NEWS Edition 3 – May 2021
Contents 2
Principal’s Say
4
Library News
6
Writer in Residence
7
Book Club
8
Staff Art Show
9
Music News
10
Enviro News
12 Visual Arts 14 Land and Water Camp 15 APC Families Trivia Night 16 Baseball Champions 17 Bike Safety
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NEWS Edition 3 – May 2021
Important Dates 4 and 5 June – TBC Litfest
PRINCIPAL’S SAY Staying positive in the lockdown
4 – 11 June Years 10 & 11 Examination Period
We may be in lockdown again, but that’s not going to stop teaching and learning or the great extracurricular activities APC is known for. We proved last year that we could succeed in remote and flexible mode and so let’s stay positive. Make sure you reach out to your friends and classmates to stay connected and ensure everyone is doing well. With any luck this campus closure will be short and sharp.
9 June General Achievement Test (GAT)
Building a reading culture
14 June Public Holiday – Queen’s Birthday 16 June Year 12 Parent/Teacher Interviews 18 June Year 12 Formal 22 June Year 9 Da Vinci Panel Interviews Year 12 Parents Book Club 24 June Da Vinci Exhibition (40 Bay St - 4.30 pm-6 pm) 25 June Last day of Term 2 12 July First day of Term 3
So let’s continue as normal. Our focus remains education, and this month we’re concentrating on building a reading culture at the school. Books proved such a solace to us last year and we’re going to try to keep the trend continuing. Why this concentration of books and reading? It’s because reading books is vital to quality learning. Research by Leading Teacher Kathryn Riosa has recently highlighted the reality that across all schools reading is in decline. Her research shows that only around half of all 15-year-old boys and three quarters of girls read books reasonably regularly. Worse, many say they seldom read except when they are required to by their teachers. To address this, APC is developing a plan to embed reading culture across all our classroom and extracurricular activities. We’re going to get more students reading again, because we know that students who read more tend to do far better in their final year exams. It sets them up for life. For the coming week, that means Book Week goes on. Our wonderful Library team of Veronica, Jess, Haydyn and Clive have organised a fantastic range of activities to celebrate reading and books, all with the very generous financial support of our friends at Rotary. Showing great initiative, they’ve managed to shift their planned activities to online so you can participate from home. See the article on page 4 for full details. The Lit Fest also be happening this year, stay tuned for details. What else are we doing? We’ve created a new senior library on the first floor at Danks Street, connected by a bookthemed study centre. We’re still filling this space with books, and we want to acknowledge the generous assistance of Penguin Books for helping us out. We have established a Reading Club at Year 9, where during the long winter our students can sit by an open fireplace and get stuck into books and share their thoughts. Our guest curators continue in the Library. Our Short Story Club, which encourages students to read widely, continues to operate every second Friday lunchtime.
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And it is now being joined by a whole school book club – see page 8 – and a walking book club, which you will be hearing more about later. And, finally, we have a new Poet in Residence, Gareth Morgan, who will be leading a slam poetry event as part of Reading Week, among his many inspirational duties. Over the coming months we’re going to be backing up these exciting book themed events with new ways for parents to join in and encourage children to read more books. Remember, if you’re at a loss for something to do during the lockdown, pick up and get started on that book you’ve always wanted to read – or even that novel or history book you’ve been set by your teacher! Steven Cook Foundation Principal
You are warmly invited to
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83 Danks St LibraryPAGE 3 Albert Park College
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NEWS Edition 3 – May 2021
An update from the APC library Again Book Week goes virtual. Although we were looking forward to hosting you in the Danks St Library, we are instead going to be using our Library Space Google Classroom as the official Book Week hub. Sign up to the page with the code p5qtyvk for all updates, links and Google Meet invitations throughout this week. As of today, any book finished as part of the Premiers’ Reading Challenge will raise $5 towards the Indigenous Literacy Foundation, compared to the usual $1 per book. This offer will run until Friday afternoon, so embrace the circuit-breaker lockdown and get reading! Remember, you can continue to borrow eBooks and audiobooks through ePlatform. Throughout the week, you will have the opportunity to post photos of yourself in your book-related dress-ups. You can dress up as a book character, author, genre; it’s up to your interpretation! We will create an assignment on Google Classroom for any photo submissions, which we will then share on Friday. Our favourite costume will win 100 points and a book voucher and all participants will receive 10 points.
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Wednesday – Poetry Slam and Workshop over Google Meet at 12.30 pm to 1 pm, led by our resident poet, Gareth Morgan. If you prefer, you are welcome to pre-record your video and email it to jesszanoni@ albertparkcollege.vic.edu.au. The winner will receive 100 house points and a book voucher. Thursday – Flash Fiction competition with Nick Xuereb. Everyone who RSVPs to this activity will receive an email in the morning with their own writing prompt. Participants will then have the day to create a mini story and send it to Nick, who will award 100 house points/book prize to his favourite piece. Friday – House Book Trivia Kahootz. Show off your literary prowess! Winning team members will receive 50 points and a book voucher each.
As for the virtual events, the schedule is as follows: • Monday – Ten Minute Plays reading with Heidi Roleff. Join the Google Meet at 12.30 pm to take part in a short play. • Tuesday – Book Balderdash. Fabricate the opening sentences to some crazylooking books! Participants will then have the chance to guess which sentence is the real one. Points allocated based on how many votes your sentence receives and for selecting the correct one from the options. Sentences will be submitted and then distributed via Google Forms. The winner will receive 100 house points and a book voucher.
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Every student who participates in the above events will receive 10 house points. We will be posting more activities and updates to the Library Space Google Classroom, so don’t get FOMO, make sure you sign up (code: p5qtyvk)!
Olivia Rielly, 11B
From the APC Library: Veronica, Jess, Haydyn and Clive
One of my favourites is the Secret History by Donna Tartt. I love the storyline – so engaging to read – and I loved the character development. It feels like a different world, and even though it’s something I can’t connect to, it makes you want to be there.
Student Book Reviews
Hannah Victoria Johnstone, 8D
Zali Cooper, 12I
I’m reading Tales of the Unexpected by Roald Dahl which is a collection of short stories. I am currently reading ‘Lamb to the slaughter’. It’s an amazing short story that is based on a married couple in the 1940s. I like the figure of speech in the story – it’s not modern. I like how Dahl depicts their struggles and how descriptive the story is.
My favourite book is Holding up the Universe by Jennifer Niven. It challenges readers to question how they view other people. It’s suitable for teenagers. Felix McPhail, 12I My favourite book is Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, it’s a short read but it has an extremely large impact. The themes are well defined and well rounded. Gabriela Marshall Rosso, 11I My favourite book is Catcher in the Rye by J.D Salinger. I like the dry sense of humour and the lack of self-awareness that the main character has. I think a lot of teenagers would like it as it’s relatable and cynical.
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Jack Potter, 11E I read Normal People by Sally Rooney recently and enjoyed it. I feel like it’d be relatable for my age group – it focuses on teenagers going into young adults. Declan Rudd, 7K I like this Roald Dahl story called Danny the Champion of the World. It’s got a lot of tension in it, I just really like it. I also enjoyed Worlds Worst Teachers by David Walliams. It’s pretty funny as there are some weird teachers in it.
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NEWS Edition 3 – May 2021
Meet APC’s Writer in Residence In 2021 APC is proud to announce its flagship Writer in Residence Program. Our Writer in Residence for 2021 is Gareth Morgan, interviewed by Kathryn Riosa. When did you first realise you wanted to be a writer? I can’t think of a moment but I went to uni where I studied literature. I was quite bad at literature which led me to creative writing. From where do you source your inspiration for your writing? I like to write about my day. I follow my nose and write a phrase that comes into my head. Last year I wrote a book about my old job. So work is a focus of my writing, and the relationships you can have with work. How would you describe your writing? What type of writing do you enjoy and why? I’m a poet, I enjoy experimental poetry. I like the openness and porousness of experimental writing. The genre is as much about letting things happen to you as much as you make things happen to a piece of writing. Poetry forms that conform to lyricism or romanticism isn’t my language; it’s not as free as the experimental genre.
was a lot of work for posties and posties were really bearing the brunt of much of the stress of the time. My book was inspired by another book called Afterglow by Eileen Miles, which is about their dead dog. The premise of my book is my father returning to me as a dog. My father’s nickname is bulldog, he is a mailman. There was an interesting interplay between my own life and Miles’ book. My book is a series of letters to Eileen. What is your favourite book? Who is your favourite author and why? Afterglow was a formative reading experience for me. I read often, I enjoy poetry but would not describe myself as a disciplined reader. What advice would you give to aspiring writers? Just do it! Experiment and write without thinking – thinking too much about what you are writing can be really inhibitive. What excites you about your residency at APC? It’s a great opportunity to talk to students about writing and maybe convince some people to become poets. Gareth’s first publication Dear Eileen can be purchased at Puncher & Wattman.
What does your writing process look like? It’s quite messy. A lot of my writing literally involves writing in my notes app on my phone. Poems emerge after a few days of jotting down bits and pieces and slapping them together and then it’s a sonnet now. How often do you write? Everyday. Writing for me doesn’t involve sitting down at a desk in a really structured way. You’ve recently published a book Dear Eileen. Can you talk about this book? What was your inspiration? I was working as a postie during the lockdown period in 2020. It was a really tough time, there 83 DANKS ST ALBERT PARK MELBOURNE VICTORIA
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NEWS Edition 3 – May 2021
APC Book Club Albert Park College is excited to invite students, their families and our broader community to take part in APC’s Book Club. The APC Book Club will run once a term in the College’s Library at the Danks Street campus and will be hosted by the College’s Library leader. Light refreshments will be provided.
Our book will be: the Survivors by Jane Harper The Avenue Book Store on Dundas Place stocks the novel. Please consider purchasing your copy of the novel at The Avenue. Albert Park College now has an Avenue Bookstore Frequent Buyer account. When purchasing books, cards and/or gift vouchers simply mention you’re part of the Albert Park College community and 10% of your purchase will turn into credit the library can spend. Every purchase can accumulate ‘points’ and every $250 spent, the library will receive a $25 voucher.
Book your FREE tickets at: eventbrite.com
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NEWS Edition 3 – May 2021
2021 APC Staff Art Show On a wintry Monday night staff of APC, their friends, their families and members of our wider community gathered in the Gershwin Room at The Esplanade Hotel, St Kilda to acknowledge the artistic talents of our staff. The annual event demonstrated the amazing artistic talent the college fosters too. Sculpture, floral arrangements, photography, knitting, sewing, illustration and painting were amongst the arts showcased. Even the principal chipped in with his own environmental themed digital production. Several artists managed to sell some terrific pieces. Congratulations to all our artists and thank you so much for sharing your inspiring skills at this beautiful event. Shelly Casey Visual Arts Coordinator
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NEWS Edition 3 – May 2021
Musical News Rehearsals for our first ever APC Musical, ‘Eden’ are in full swing! Our show follows the story of the brave Bailey – a technologicallysavvy girl whose mission to save her mum exposes a huge government cover up!
This completely original piece of musical theatre is part of APC’s tenth year anniversary. Cast and band rehearsals are in full swing, with students involved in all aspects of the show. We are rehearsing throughout Term 2 and performing at the Alex Theatre in St Kilda in Term 3 (August 11–13).
Composer in Residence A bit over a week ago I had the good fortune of attending a fairly small and intimate presentation and performance evening run by Cameron Dayell, APC’s composer in residence. He’s a New Zealand born guitarist, composer and producer that studied at UCLA in California, and has worked with a dizzying array of artists, including Sia, Goyte, Katie Noonan, and many more. During his time as composer in residence he ran workshops with students that delved into the worlds of songwriting and music production. Having attended them, I can tell you they were illuminating. The evening was a great opportunity for us to gain a view into the world of a professional musician, and particularly how this changed during the deep, dark lockdown of last year when all public performances were essentially impossible. Apart from showing us what he has
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been working on during his time as composer in residence, Cameron shared with us some of his own history, as well as the history of some deceptively uninteresting fields (who could have known the 12-string guitar had such a fascinating story?). We were also able to hear some of Cameron’s works, which ranged from ambient to punk to folk, including some songs yet to be released. The presentation ended with a performance from Cameron and Lior (yes, that Lior), who played two haunting and downright stunning pieces. The evening was a fantastic primer into a world of music that I was unfamiliar with, and I’m very grateful to have invited. APC is certainly lucky to have someone like Cameron as composer in residence. Year 12 student, Max Crandall
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NEWS Edition 3 – May 2021
ResourceSmart Schools Achievements As a final step towards our ‘1 Star status’ with ResourceSmart Schools, APC would like to bring your attention to the HUGE environmental savings our school has achieved throughout our ResourceSmart Schools sustainability journey! Between 2016 and 2020, the hard work and dedication of our staff, students and parent community has diverted mountains of landfill, saved bucketloads of water and masses of energy, and bounced back a long way in our quest to improve biodiversity. Please see below our amazing achievements and stay tuned for the announcement of our 1 Star renewal, as well as our 2021 data!
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Biodiversity at Danks Street APC continues to promote biodiversity on our confined, inner-urban campuses. Recently, Enviro Club students worked with CERES facilitator, Leah Martini, to conduct our annual ResourceSmart Schools audit of biodiversity at the Danks Street campus. Our overall score, 83 out of a possible 100 showed a 13-point increase on our score from May 2019. Much credit to Chris, Paul and the maintenance team for keeping our grounds in beautiful condition and ensuring our students enjoy a wonderfully diverse environment despite the relative smallness of our footprint compared to other schools. The amount and diversity of vegetation squeezed into the single hectare at Danks Street will inspire future environment leaders to create a more sustainable, diverse and prosperous future. We marked Endangered Species Day on Friday 21 May this year. Although we account for just 0.01 percent of all life on planet Earth, humans have caused the extinction of 83 percent of all living things. It is telling that the children and young adults of our species chose this day to stage a strike to protest the peril that their future faces from climate heating and humaninduced environmental destruction. Mr. Steven Stanecki Environmental Programs Coordinator
APC students lead School Strike for Climate On 21 May, thousands of students across the country went on strike to raise awareness and demand government action on the climate crisis. I have been involved in organising the School Strike 4 Climate since I was in Year 7 and it’s incredible to see how many APC students took the lead to attend the protest. The rally was held at Treasury Gardens and I am proud to say I MC’d the event with my friend, Anj. The presence of our students and their incredibly creative signs showed how passionate APC students are about climate change and their willingness to be changemakers. Ella Simons, Environment Student Leader
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Visual Arts Showcase We’re not able to go out to galleries and exhibitions, so we’re bringing them straight to your living room, we hope you enjoy the work of our visual art students.
Nikki Briggs
Chhavi Chaudhary
Sebastian NG
Jane Zorbas 83 DANKS ST ALBERT PARK MELBOURNE VICTORIA
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Dakota Johnston
Jasmine Robillard
Ellen Young
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Louie Lee
Hunter Seabrook
Kiera Andrews
Estelle Andrews 83 DANKS ST ALBERT PARK MELBOURNE VICTORIA
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Milo Thompson
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NEWS Edition 3 – May 2021
Land and Water Camp Land and Water Camp 2021 was one heck of an amazing experience. The awesome variety of activities was exhilarating and it was a great way to make new friends. The smaller numbers make it possible to get a close connection with all students – something also helped by the fact that it’s a device-free environment. This year’s activities were white water kayaking, rock climbing, bush skills and river sledding. Mr O’Connell, Mr Kelly and Miss Simpson along with the guides from Melbourne Adventure Hub were a great help during the camp, which was a 90-minute bus drive to the Yarra Valley, passing lots of beautiful scenery. Whilst kayaking you can see amazing views and learn a lot about the history of the Yarra River. River sledding was a great activity to rest and enjoy the cool water running on your skin. This camp also helps you build your bush survival skills by teaching you about DRABCD and how to treat a snake bite. Overall this camp was a great experience and I recommend it to anyone who is looking for a camp unlike any other. Mark Kazoglou and Kaleb Wandishin
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APC Families Trivia Night Staff team gains bragging rights Wow! What a fantastic community we have. Thank you to everyone that came to the Trivia event. It was fully sold out and a fun night was had by all. Great to see so many Year 7 parents attending. The Station Pier Cruise Ship terminal 2 provided an incredible space for such a large number of people and we are very grateful that Vic Ports was generous to donate the Venue for the evening. We had a huge selection of silent auction items that were donated from our generous local community with a retail value of in excess of $10,000. Please make sure you give these great school benefactors your support. Their logos are below.
Thank you to Assistant Principal Tim Nolan and the wonderful parent volunteers for putting in the time to make this event a success. Thank you also to our hospitality club for putting together the cheese boards. We have raised $15,000, which will go towards the build and fit-out of the new APC STEM Centre. Our winners took home their grand prize, which also included the new perpetual Michelin Man Trophy. The winners happened to be the APC Staff Table. It looks like our students are in good hands! In a humble official statement received by the editorial department, our Principal Steve Cook, a member of the winning team, said: ‘This proves finally what we have known for a long time: that the staff really are smarter than the parents.’ Bernadene Voss APC Families President
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Baseball Champions After winning the local Interschool tournament last month, the Year 9 and 10 APC baseball team took part in the Southern Metropolitan Sports Regional Baseball Championships on 30 April. Against difficult competition the team performed well and finished with three wins and no losses including an exciting Grand Final victory. Caps off to our new regional champions! Next stop – the State Championships. Good luck team.
The team applauds dominant efforts from: • Hudson Pallay • Beau Graham • Spencer Pallay • Archie Lang • Aidan Sinclair • Henry Wild • Lachlan Voss • Jacob Bubnic. Hudson and Spencer Pallay
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An important reminder about bike safety We love that such a high number of our students and staff travel to and from school and between campuses on their bikes. Positive action for our precious environment! It is vital that we all use our roads and bike paths responsibly, and according to the law. Please speak with your child if they ride their bike to school and ensure that they know the road rules and laws specifically relevant to cyclists.
Remember that like everything else at APC, road use is about respect. Keep riding safely everyone! Further information, including laws specific to cyclists and road use, can be found on the VicRoads website.
In particular: • obey all traffic laws when riding on the roads • always wear a helmet • don’t ride on footpaths if you’re over 13 years of age • remember that on footpaths pedestrians must be given right of way • use bike lanes and cycle lanes where possible • use a ‘D lock – they really work • don’t ride bikes indoors or within school grounds.
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