It is astounding to pause and reflect on how much has happened in just five weeks of the school year.
So much has happened, from the Year 7 orientation camp and Year 11/12 leadership camp, to co-curricular sign ups, SATIS basketball rosters for the boys and SATIS soccer rosters for the girls, not to mention Primary and Secondary teams in the Kingborough Huon Basketball Association roster. We’ve had Year 3-6 trials for the Huon and Channel Athletics Team, the Primary and Secondary school swimming carnivals and the SATIS Swimming carnival this week. And in all of this, we are working with the academic program to create the very best of holistic education for our students.
Herein lies the focus of this week’s newsletter: recognising opportunities and getting on board as a participant.
On Wednesday this week, our Calvin Christian School secondary students participated in the Southern Sports Association of Tasmanian Independent Schools (SSATIS) Swimming carnival at the Hobart Aquatic Centre. Many of our swimmers do not swim at clubs or even practise swimming for that matter; however, in each and every instance our swimmers stepped up and gave it their very best in the pool. In some races our students were placed amongst the top finishers. In other races, while not necessarily placing, some swimmers set personal best times and, importantly, swam the relays without any disqualifications or penalty. During the course of the day, score updates were passed to the competing schools. Soon every swimmer realised that diving in and giving the events a crack would lead to the collective score accumulating. Eventually there was a friendly contest between us and another school as to who was going to out-score whom.
“Herein lies the focus of this week’s newsletter: recognising opportunities and getting on board as a participant.”
That sense of ‘it is about us, and not just about me’ is what sparked my interest and motivated this article. These thirteen swimmers were not interested in individual accolades but were more attuned to what impact their efforts had on Calvin’s score.
Having African roots, it seems fitting to bring in some of the African culture I have lived with over the years. A word that rolls off the African tongue so smoothly (but can present as challenging in a global context) is the word ubuntu. Loosely translated, ubuntu means, ‘I am because we are’. Dissecting this loose translation posits the notion that the success of an individual is rooted directly in their involvement with the people around them. The success celebrated by a team — whether through playing sports, doing science quizzes, or being part of the Student Theatre Company — is dependent on the performances of the individuals. Equally the success of the team directly reflects on the sense of achievement of the individuals within the team.
I have been teaching for twenty years, and in that time I have had the privilege of coaching sportsmen and sportswomen who have gone on to represent their respective countries on the world stage in their particular sports. Sure, along the way they may have won a trophy or received a certificate or award. But when asked, without fail they will say their greatest joy from a win has been attributed to the feeling of belonging to something greater than themselves — for some it was their team, others, their family, their school, club, state or country. Their sense of achievement came not from winning but from being a part of something where they contributed to the collective success.
As we continue to make opportunities available to our students, let us be those teachers, coaches and mentors who praise the efforts of our students and encourage participation to ensure the success of Calvin Christian School teams and groups in forthcoming sporting, cultural and academic endeavours. Our success, and theirs, depends on it.
Ken Holloway – Director of Operations