Our swimming Spartans recently completed the Junior School Inter-House Swimming Carnival. It was a big day for all Spartans, especially our Year 3s who attended their first major swimming carnival.
It was great to see the stands full of spectators ready to cheer on our students as they gave it their best in the pool.
We had some amazing individual performances with the following students taking out first place in their respective age groups:
After a big day of competing student eagerly awaited the presentation, in which Franklin House was awarded Champions of the carnival. Congratulations, Franklin!
To see more on the carnival watch this week's episode of Spartan Stream.
Our Invesiture Service saw the commisioning of our Class of 2023. Read a snapshot of our Deputy Headmaster, Nicholas Brice's address to our Seniors.
When I was leaving my previous school and in anticipation of coming to Somerset College in 2021, I received a gift from someone. They handed a wrapped parcel to me, which was obviously a book, and stated, “You’ll need this.”
I immediately speculated and wondered what it was.
Was it a copy of Deputy Headmaster for Dummies?
I returned home that night and eagerly, but also quizzically, opened the gift and was surprised with what greeted me: The Art of War by Sun Tzu.
Confused, I immediately read the text that night.
I discovered that The Art of War is the most famous study of strategy ever written and has had an extraordinary influence on the history of warfare, government and politics. Sun Tzu himself was a Chinese military general, strategist, philosopher, and writer who lived during the Eastern Zhou period of 771 to 256 BCE.
Within The Art of War, Sun Tzu makes the following statements amongst many others:
“The art of war is… a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin.”
“All warfare is based on deception.”
“Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected.”
Although quite intense at times, it has and awful lot of information that has been of great value to me and, no doubt, thousands of others.
Upon completion, I closed the text, lay on my couch, stared off into space and reflected on something. Not what the messages within the text were, or Sun Tzu’s directives.
I realised that the question I needed to ask wasn’t, “what is this text?”. The question was actually, “why was it given to me with the instruction, ‘You’re going to need this’”.
The truth is that I unfortunately feel that the book was gifted to me as they believed that being a leader is the same as going to war. Making it more simple – they potentially felt like leaders “battle” and I was being given a rule book as to how to “win”.
I hopped off the couch and headed to bed with a decision made: I didn’t agree with them.
We live in a society that can unfortunately be obsessed with winning or losing. There are some who only celebrate champions and discard those who come second. Our day-to-day conversation is littered with examples:
The argument is often made that competition builds character, as learning how to win and lose toughens us and give us confidence. Please trust that I am not advocating for the mentality that ‘everyone should get a medal’. It’s important to learn lessons from success and defeat and at the Investiture Dinner, Olympian and Somerset alumni, Mr Alex Beck, imparted some incredible wisdom to the Class of 2023 regarding this.
But, for today’s purposes, I am mirroring what anthropologist Jules Henry said which is that, “…a competitive culture endures… by tearing people down." Another way of saying this is that, unfortunately, some believe that their candle will burn brighter, if they blow your candle out.
I don’t agree with this.
Again, Alex Beck stated that, as the Seniors of the College, you have to lead by example and support those in the community. What he was discussing was servant leadership.
The phrase "servant leadership" was coined by Robert K. Greenleaf when he used it for the first time in 1970. In his essay, Greenleaf explains the term servant leader and talks about the reason for elaborating on this new leadership approach.
In short, servant leadership is a leadership philosophy built on the belief that the most effective leaders strive to serve others, rather than try to gather power or take control.
But here is the most important point… you can’t choose who you serve.
Service must be to and for everyone…
Those who are ‘beneath’ you.
Those who are ‘above’.
Those who are beside you.
Those who agree with you.
Those who don’t.
Those who are your close friend. Those who aren’t.
Those who will be of benefit you.
And certainly (and most importantly) those who have no means to repay.
To close, I circle back to The Art of War.
I might have painted Sun Tzu in a negative light and that would be remiss of me. He also stated that, “I have three treasures that I keep and prize: one is kindness. By kindness one can be brave… The exercise of kindness leads to victory…”.
With utmost respect, I’ll slightly twist these words. I would ask that, throughout this year and as servant leaders…
Be brave enough to be kind.
Click to see a brief highlight from our Investiture Service.
Over the past school holidays, I had the privilege of undergoing a Summer Internship with the MBA Partnership, Southport. The MBA Partnership, established in 2001, is a diverse financial firm offering services in Accounting, Wealth Management, Strategy and Advisory, Book-Keeping and Offshore Outsourcing (just to name a few). They are an incredible team of financial experts dedicated to excellence and I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to work with them.
As a Year 11 student, the reality of having to start fresh outside of school in less than a year is quite daunting. Consequently, as part of the ‘Futures’ program run fortnightly for Year 11s, Somerset welcomed Sandy Aitkenhead (HR Manager), and Kaya Mukai (Accountant) from MBA. For the first time ever, the MBA Partnership decided to extend its Summer Internship Program to school students, acting as a valuable experience to taste what work is like in the real world. After application, many emails, zoom meetings and phone calls, I was honoured to be invited to spend four weeks as an employee of MBA.
During the course of my internship, I spent time in every different department at MBA, shadowing industry experts and learning the ins and outs of their specialised areas. From Accounting, to HR, Wealth Management and Offshore, I gained exposure to such valuable and imperative areas of the financial industry, working alongside my colleagues on both individual and group projects. My work experience at MBA has proven to be one of the most valuable four weeks of my life and has played an enormous role in helping guide me through deciding on my tertiary studies. I am incredibly thankful to MBA for hosting me throughout the school holidays and would encourage all students to take advantage of this incredible opportunity Somerset and MBA have orchestrated.
We have only just commenced the school year and already have some wonderful Netball news to celebrate. Congratulations to the following students on being selected in the 16 to 19 years Hinterland team, Marley Burns, Rio Burns, Shemeah Poloai and Bayley D'Hotman de Villiers, and Ruby Partridge. Congratulations also to Ariana Ransfield on being selected in and named captain of the 13 to 15 years Hinterland Team.
Good luck at the SSCC carnival on February 21. We are very proud of you all!
In other Netball news Elsa Sandholt has been selected in the 19 and Under Queensland State Netball Team to compete at the National Netball Championships in April, with Tahlia Evans being named as a Training Partner. Phenomenal achievement girls!
Photo (Left to Right) - Tahlia, Bayley, Elsa, Rio, Ruby, Marley, Ariana (absent, Shemeah)
At the tail end of 2022, two Somerset senior teams headed to Cairns to take part in the Australian Schools Teams Championships.
Open Secondary: Byron Morris, Eason Wang, Kenny Ming, Oliver Yang
Girls Secondary: Lyanna Chan, Jennifer Yeung, Melody Yang, Ruhara Mapabandara
The Open team was seeded in the bottom half of the draw, but only lost a match to eventual winners Anglican Church Grammar School with the team finishing in second position. They demolished teams from ACT and SA by 3.5 to 0.5, and NSW 3 to 1, whilst they drew with the Victorian Champions 2-all. Individually players all performed well, with Kenny Ming picking up the prize for best player on board 3.
The Girls team knew they had a chance to do well in the event and this they did, finishing in second position with a score of 16/20 (normally enough to win the event!). The champion team was Mac.Robertson Girls High from VIC who defeated Somerset in their head to head match up. Somerset meanwhile defeated ACT, QLD 2, and SA by 4-nil and then beat NSW 3 to 1. Individually, Melody Yang (board 3) and Ruhara Mapabandara (board 4) won their board prizes for best on board.
Prep to Year 2 have lunch time clubs running three times per week (Wednesday, Thursday, Friday), with students collected from, and taken back to, their eating area. This will start in Week 3.
Year 3 to 6 students will have a chess club in Brown 2.6 (Chess Room, above the KIP) on Thursday morning from 7.30am to 8.30am. Registration can be done here. There is no charge for this programme as this is replacing the lunch clubs that were offered. Year 1 to 12 students will have access to a competition club on Friday afternoons from 3.30pm to 5.30pm in Brown 2.6 (Chess Room, above library). Starting Week 1.
Year 1 to 3 students must sign up via The HUB (there is a cost on this).
Year 4 to 12 students are to be signed up via this link (there is no cost as this is covered by the sports levy).
Stay up to date with information on the Chess Schoolbox page which will be updated periodically with upcoming events, news and other information.
For any questions, please email the Gardiner Chess team.
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