NEWSBITES

BY RYAN HALL

MARKETING AND COMMUNICATIONS OFFICER

DA VINCI DECATHLON

Our Year 5 and 6 students represented CGS at this year’s Da Vinci Decathlon, placing 1st in a series of challenges designed to put your knowledge of mathematics, art, science and technology to the ultimate test!

SUE GEH CUP

Congratulations to our Year 5 & 6 Primary School Girls Basketball team on their win at the Sue Geh Cup!

KIDS LIT QUIZ

Congratulations to Harry, Oliver, Soraya and Annaliese (Years 6/7), for winning first place in the Canberra Heat of the Kids Lit Quiz! Jordan (Year 11) and Mrs Amy Lomas were our guest Quiz Masters.

INTERNATIONAL GEOGRAPHY OLYMPIAD

Congratulations to Rhea Sankar, who was one of four students to travel to Darwin to compete in the International Geography Olympiad (via Zoom), where she received a bronze medal and was the highest ranked Australian!

INTERNATIONAL LINGUIST OLYMPIAD

Each year students around the world take part in local Linguistics competitions. In Australia, OzCLO is held in early March, and Canberra Grammar School has a strong history of success in the competitions. This year, as was the case in 2018, one of our teams placed in the top 2 in Australia in the National Round, held in late March. The team, comprising Noah Gorrell, Sachin Lalloo, Joshua Lee, and James Monro, was selected to participate in the International Linguistics Olympiad (IOL). Due to COVID, the competition was held virtually from Latvia. The boys spent six hours on Tuesday 20 July completing the Individual competition. They had to answer five complex linguistic questions, solving problems related to languages from countries including Papua New Guinea, Nigeria, and Brazil. Noah Gorrell achieved a Bronze Award for his responses. On Wednesday 21 July, the team competition took place over 4 hours. This time, Noah, Sachin, and Joshua had to answer questions based on two Caribbean languages. Although they worked well, they were not awarded any prizes. However, the organisers acknowledged that the questions in this competition were the most challenging set ever! We are very proud of them and the effort they put into learning about linguistics. All agreed it was a worthwhile experience.

REMOTE LEARNING

DUKE OF EDINBURGH

Due to the pandemic, the School returned to a remote learning model for the Canberra lockdown period between August and October. Teachers and students were able to quickly adapt to the circumstances, enthusiastically participating in their Zoom classes and performed exceptionally well under an unusual learning situation. Thank you to our students, teachers and families for their enormous efforts during a difficult time.

History was made this year as The Duke of Edinburgh Award celebrated what would have been Prince Phillip’s 100th birthday. Lachlan Ho and Angus Truman were among 10 in the ACT to be presented their awards at Government House in Canberra by the Governor General.

GOLD awarded to Alvin Charles (CGS 2019)

SILVER awarded to Josh Lee, Ashley Grice, Angus Truman and Zach Proctor

BRONZE awarded to Gabriel Thomson, Kelsie Mailler, Talia Yett, Anahita Fard, Nancy Xu, Thomas Fahey, Lachlan Ho, Aaditya Rai, Justin Tsoi, Milind Merson, Audrey Kuan, Victoria Spark, Robert Di Dio

WORLD’S GREATEST SHAVE

This year, The School participated in the World’s Greatest Shave, encouraging students to shave, cut or colour their hair in solidarity with those diagnosed annually with leukemia. The School set a goal of raising $33,000 through the fundraiser, and ultimately smashed that goal, coming in at a total of $43,240.58!

HARMONY WEEK

In March, CGS celebrated Harmony Week, which culminated with Harmony Day, a day which celebrates and honours the cultural diversity that makes both Australia and CGS unique. Students came to School dressed in traditional attire representative of their culture, or the colour orange to mark the occasion.

POLE VAULT 1ST PLACE

Athlete Development Programme student Itamar Oren came 1st in Pole Vault at the NSW Athletics Championships. A fantastic result for Itamar and all involved in preparing for the event. Well done Itamar!

TENNIS ACT AWARD

CGS Tennis enjoyed a year of big accomplishments for our tennis superstars. In Year 9, Wambui Taylor was awarded the honour of being crowned ACT Junior Club Player of the Year, while Elijah Dikkenberg in Year 7 came 2nd in the 12 & Under Boys Singles and 12 & Under Doubles competition at the Australian Clay Court National Championships. Congratulations to Wambui and Elijah on their huge tennis achievements this year.

YEAR 12 EXAMS

Year 12 students were the first to return to School following the COVID lockdown in October to finish studying for their exams. While being at School was quite different with check-ins, masks and social distancing, having students back for their last weeks of learning was a true bright spot in the year!

AUSTRALIAN ROWING CHAMPIONSHIPS

The CGS Rowing Team performed spectacularly at the Australian Rowing Championships! Madeline Vagg received a Gold Medal in the Under 19 Singles, while Zoe Bond received a Silver, and together the two of them reached a Silver Medal in the Under 19 Doubles. In addition, Madeline and Zoe, along with Penelope Robson, Niamh Pascoe, and Orlando Throsby achieved Silver in the Quads.

SAILING - ACT TEAMS RACING CHAMPIONSHIPS

Congratulations to the two CGS Sailing teams for taking out 1st and 2nd positions in the Schools Division of the ACT Teams Racing Championships. One of the teams also won a bronze medal in the Opens division.

ONLINE FITNESS CLASS

The Active Education team worked hard to ensure that the entire CGS community could remain healthy, happy and active during the COVID-19 pandemic, offering a fitness class via Zoom every Thursday. People could log in from their laptop or phone and join along in an intense workout in lieu of team sports or gyms.

ACT ATHLETICS CHAMPIONSHIP

Ben Kalenjuk competed as a Para-Athlete in the ACT Athletics Championships, where he competed in six events and came away with gold medals in each of the events he competed in! While the day was tiring for Ben, he did himself and CGS proud with his results, smashing his own personal best and qualifying for the Australian Athletics Championships in Sydney.

DEEP RACER AUSTRALIAN GYMNASTICS CHAMPIONSHIP

Congratulations to CGS Athlete Development Programme student Emil Rivera Jonsson, Year 12, for winning Bronze in the Level 8 Opens Vault at the Australian Gymnastics Championships.

This year, students have been programming self-driving cars to compete in Amazon’s Deep Racer League Global Competition. 27 CGS students qualified for the Community division and entered the Professional Division, and Year 11 student Oscar qualified for the monthly final. Oscar Brown and Henry Gotzinger competed virtually in a competition held in Las Vegas, where they both won considerable prizes.