a cahoot game to end the session on a high and focus on mental well-being.
It is not compulsory for students to come to school at normal bell time, so the students are given the opportunity to choose what they would like to do with the extra hour (whether that be sleep, study or hanging out with friends). This first late start of the year gave every prefect a good indication of how they think their session was received and has allowed the prefects to see how they can develop and improve their activities for the next late start. Overall, late start is an extra hour enjoyed by the whole school.
Mia Gilchrist