Senior Boarding Housemaster
Welcome back to Shore and in particular a warm welcome to all our new families joining the Shore boarding community for 2019. The staff across our 4 boarding houses are all very excited about the year ahead and all that it promises.
As Shore’s new Senior Boarding Housemaster, I am looking forward to being the best support for you and your sons in the journey we are about to take together. This is my tenth year as Barry Housemaster, I also spent 6 years as a full-time boarder myself at Joeys so empathise with the parents and boys and want to assure you that I will always have your son’s best interests at heart. No system is perfect, and no person within it is flawless but the boarding staff look forward to your patience, forbearance and understanding as we continue to strive to make Shore the best boarding school it can possibly be. We want you to be proud when you say, “My son goes to boarding school at Shore.”
Last month, all boarding families received a letter, giving a small glimpse into my background and goals as we move forward. I won’t repeat that here, but I am open to communication on anything that you may wish to discuss or the vision I have for boarding in general, so please feel free to contact me directly. A wise man, Will Hogg once said that, and I don’t think it needs any expansion:
Vision without action is a dream. Action without vision is a nightmare.
2018 HSC
In the 2018 HSC, Max White placed 5th in the State in Drama, Hamish Crafter placed 19th in the State in Mathematics General 2, while Isaac Barron and Max White had their Drama group performance, In the Beginning Program 1, selected for OnSTAGE at the Seymour Centre. Max White also had his Drama individual performance, Bottleneck, nominated for OnSTAGE.
53% of our Boarders achieved an ATAR of 88.00+ (compared with 50% in 2017, 51% in 2016). Archie Hancock deserves special congratulations, scoring a wonderful ATAR result of 99.60. On Monday night in Week 2, he was back at Shore as a boarding academic tutor, inundated with “customers” eager to learn how to repeat the feat themselves. Archie’s friendly disposition and great sense of humour equates to a wonderful personality and brains. No wonder the boys love him.
Seb Shanahan, Sunny Chen, Finn Blake, Henry Li, Josh Brender and Colin Lau all achieved ATARs above 95, while Max Slack-Smith, Hamish Crafter, Jack Cowan, Sam Broadley, Alex Neale, Jack Seabrook, Adrian Liu, Harry Moses and Digby Cooke were all above 90. Overall, it was a tremendous reflection of the hard work the boys poured into their studies and the deserved results that come from this approach. What must also be remembered is that there are many, many boarders not on the list above who also made significant improvements over the course of the year. In many ways they are the unsung achievers who deserve as many accolades as those whose names appear in print. To these boys also, we salute you.
Finally, it is also worthwhile noting that Shore is the highest academically-ranked boys’ boarding school in NSW.
I have also kept in mind the feedback that reached us after the 2018 survey, and those areas of concern that have come to our attention have been, and will continue to be the cornerstone of what we want to improve; they will appear on agendas every time our boarding staff sit down to improve and establish our standards. Perhaps the first is communication, and I hope that, in time, your sons will become more visible when they are not with you, and that we will be (perhaps ironically) more transparent, communicative and accessible. All we want is for your son to be happy, feel safe, and make the most of his opportunities while trying his hardest, in what I believe is a truly great school.
Hodges House and the top floor of School House have now been fully renovated, and most of the rest of School House will be finished this time next year. When you consider adding this to the new SPEC construction (due for completion in 12 months’ time), our facilities at Northbridge, our location in North Sydney, the quality of our teachers and our HSC results, there is plenty to admire about what Shore offers its boys. Of course, a school is not its buildings, it is its people, but I think we have a community of quality that at the very least, matches the confines of the School.
We will be out visiting country areas throughout the year; the itinerary is being finalised as I write this, and we would love to meet you on your home ground, to catch up, chat and hopefully take Shore boarding beyond the walls of North Sydney.
Staffing Changes
Mr Darren Junee has joined Shore this year as School Housemaster. He brings with him a wealth of experience after 17 years at St Joseph’s College, 11 as Boarding Year Co-ordinator. There is an in-depth introduction to Darren elsewhere in this newsletter that will give you a fuller picture. Welcome aboard, Darren.
Darren is not the only new kid on the block. He is joined this year in School House by two new Assistant Housemasters, Mr Cameron Burke and Mr Josh Chapman. Cameron spent several years as Assistant Housemaster in Robson House, leaving at the end of 2017 to take up a teaching post at The King’s School. He returns this year with a depth of experience having drawn on his boarding experiences at Kings, Trinity, Knox and, of course, Shore. Josh joined the Shore staff in 2018 as a Science teacher, and he currently coaches basketball in the summer season. Josh is an extremely efficient, enthusiastic and effective boarding master who has already settled in comfortably to boarding at Shore.
With the departure of Mrs Eliza Bell at the end of 2018, Mr Werner Pienaar has taken over the role of Year 7 Boarding Co-ordinator. He, and Director of Inclusion, Mrs Cate Fryda, have made the transition of our boarders as smooth as it could possibly be. In just one week the Year 7s under Mr Pienaar’s guidance have acquainted themselves with the North Sydney area, walked across the Sydney Harbour Bridge, swum at Balmoral Beach and North Sydney Pool, taken a harbour cruise and learnt the ropes of life in boarding at Shore. The Year 7s are in great hands.
Barry, Hodges and Robson Houses have had no staffing changes from last year.
I would also like to take this opportunity to thank former Director of Boarding, Mr Anthony Benn, for the outstanding service he has given to Shore boarding over the last four years. He has left a tremendously positive legacy, but it is the unseen things done behind the scenes, many of which people know very little about, that have been the most significant. Thank you, Mr Benn, for all you have given.
It has already been a busy start to the year, across the board, and we have really hit the ground running. Boys and staff have been very active, and we have all fallen very quickly into routine. On February 5 the Year 9 Study Skills evening took place, an opportunity to receive guidance on study skills, organisation and academic help. Year 7 will have the same evening on February 11. The Boarders’ Cocktail Party will also take place on the Graythwaite Lawn on February 22nd and the Ice Breaker at the same venue on March 1st.
2nd Batch Sub-Prefects
I would like to acknowledge the appointment of the following boarders to role of sub-prefect. We know that they will serve the Shore Boarding and Wider Community with dignity, responsibility and loyalty. Well done:
Wyatt Bellotti, Deuchar Dight, Tom Nicholl
I have listed below some important dates in Term I:
- Friday 22nd February: Boarders’ Parents Cocktail Party 7pm on the Graythwaite Lawn
- Friday 1st March: lcebreaker
- Saturday 23rd March: GPS Head of the River Regatta
- Thursday 11th April: Term I ends at 1.50pm
- Tuesday 30th April: Term 2 begins (boarders return by 8.30pm on Monday, 29th April)
I look forward to meeting as many of you as possible in the weeks and months ahead, and hope that life treats you well in 2019. If there is anything that I can do to help make things easier or clearer, please let me or my wonderful EA, Heather Foord know, and we will do all we can to help.
Kind regards and best wishes
Brendan Morris
Senior Boarding Housemaster
