Welcome to Term 2 in CommUnity!

How is your child feeling about returning to school this week? For many (and personality obviously plays a part here) there is a sense of impending social opportunity that excites them.

For others, there is a feeling of uncertainty, a concern about what it will look like and feel like as they return to classes. In a sense, it is a very human concern to wonder how we will be received by others. Relationship is key.

Within the context of a Christian school community, relationships are not simply something to be managed rather, they have the potential to be transformed and transformational as the members of our community, staff, parents, and students respond to God’s call on our lives; lives, relationships and community transformed by the living presence of Christ is our hope. Expressions of our, often imperfect vision of Christian community are things to celebrate as we acknowledge the work of God in our lives and community.

In the year of our School theme of commUnity, I am eager to draw your attention to some of the exciting expressions of community that can radiate our sense of purpose and hope. These are opportunities for you to connect and perhaps find ways that you would be comfortable contributing to the life of Calvin Christian School.

Oliebollen

The School Council is excited to announce that we are working towards the possibility of running our much-loved Oliebollen festival again in 2021. This will, of necessity, be a little bit different to previous years’ events but will continue to offer many of those core elements of our successful community event (including the treats that people enjoy so much). This is tentatively scheduled for September. Please keep your eye out for more information to come.

Senior Secondary Parent Information – Virtual Event

For the parents of students in Year 10, we would encourage you to connect on the evening of 6 May at 6.30pm with our online introduction to the School. We will be delivering this event via Facebook Live with an opportunity to interact and ask questions during the event. RSVP via the Facebook event. The event stream will be made available via our YouTube channel shortly after the event.

Discover Calvin Secondary - Thursday 13 May

If you are considering Calvin Secondary for your child in 2022 or 2023, come and join us for an evening of hot food provided by a local food van gathered in the warm glow of our fire pits. There will be short informative presentations and an engaging student question and answer interview panel. Held in the Calvin Secondary Library, free tickets are available via our Facebook event or Eventbrite.

Scott Ambrose — Principal

Easter - the power of selfless action

It must seem strange to our children when they hear contradictory messages about who they are and the purpose of their lives.

Often the messages that they are hearing are that ‘it is all about you’, ‘your future is for you’ and ‘you are number one’. Whilst we want our children to feel loved and supported, there is a radical alternative vision of life that they would do well to imitate. An alternative that assigns value not to a self-aggrandising and self-centred view of our lives and futures, but one that calls us to put ourselves second, to consider others first, and even to serve one another.

Taking the language of the humble, this alternative view would encourage our children to develop a sense of confidence based not in their own strengths or sense of entitlement. It calls us to a radically different lifestyle and choices made for the benefit of others. With all of the distressing stories of ‘me-first’ actions that are echoing through our parliament and streets in the news at the moment, wouldn’t it be remarkable to see more individuals putting concern for others ahead of their own needs.

“Good Friday is a stark reminder of the power of selfless action. ”

Good Friday is a stark reminder of the power of selfless action. One man chose to prefer others ahead of himself in an action that brought hope and an eternal future to mankind. Paul, a follower of Jesus, wrote of his action that “…he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death – even death on a cross!” What a powerful antidote to the ‘me-centred’ world in which we are raising our children. 

Jesus’ act on that day around 2,000 years ago continues to resonate through the centuries. As you and your family remember Good Friday and celebrate Easter Sunday together, I would encourage you to watch and share the links below where members of our humanities staff have reflected on Easter for our school community in a series entitled Better Story, Better God.

1. Better Story, Better God Part 1

2. Better Story, Better God Part 2

3. Better Story, Better God Part 3

4. Better Story, Better God Part 4

May the God of hope speak to you and your family this Easter as we remember Jesus’ call to a radically different lifestyle for us, for our children, and for our communities in a way that will ultimately transform lives.

Scott Ambrose — Principal

The value of persistence

As parents, we instinctively want and expect the best for our children. This includes our desire to instil healthy attitudes to work and study.

However sometimes, in our desire for them to succeed, we can ‘over-correct’. Motivated by our own experiences and eager to see our children avoid some of the challenges we faced, we can try to enforce what needs to be learnt.

It is only natural that we would want our children to have the benefit of our experience. With this aim, we seek to build good structures around them that will enable them to succeed. Unfortunately, there are times in a child’s life where they learn more through personal challenge. And, as much as we want to protect them from these events, the reality is that often we need to learn to make the difficult choices ourselves and realise the consequences of our actions.

Building a culture of persistence means working through challenge and even failure. In fact, Paul writing in Romans, encourages us to not only push through the difficult moments but to ‘rejoice in our suffering’ with the promise that from that God will build ‘perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us…’ (Romans 5.3-5). The exciting thing is that we have a redeeming God who can use these events as formative opportunities to shape and mould us, developing our characters.

As a school and home, working together, we have an opportunity to build sound structures that include consistency of expectation and opportunities to face challenges, sometimes to fail, but always within a supportive community. What greater gift can we give our children than this hope established in faith and built on a character that has learnt the value of perseverance.

Scott Ambrose — Principal