Model United Nations Assembly
MUNA is run by Rotary International and takes place over two days at Auckland Girls Grammar. Teams of three students represent their designated nations (we were given Pakistan and Chile this year). Students need to organise costumes and research their country's perspective on issues ranging from the Syrian refugee crisis to the Zika virus. They then need to address the gathered assembly, propose amendments to remits and take part in impromptu debates. The assembly is run using the same rules as the United Nations, with Ross Robertson (a former assistant Speaker of Parliament and current President of Parliamentarians for Global Action) running proceedings.
Our students Abhishekh Sharma, Emily Scopes, Angelica Chand, Numa Wadhwania, Vanshika Patel and Bharani Vindamuriwere fantastic representatives of Lynfield College. They committed themselves fully to all aspects of the experience, from the organisation of wonderful costumes to some serious lobbying behind the scenes! It is a rare opportunity to be able to discuss the finer points of crafting an amendment to a remit with a view to maximising its probability of success, but that is exactly what some of our students were doing last Saturday afternoon (May 28)!
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Karan Kalsi takes on Nationals once again
The past few weeks have been "exhausting, challenging and amazing" for Auckland Regional Debating team member and Lynfield College Year 12 student Karan Kalsi, in the lead up to the NZ National Debating Tournament held last weekend in Wellington.
Prepped by ASD Regional coaches Hamish Saunders and Lucy Harrison, the team received many hours of high level coaching and practice debates over a course of several weeks in order to be ready for the challenging moots covered at a National tournament. They even took part in a University Debating competition and took 3rd place, and Karan was named one of the Top 5 speakers in the tournament!
Last year, Karan was the youngest member (Year 11) ever selected for a Auckland Schools Debating Regional team, and his underdog status shocked everyone when his team made it all the way to the Grande Final of the tournament.
A strong favourite this year, Karan and his team battled some rather tough adjudication in the early rounds. After preliminary rounds were complete, the team was on 4 wins and 3 losses, which was enough to break into the semi finals, which they won, to secure a spot in the Grande Final .
The final was the culmination of a weekend of debating between thirty six of New Zealand’s top secondary school students at Victoria University of Wellington. Teams from Wellington, Auckland, Canterbury, Otago-Southland, Hawke’s Bay, Northland, Central North Island, Waikato and Kahurangi-Marlborough took part in seven preliminary rounds of debates, confronting such issues as whether we should implement a universal basic income, whether advertising of pharmaceutical drugs should be banned, and whether the government should extend the student loan scheme to people studying overseas.
Students found out the topics and what side they were to argue only one hour before the debate.
In the final, Auckland White needed to negate the motion “That state housing should be built in high socio-economic areas", and were defeated by the Wellington Gold team in a 3-2 decision, in front of a huge crowd from around Wellington. This was yet another win for Wellington, making it four in a row. We hope Karan can make it three in a row next year, and put an end to Wellington's streak.
Debating is not over for Karan this year, as he and Lynfield 1 are currently on 4 wins and 1 loss in the Premier Advanced Debating Tournament, with two more debates before the quarter finals. There is also the Impromptu Cup tournament coming up soon as well. We look forward to seeing how his Lynfield teams perform!
We are all very proud of Karan's incredible achievement!
Auckland White with Auckland Schools Debating coaches Hamish Saunders and Lucy Harrison |
New Zealand Debating Nationals Grand Finalists White team Geneva Roy(Kings College) , Zachary Wong (MacLeans College) and Karan Kalsi (Lynfield College) with Peter Dunne in Parliament |
Our Next Generation of Robotics Enthusiasts
Lynfield's success at the recent Vex Robotics World Championships is inspiring junior students who are ably and enthusiastically honing their skills and venturing out into competitions with their robots.
On Saturday 28 May the Lynfield College Robotics Group competed in the Auckland regional finals of the Kiwi Challenge. The Kiwi Challenge is for students new to robotics competitions. All of the students in our 3 teams were Year 10 students and it was their first official competition outside of our own small internal school challenges.
After a tough morning of qualifying rounds all 3 of our teams made it through to the finals in the afternoon. One of our teams dropped out in the quarter finals. The other two ended up in opposition alliances in the grand final meaning that one of Lynfield College’s teams had to win and did win the Kiwi Challenge Robotics competition.
Some of the senior robotics students did a great job mentoring these teams and our robotics future looks very good at the moment.
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What a difference 150 metres makes!
The distance between the college’s White Swan Road gates seems minimal. However, the Level 2 Geographers found that on Mt Ruapehu, this 150 metres makes a world of difference when it is a change in altitude.
Comparing two locations for their Research internal, students found a forest of Beech trees (Tawhai) at the lower site and no trees at the upper site. As well as vegetation differences, slope profiles and stream velocities had also changed. Riding the Whakapapa skifield chairlifts to their highest point, students observed a total lack of plant life and experienced a bone-chilling nine-degree temperature drop.
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Hot food and drinks in New Zealand’s highest cafe were enjoyed by the 53 students on the three day trip.
Assessing the Impacts of the Chocolate Industry
The students from 10AZ and 10PR have visited the Auckland zoo as part of a unit of work they have been doing on the chocolate industry, in Social Studies. The students have been looking at human rights and environmental issues within the industry.
While at the zoo the students learnt about the impact palm oil plantations are having on the environment of species such as the Sumatran tiger and Orang-utan. 80% of the world’s palm oil is produced in Indonesia and Malaysia. There they are logging the rainforest which is the natural habitat of orang-utans and many other species. It is believed that at the current rate of deforestation some species of orangutans will be extinct in the wild as early as 2022.
One of the issues with the use of palm oil in New Zealand and Australia is that there are no laws around labelling products that contain palm oil. These exist in both Europe and the USA. This makes it difficult for consumers to make an informed decision when purchasing items at the supermarket as palm oil can be labelled in many different ways here. These include sodium laurel sulphate, vegetable oil, emulisifer 422 or 476 etc.
At the zoo the students worked with a zoo educator who taught them about palm oil and its impact on the environment. They completed several activities that gave them some ideas about how they could recognise palm oil in products. The students also attended the orang-utan " encounter" in which the keeper gave us an insight into the life of an orang-utan. She also explained how they are looked after at the zoo and what impact palm oil plantations are having on their habitat.
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The next step for the students is to undertake their own social action about an aspect of the chocolate industry they feel could be improved. This could include campaigning against child labour, human trafficking, slavery or palm oil. The students are completing this as part of an NCEA Level 1 Social Studies Achievement Standard.
Update on our Sporting Scene
Winter sports are now underway. We have 55 teams entered in weekly competitions in 10 different sports. Some teams are just completing grading games while championship rounds have begun for others. Each week on Wednesday afternoon and Saturday morning there are ‘home games’ played on our football and rugby fields. We welcome the support of our school community at these games.
Some images from last Saturday's matches here at college:
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Individual Honours
Our students certainly take on some interesting sports and challenges! Several have had notable success recently. Congratulations to:
Maddison Wesche (Y12) has been selected to represent NZ in the World Junior (U20) Athletics Championships in Bydgoszcz, Poland, 19 – 24 July 2016. Maddi is one of 17 NZ athletes to qualify for this event and the onlt shot put representative.
Michael Carswell (Y13) is a dedicated cyclist who is performing extremely well in all aspects of this sport. Last month Michael raced in the NZ Road Race Championships where he took the bronze medal in the NZ U19 Road Race - over 105km.
Alastair Maisey (Y13) has just returned from Melbourne where he competed as a member of the NZAFL U18 Hawks team.
Mario Sinovcic (Y13) has been selected in the NZ U19 Water polo squad of 16 plyers. In August the final team (12 players) will be selected from this squad.
Ana Cornish (Y13) was recently placed 1st in the Youth rumba section of the Pro-Am International Latin dance Competition.
Junior Laveaina (Y12) has been selected for the Northern Region Maori U16 Rugby team.
Bhakti Patel (Y9) won 1st and 2nd places in events at the Halberg Disability Games held during the school holidays recently.
Jazz Combo Visits Melbourne
Our successful Jazz Combo under the leadership of Mr Paul Norman has returned from a week in Melbourne.
| During the week they performed and took part in workshops at three Melbourne high schools and were inspired by professional players at two of Melbournes top jazz clubs. They also spent a day at Monash University where the group supported drummer Ryu Kodama at his audition. The tutors were very impressed at the standard of the group and Ryu has been offered at place for 2017. The main draw card was the Generations in Jazz Festival, held in Mt Gambier. This festival attracts around 5000 students from around Austalia who spend the weekend taking part in performances and workshops. There were also concerts by internationally acclaimed artists One O'Clock Lab band (Grammy Award nominees from USA), Kate Cerbrano and James Morrison. Some photos below give a glimpse of what they experienced week 1 of this term. |
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Junior Leaders Enjoy Hillary Outdoors Tongariro Experience
Two of our Year 9 students have reported on their camp..
Peter Tan 9MK...
The Tongariro trip was about challenging yourself and leading other people. It was strange in the fact that everyone that went on the trip was a leader and we all wanted to lead at the same time! So we all gave each other ideas within the group and went to trial those ideas; if they didn’t work we would agree on another plan.
At the camp we did caving, high ropes, abseiling and an outdoor overnight expedition. These were all enjoyable times as they were challenging in a frightening, uncomfortable way. At the camp we learnt about sharing ideas amongst a group, listening to instructions carefully (you wouldn't want to fall off a 30m cliff and get trapped in a cave), and accepting others' ideas in a group.
It was an enjoyable time for everyone at the camp. Thank you to Tania (our guide) and Mrs Connew.
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Sophie Bradley 9MK...
Term 2 Week 1 most of the Year 9 sports and class representatives went on an exciting trip to Tongariro Hillary Outdoors Centre for our Leadership Camp. Some of the fun things we di, included; hiking, abseiling, rock climbing, and caving. When both smaller groups went on our overnight experiences, we learned how to navigate using a map with no compass, and how to lead our group without any help from our instructors or teachers. My group slept in a cave for the night and we found out what glow worm poop tastes like! We shared the shallow cave with glow worms and a rat that decided to have a party in our cave from around 12:00am to 5:30/6:00am. Woo hoo! At least we stayed dry.
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Thanks to the fantastic Mr Smith, Mrs Connew and all the instructors from Hillary Outdoor, who organized the brilliant trip and for standing back and letting all the kids lead the way.
12 Outdoor Education Tramp in Waitakere Beauty
A two day tramp through the Waitakere Ranges was eagerly anticipated and enjoyed by the students in 12 Outdoor Education. The images below indicate the spectacular route they tramped and of course the beauty of this part of the country.
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Success for Bhakti at Halberg Games
Huge congratulations to Bhakti Patel from 9CN who competed at the Halberg Disability Games during the school holidays. The Games are a 3 day event open to anyone with a physical disability or visual impairment from ages 8 to 21. Athletes compete in regional teams across 19 sports - including athletics, blind cricket, rowing, boccia, goalball and wheelchair basketball.
Bhakti was chosen to represent Auckland in both Swimming and Athletics. Not satisfied with just competing however, she gained a second place in one of her running races and third in her swimming race.
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Well done Bhakti on a tremendous achievement!
Welcome to our Friends from Hangzhou Greentown Yuhua School
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12 students and 2 teachers are staying with our students and staff during this week
On Sunday the group went to Mission Bay and had a look around Auckland. On Monday a powhiri began the day and one of the students from Greentown gave an excellent speech in English which included an invitation to our students to visit their school in Hangzhou. With our Hospitality students a delicious lunch of pumpkin soup and blueberry muffins was cooked (and eaten!) before the Chinese students spent the afternoon in an art class.
For the next two days there is a visit to Cornwall Park then shopping in Sylvia Park, and a tour out west to Arataki Reserve and Muriwai beach. Thursday will be spent in classes with their host students before they fly home late evening..
Lynfield students who have hosted will get first priority when we next visit China in 2018.
The images are from the last couple of days: Art class Hospitality class Testing the water at Mission Bay |
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