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This Week – 18 September 2019 – Keep Them in the Loop.

This Week – 18 September 2019 – Keep Them in the Loop.

Today we heard a pitch from ex-student Lincoln Haworth who is running for the local council. One of our greatest hopes in our work with you is to see you head out into the world and make a positive impact. It fills us with pride to consider that our own ex-students will end up in positions in society where you contribute to the greater good.

We reflected on the practice examinations that have just been completed. These will make an excellent foundation for the preparation phase leading into the final exams next term. You’ll receive an NCEA progress report at the end of the term – but before then, we urge you all to have a look at your credits to date and make sure you’re still in a secure position to achieve UE. Regardless of what your next step is, we consider this qualification as the benchmark for the completion of your school career. If you think you’re in a marginal place for the qualifications you need, let us know!

And on the subject of communication – another party who we encourage you to keep in the loop is your family. You’re now juggling plans for 2020, applications for trades, apprenticeships, scholarships, tertiary study and accommodation and your workload for school – most of these processes place you at the centre: but your family are still as interested as ever in everything that goes on in your life. Take the time to keep them in the loop. Tell them where you’re applying. Tell them how you made the decision. Reassure them when you meet a deadline. Explain University Entrance to them (especially explain that it’s not just for university!) and show them how your course will support your gaining that qualification this year. And, possibly most important of all, bring them close if things aren’t going well. If your practice exams fell apart. If you’re behind on internals. If you’re worried about not making it across the line – tell them! Make a rescue plan together.

Students in the Community Final Feedback

Remember that in order to get the recognition that you so richly deserve for the countless hours of volunteer work you have done this year, you must complete the Students in the Community Final Feedback form before 5:00pm on Friday 27th of September.

Careers Dates and Info:

  • AUT Skype course planning September 19th at 1:30 pm with Pablo
  • Canterbury University Course Planning Friday 20th 8:35 am with Dan in the Library
  • Victoria University course planning Friday 20th 1:20 pm with Poppy in Room 23
  • Massey University Course Planning at MAC Wednesday 25th 3 pm in the Library

Jobs

We are contacted by employers at this time of the year who are seeking long-term employees in Wanaka for 2020. Please make sure Charlotte is aware that you are actively seeking employment and check out the MAC Careers website for advertised jobs at careers.mtaspiring.edutronic.net

CVs

You are advised to send us your CV before leaving school so we can offer feedback. If you would like to meet with us to get some help with that then please just ask.

Plan A and Plan B

Most students have a Plan A for next year, which is great. We always recommend having a Plan B as well, so keep this in mind. If you are struggling, remember you are our priority and we are here to help.

Stay close to Charlotte’s careers website careers.mtaspiring.edutronic.net to keep yourself up to date with scholarship opportunities, CV guides, summer jobs and tertiary application information. Better still, click on the “follow” tab at the bottom right and get everything new emailed directly to your inbox

Home Study – Commences 19 September 2019

This Week – 28 August 2019 – Kindness.

This Week – 28 August 2019 – Kindness.

Today we focussed on kindness. Charlotte and I consistently benefit from your kindness, and we could not over-state the difference it makes to us when we receive a word of appreciation or acknowledgement. We asked to you to consider now whether you afford the same dignifying respect to each other – particularly the others in your social world who may be more on the margins. Do you go to the same trouble to think about what life must be like for them, and do you act with the same generosity of spirit that Charlotte and I experience? We would really like to think so.

Today we also said “break a leg” to Liz, who is off to Krakow on a writing residency. She’ll be back in November, and Sarah has taken over her office and role in the meantime if there’s anything you need. Remember the sic website is sic.mtaspiring.edutronic.net

Don’t forget that our school scholarships application closing date is this Friday.

You can still download the information and forms here:

The Rotary Scholarship team require hand-written submissions on this separate form:

Careers Info:

Stay close to Charlotte’s careers website careers.mtaspiring.edutronic.net to keep yourself up to date with scholarship opportunities, CV guides, summer jobs and tertiary application information. Better still, click on the “follow” tab at the bottom right and get everything new emailed directly to your inbox

Home Study – Commences 29 August 2019

KINDNESS, BY NAOMI SHIHAB NYE

Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.

Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.

Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to gaze at bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
It is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.

From Words Under the Words: Selected Poems. Copyright © 1995 by Naomi Shihab Nye.

This Week – 14 August 2019 – Scholarships.

This Week – 14 August 2019 – Scholarships.

This week our primary focus is on ensuring everyone is clear and well-planned in your application for scholarships for tertiary study. The deadlines for these are coming thick and fast – and in this case, unquestionably: nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Massive School Scholarships List:

The Rotary Scholarship team require hand-written submissions on this separate form:

Careers Week Info:

Stay close to Charlotte’s careers website careers.mtaspiring.edutronic.net to keep yourself up to date.

Plans for 2020

Reminder to please complete the form HERE (even if you are still unsure!)

Home Study – Commences 15 August 2019

Special Assessment Conditions

If you are a student who is entitled to Special Assessment Conditions in your NCEA Examinations, please contact Vicki Ashton to respond to her request for confirmation of the specific support provision you require this year

This Week – 19 June 2019 – Waiting for Snow

This Week – 19 June 2019 – Waiting for Snow

Dear Year 13 Students, Parents and Families

As winter limps along and we’re waiting for even a subtle hint of snow, the Year 13 cohort continue to amaze and delight us. Today Chris highlighted your ever-improving attendance, fortnightly grades and academic data of the cohort which will no doubt be reflected in your mid-year reports next week. We three are proud of your increasingly mature interactions with us, each other, teachers, adults and the school community. In this newsletter;

  • Worker’s Rights Talk
  • New Home Study List
  • SIC Students going Over and Above
  • New Scholarship Database
  • Fun with ERO
  • Holiday Course Sailing for Credits
  • Latest Home Study List

Have a fabulous week everyone

Liz, Chris and Charlotte

Generosity New Zealand Data Base

Search for scholarships to help you with your 2020 cash flow; the school has paid a subscription to access a comprehensive scholarship database through Generosity NZ. All you need is a little time…

  1.  Click on the HERE to sign up using your SCHOOL email address
  2.  You will receive a confirmation email after you sign up.  Please check your spam/junk folder if the confirmation email went there.  
  3.  After confirming your email, you can now log in to the search database.

National Volunteer Week

Some short snippets for you since it is National Volunteer Week this week. This year’s theme is “Whiria te tangata – weaving the people together”. In weaving our community together, this year’s Year 13 students have so far recorded a collective number of 2219 hours of volunteering on over a thousand separate occasions. 

Students who have recorded more than 40 volunteer hours this year so far are Jessica Paddon, Lucas Baird, Jessa Bennett, Fletch Cavanagh, Daniel Kemner, Annabel Fairbairn, Jesse Fothergill, Madi Gainsford, Mckenzie Hart, Ella James, Christina Lamb, Bridget O’Brien, Nicole Pittaway, Caitlin Roberts, Jesse Robertson, Max Swift, Eva Wilson and Hayley Yule. This is a fantastic effort by all of them and they, and so many other students, are keeping up the great work. 

Every year the SIC coordinator makes a cake for the person who files the 1000thform for their volunteering. This year Jessica Paddon was lucky number 1000 – her volunteering includes coaching netball, visiting Wanaka Preschool and helping out at events.  Thanks to our amazing ‘SIC’ Coordinator, Liz Breslin – baking a Red Velvet Cake! What a legend.

mde

Opportunities and Career Notices

  • Radiation Therapy Campus Tours; if you are thinking of applying for this course a visit is an essential pre-requisite, please email Charlotte
  • This year the ‘Global Development Tour‘ travels to New York, London, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, and Rome from January-February 2020. The tour will educate 22 New Zealand high schoolers on the inner machinations of the United Nations global network, as well as the role of the Sustainable Development Goals in development across the world. It gleans insight into global citizenry, spanning cities, agencies and key players at the forefront of progressing our world forward. Go to https://unyouth.org.nz/event/global-development-tour/ to apply by June 23!
  • Workers Rights – if you plan on working next year then sign up for this essential talk next Wednesday about all the employment stuff you need to know
  • Snow Programmes – if you are part of an organised ski/snowboard development squad then it’s time to get this sorted. Mr Bosley needs to approve your absence for training. Email us at “year13deans@mtaspiring.school.nz” for the snow form.
  • Sail Away… on a Youth Development Course to Stewart Island where you live onboard the yacht ‘Elwing’, have adventures for a week around the various bays, giving you time to think about yourself and the future. Cost only $100 for the week. An unusual adventure.

Home Study List for the Next Fortnight

Click here for the list on the Year 13 Website

Love,

Charlotte, Liz and Chris

This Week – 1 May 2019

This Week – 1 May 2019

It was brilliant to see you all back this week for the start of Term 2.

The highlight of today’s meeting was being able to hand out the “Get Out of Jail Free” cards to so many of you. To be eligible for one of these, you had to have a perfect attendance record for Term 1, with zero unjustified absences. Just to put this into perspective, only one person in last year’s Year 13 cohort had maintained such an outstanding attendance record in May last year.

As we said today, while it must have become obvious to you by now that this kind of data and metric is a bit of an obsession of ours, this is for good reasons. There is very sound educational research that demonstrates that simply turning up to school has a significant and sustained positive impact on a number of areas of a student’s life.

The List

If we missed you off this list for some reason, please contact us and we’ll rectify this immediately. If you missed out this time around – fear not. The fortnightly system will still operate as it did last term: a perfect attendance for two weeks unlocks home study for the following two weeks. You can then clock up perfect attendance scores for Term 2, earning yourself a Get Out of Jail Free card for Term 3 – when you’ll need it most!

Don’t go it alone

This term is always a challenging one in the life of a Year 13 student. The NCEA assessments will come thick and fast (especially in the last two weeks), the snow hasn’t yet fallen, there can sometimes be an inversion layer of cloud that keeps the sun from shining for up to a month and the cold and dark can just make everything a bit more difficult. If things start getting on top of you – don’t bear it alone. Come and speak to us.

Put it on a plan

Developing a plan will also help a lot in this process. Put all your commitments and deadlines in one place and develop an overview. Plan in your social time too – and rest – and recreation. Share your plan with someone who cares and keep updating it as things change. This simple process can work wonders.


Notices

Righto – until next week!

Chris and Charlotte