senior school newsletter

SENIOR NEWSLETTER
12 JUNE 2015
SENIOR SCHOOL
NEWSLETTER
PRINCIPAL’S MESSAGE
Dear Parents
The highlight of the past few weeks was undoubtedly the Fun Day. This is hosted by the Parent
Teacher Partnership (PTP) to raise funds for various projects that benefit the whole school. We are
very grateful to parents for the generous support of the day. Current projects include the upgrading of
the Jubilee toilets and erecting shade cloth around the pool area. Initially we were anxious about the
proximity of the Fun Day to the start of examinations, but in retrospect this was a wonderful opportunity
for the girls to “let their hair down” and participate in some healthy outdoor fun! The theme for this year
was Sports Heroes and Heroines and each class came up with its own creative interpretation of the
theme. Mrs Donly and her class certainly made a statement by dressing up as Rollerbladers in pink
wigs and short frocks. The day was blessed with wonderfully sunny weather and Active Ed kept the
girls busy with a variety of team activities. Even Mrs van Zyl and myself could not resist going head to
head on the inflatable obstacle course. Well done also to the matrics who manned the Spirit Station
and kept the girls busy with some very creative and entertaining challenges. Thanks also to the mums
who kept us fed and watered; the prego rolls certainly exceeded all our expectations.
Catholic Schools Week saw many students from several Catholic schools come together both on the
Sports field and the cultural arena. The week culminated in the beautiful Grade 11 mass at the
Cathedral at which our choir and marimba players did St Dominic’s proud.
Examinations are well on their way and we encourage the girls to keep warm and stay healthy during
the cold weather.
Sharon Fizgerald
Inside this issue:
Sports News
2
Music Post 2016
3
Drummie & Technology News 4
Grade 10 Outing
5
Grade 11 Mass
6&7
Catholic School’s Week
8
Marian Pilgrimage
9
Dates to Diarise
10
One School, One Family, One Spirit
Page 2
Sport Results
Netball
The first Netball team participated in the annual Inter-Catholic
tournament on 16 May. They played brilliantly ending third overall. Well done, ladies.
Indoor Netball
Some of our netball players participated in the indoor league
over the past few months. The season ran from March to June,
with our girls playing matches every Monday evening. St
Amy Meewes
Dominic’s entered two teams into the Benoni Indoor league; one
Abena Osei
junior team and one senior team.
Our senior team had a hard season, playing against provincial ladies teams but went
from strength to strength and made it through to the Bronze final. The team played
against very strong opposition and narrowly lost the game, finishing fourth overall.
Well done to all the girls who played in the senior teams throughout the season, and
a special well done to Amy Meewes and Abena Osei who were selected to represent
Benoni Indoor Arena in the upcoming super league!
Anke Jacobs, Coach
Hockey
Results for hockey match vs Boksburg High:
U14 – Drew
U15 – Drew
2nd – Lost
1st – Won 3 -1. Well done to the 1st team on this win as this is
Michaela Rees
the first win of the season, and a special well done to Michaela
Ashleigh Teixeira
Rees for scoring all three goals!
Over the weekend of the 23rd of May the first Hockey team participated in the annual Inter-Catholic. The team performed well
winning 3, drawing 3 and only losing 2 matches. The Player of
the tournament was Candice Potgieter, Most Improved Player
was Ashleigh Teixeira and Most Consistent player was Chayla
Menezes. Well done, ladies.
Tennis
Well done to the D team for winning their match vs Oosterlig.
Chess
Candice Potgieter
Well done to the 1st team for beating Benoni Christian School
Chayla Menezes
5-0.
One School, One Family, One Spirit
Page 3
Golf
During the holiday Jenifer Haw won her division in the Ekurhuleni Golf competition
held at Benoni Country Club. Teagan Lubbe was selected for the Ekurhuleni team
championship to be held in East London for five days. Well done, ladies.
Jenifer Haw
Post available for 2016
We invite applications from suitably qualified persons for the following post from January 2016.
GRADES 0 to 9 MUSIC TEACHER
The successful candidate will:
 Identify with and support the Catholic ethos and values of the school;
 Be SACE registered;
 Be computer literate;
 Be involved in extra-murals and school functions;
 Have good communication and intra personal skills.
Key competencies:
The successful candidate will:
 Be able to teach music appreciation using appropriate instruments to all grades from Grades 0 to 9;
 Be able to teach singing in all grades from Grade 0 to Grade 9.
Advantages:
 Experience in teaching these age groups;
 Experience in teaching marimbas, steel band and orchestra;
 Experience in working with choirs;
 Experience in productions with these age groups;
 Experience in running festivals and concerts.
To apply please e-mail your CV with references to wendy.buchwald@stdominics.co.za.
The closing date for applications is 3 July 2015.
Only applicants who fulfil all of the above requirements will be considered. Application does not automatically entitle the applicant to an interview or an appointment. If you have not been contacted with regard to
an interview by 15 July please assume that your application has been unsuccessful.
One School, One Family, One Spirit
Teagan Lubbe
Drummie News
Page 4
On the 23rd and 30th May our Senior Drum Majorettes took part in their
Provincial Championships. Our girls did extremely well coming 1st in
Throwing Prop, Non Prop and Flag . In the small drill Category they were
placed as follows: Leader 1st, Sub leaders 1st, Squad 1st, display 1st and team overall
1st. For large drill the team was 2nd for leader, 1st for sub leaders, 1st for squad, 1st for
display and 1st place over all.
The Saints were also named Champion of Champions for Gauteng.
We are extremely proud of them and wish them the best of luck for Nationals in July
in Bloemfontein.
Sheri Kock
Technology News
Like many schools, St Dominic’s is committed to making technology work for education. However, as many will know, this is a challenge. At St Dominic’s we are
blessed as the infrastructure is well in place to move forward. As a school we have
decided as our next step is to introduce Moodle as a Learning Management System
(LMS). It is a versatile open source system that allows teachers to use technology
and the internet with its widely available lesson resources for their teaching. Applied
in the classroom, it can engage students in different ways through quizzes, surveys,
audio visuals, learning games and much more.
We have started over the last few weeks introducing Moodle to the teaching staff
through an international Moodle webinar (iMoot15). Hundreds of participant worldwide could subscribe and participate to talks and demonstrations relevant to teaching and the application of Moodle in the classroom. During the webinar we became
well aware that there is a fair learning curve ahead of us.
The school is committed to the development of ‘Champions’ or ‘Facilitators’ to support the teachers in using Moodle through extra training and a professional development programme.
Harry van der Burgt
ICT Manager
One School, One Family, One Spirit
Grade 10 Outing
The Grade 10 History girls accompanied by Mrs Ross visited Constitution
Hill on Friday, 22 May. The learners
visited the Women’s jail where political prisoners were incarcerated by
the Apartheid government, including
St Dominic’s past pupil and Member
of Parliament, Barbara Hogan. The
notorious Number 4 men’s jail was
also visited where amongst other political prisoners Mr Mandela, Albert Luthuli and
Mahatma Gandhi were incarcerated for fighting for human rights for all South Africans.
The highlight of the tour was the visit to the Constitutional Court, the highest court in
the country. This court’s role is to protect, interpret and enforce the Constitution. It is
committed to ‘the creation of a just society based on human dignity, equality and freedom.’
Mrs Ross would like to thank the Gr 10 History learners for their excellent behaviour
and their active participation in asking and answering so many questions.
Mrs Ross
One School, One Family, One Spirit
Page 5
Page 6
Grade 11 Mass
This year the annual Grade 11 Mass was celebrated on Thursday 21 May at the Cathedral of Christ the King in Johannesburg. After much preparation our Grade 11s set
off on the last leg of their pilgrimage early on a beautiful autumn day. We had received
the Pilgrimage Cross from Veritas and handed it over to St Catherine’s during Term 1.
The cross was sent from school to school until it was brought to the Cathedral by Dominican Convent, from Belgravia. The cross was brought into the Cathedral at the beginning of Mass, followed by all the represented schools bearing their school banners.
This year we had a brand new banner to show off. The Grade 11 Mass is specially
planned and organized so that every school present is involved.
The theme of this year’s Mass was “We gather together to celebrate the pilgrim journey
of Our Founders.” Prior to the Mass the Grade 11s were instructed about the value of
pilgrim journeys. They also collected toiletries to donate to the Sisters of Mercy centres
in Beria and Rosebank. Once again the boxes were beautifully wrapped by Mrs Geier.
Grade 11s also collected money to be given to the Cathedral’s soup kitchen in order to
purchase fresh ingredients for the soup that is handed out to the people of Johannesburg.
At the Mass our Marimba Girls played their hearts out. Mrs Penny was part of the musical team and the singing at Mass was awesome. As was the case last year, Fr Sebastian gave a meaningful homily, even getting all the Grade 11s to sing together: “If you
wanna be somebody, if you wanna go somewhere, you better wake up and pay attention.” These are words from “Sister Act.” Fr Sebastian’s approach was appropriate for
the teenagers present at the mass. His approach was uplifting and entertaining as well
as spiritual.
One School, One Family, One Spirit
Grade 11 Mass continued.
Mikyla Koen felt that Fr Sebastian’s message to the Grade 11s was constructive and
gave them something to think about. Joy Nsibanyoni felt that Fr Sebastian’s message
helped to put the Bible readings into the context of a teenager’s daily life.
Mrs Penny
Thank you to Zama Buthelezi,
Lara Chelius, Mikyla Koen and
Joy Nsibanyoni for their input.
Mrs Jones
Thanks to the teachers who
accompanied the Grade 11s on
this pilgrimage. (Mr Geier, Mrs
Jones, Mrs Penny, Ms Rindfleisch & Mrs van Zyl.)
Mrs Geier
Zama Buthelezi summarized Fr Sebastian’s message as follows:
God will ask you to do
things that you may not
want to do. You may think
“why” but he trusts that
you will spread his message and share his presence whether you’re in
front of 1 000 people or
just 10. Fr Sebastian also
encouraged all the Grade
11s to emulate their patron saints and learn more
about them. We are going
to miss Fr Sebastian and
wish him well in his new
parish at Kamieskroon in the Northern Cape.
After Mass the Grade 11s were given time to socialize and share their lunches. The
interaction between girls and boys was an opportunity to meet new people. This was
followed with a fellowship session led by Dean Spiller from St Benedict’s College. It
was very difficult to tear the
girls away. In the small bus the
girls sang: “Why did we have to
leave so soon.”
Page 7
Mrs Van Zyl
Ms Rindfleisch
Page 8
Catholic School’s Week—Celebrating our Founders
Not even load shedding stops St Dominic’s!
Catholic School’s Week was celebrated recently. On Saturday
evening of 17 May some of our girls wore their school uniforms
to Mass in order to highlight the close relationship between St
Dominic’s School and St Dominic’s Parish. Girls volunteered to
proclaim the readings of the day, offer up prayers and take up
the gifts to the altar. The altar servers were also from St
Dominic’s School. While the Parish Church has a generator, it
was not strong enough to work the microphones, so our girls
had to put in a greater effort in order to be heard. We are very
proud of them.
At the end of Mass Ms Dos Santos thanked the Parish for their
involvement in the school.
During the week following
Catholic
Sunday
School’s
the
Primary
School classes unveiled
their classroom
doors
that were decorated in
order to commemorate
the
founders
of
St
Dominic’s. The Grade
7s were given the task
of
commemorating
Mother
One
Rose
morning
school
gates
Niland.
at
the
parents
were given a paper rose
made by girls in the Primary School. The rose
was chosen as it is a
reminder
of
Ms Rindfleisch
Rose Niland.
Ms Rindfleisch
One School, One Family, One Spirit
Mother
Page 9
Marian Pilgrimage at St Dominic’s School 30 May
Every year numerous pilgrims go to Lourdes in
France, or Fatima in Portugal, to visit and pray at the
Marian shrines there. In
Africa pilgrims visit Marian
shrines at Ngoma or Groblesdaal. But in the largest
archdiocese in Africa – The
Archdiocese of Johannesburg - there is no Marian shrine for pilgrims to visit. Archbishop Buti Tlhagale has a plan
to change that. St Dominic’s School was selected as one of the venues for a pilgrimage
to take place on 30 May 2015. From early in the morning a large number of people
flocked to St Dominic’s School from all corners of the East and Far East Deaneries to
celebrate Mass and participate in the Pilgrimage. Numerous sodalities were present including the Sodality of St Anne, the Catholic Women’s League, the Children of Mary, the
Knights of Da Gama. The morning Mass was celebrated by Archbishop Buti and was
followed with Benediction. The choirs could
be heard from Kruger
Street. Archbishop Buti
explained that the plan
was to raise the necessary funds for a permanent shrine to be built
somewhere in the Archdiocese.
Other dates for Marian
Pilgrimages will be announced in due course
in other parts of the
Archdiocese.
Ms Rindfleisch
Soirée on
4 June
Laura Paula, international pianist performed
Beethoven
and
Khatchaturian
to
enchanted
audience,
displaying
exceptional
skill and musicality.
It
was a true treat and we
were indeed fortunate
to have a pianist of that
standard performing in
our school. Thank you
to all who attended.
Ms Olivier
One School, One Family, One Spirit
an
Page 10
DATES TO DIARISE
The best way to
cheer yourself is to
13 June
Netball and Hockey ISSF
15 June
School Holiday
16 June
Youth Day
cheer somebody
else up.
~ Mark Twain
Redhill Youth Day Netball (1st Team only)
17 June
Hockey St Dominic’s vs Assumption (Home)
24 June
Netball Senior School Champions (St Stithians)
26 June
Senior School Exams finish
Close for Mid– Term 12h30
6 July
Re-Open Day 1
6-12 July
Drummie Nationals in Bloemfontein
14 July
PTP AGM Guest Speaker Emma Sadlier
One School, One Family, One Spirit