The Seasons

Oneli Gunesena 7Stirling

Springtime never waits upon the perfect snow-free day, It pushes forth, at first chance, to warm the light of day. The breeze is a trembling petal, softly tinted with brown, It wraps love around me like a silken, flowing gown, Awakened by the innocence of a warm, gentle breeze.

A newly radiant sun steps forth from springtime, Wrapping us in her warm embrace in summer; Sunflowers follow her rays when she rests behind the hills. The wind whispers a warm and gentle breeze like the windmills, So bright and deep it all is, like a daffodil drifting into slumber.

As chattering autumn leaves of gold and scarlet, create a buoyant mood. The cold, crispy breath shakes the dancers off the trees, how rude. Maple trees cling desperately to their memories, One by one, they dance their final ballet in their faithful final mood. On an autumn day, I breathe in gold and let it flourish in my lungs.

Winter brings an icy chant, a coolness to shake the warmth within. The snowflakes take their dance in the wintry air where Santa has been, The petals display a trace of white within the edges, Luscious green leaves trapped within frost in hedges, Winter lies down for the longest sleep as spring flutters in.

The seasons are my favourite bedtime story. Each time, the same and yet different in its own ways, Seasons fade in and out like a soft, cheerful lullaby.

Change is a blessing, We tend to ignore. Appreciate, What change has done, To me and to you.

Reflecting...

Coming out of another lockdown, and now back into yet another, I now feel refreshed and every so slightly arrogant about my large collection of useless knowledge on music and TV shows.

Sometimes I feel worried that I am consuming too much. Not of food, but of social media and other forms of entertainment. For around 3 weeks now, I have been kind of inactive on social media. I thought that I really was topnotch- that this single action would guarantee me a healthy lifestyle full of study, exercise and good conversations.

Boy was I wrong. On one hand, I do have lots of free time now. I read books sometimes and occasionally see the sunlight (which is well above my usual average). Has my life improved significantly? Honestly, probably not.

I’m still not sure whether it was the right idea to remove social media, especially now that we find ourselves in another lockdown. I’m not even sure if it is smart to invest this much time thinking about this somewhat insignificant first world problem.

Nevertheless, here is a singular observation I would like to share with the world (or the people who get this far in my piece): Life is short. It is the inevitability of an end that makes it so precious. So do what you want, because why not.

It's easy to feel squashed and constricted by so many things: societal expectations, expectations from school, expectations from your peers.

But guess what- it is your life. Actually. Think about that. This life is yours. The world is truly your oyster. Nobody else owns your life, nobody else controls it. We are so privileged to have freedom and the chance to make our own choices. So that is exactly what I won't encourage you to do. To do what you want.

Ria Singh, Vice School Captain

GIRL POWER

Pre-COVID19, I applied for a program called Girl Power. Girl Power is “a program for female high school students, contributing towards gender parity in engineering and IT disciplines. ” It is run by Melbourne University and is a 4 year program with the hopes to get females interested in engineering & IT. @ Uni MelbAfter sending through my application and being shortlisted to go through the interview process, I was fortunate enough to be accepted into the program. I would like to focus on what normally happens in year 9, well year 10 for me because of COVID. Over the holidays I stayed on Melbourne Uni campus where I was able to meet just under 50 girls from different schools from around Melbourne. Together we spent a couple of days causing chaos around campus, doing workshops and eating croissants, drinking coffee and horrible quality tea from different cafes across campus. During the workshops, we were introduced to different fields of STEM, such as software, civil, mechanical and looked at other activities such as virtual reality workshops.

Olivia Lee 10L6

We were also allowed access to the new Telstra Maker Space where we got to meet people who worked at the facility and learn about what they do. On the final night, we had a careers/ networking panel discussion where we got to meet CEO’s and engineers who have worked around the world where they talked about their experience in the workforce.

This year was only the first of the program. Generally, in Year 9 you go on camp, in Year 10, you are offered work experience, and in Year 11 + 12, you participate in a mentoring program between yourself and a university student. However, this year was a little different because of last year's COVID-19 restrictions. Although it is early if you are in one of the younger year levels such as year 8 I highly recommend thinking about looking into the Girl Power Engineering and IT program, especially if you are interested in STEM and are not sure what sort of career path you want to go down. I have had such an amazing experience and made some great friends. I would highly recommend the program!