Scotch College

Beyond the School gates

Ed Tudor

Beyond the School gates

With the number of activities constantly taking place at Scotch one could be excused for believing that our students never have the time to get ‘beyond the School gates.’ However, every day Scotch boys are representing their School in the wider community.

Scotch’s International Exchange Program is busier than ever. Over the mid year holidays and first weeks of Term 3, Scotch continued its strong link with students from Lyon, France. Seven Lyonnaise students attended Scotch, having already hosted Scotch boys during the last summer break. Students from Germany, China and Indonesia have also come to Scotch over the past term. Many people have noted how lucky we have been in 2004 to have international visitors who have been so willing and enthusiastic to take part in life at Scotch. It is with much excitement that we farewell 34 of our own students as well as four staff members to China for three weeks across the September holidays. The boys, who all learn Mandarin Chinese, will spend one week at the Beijing University Middle School as well as visiting Shanghai and Nanjing.

This year four boys from the Middle School took part in the Alpine School Program at Mt Buller. Throughout Term 3 James Abercrombie of Year 7, Simon Brown of Year 8 and Mark Gronow and Davis Yu of Year 9 lived on the mountain as members of Team Buller. The boys were constantly in contact with their teachers at Scotch via the school intranet and email system and managed to squeeze a day’s lessons into two hours in the morning and one in the afternoon. As part of the program, the boys represented Scotch in various inter-school ski competitions.

Year Twelve students Simon Wolfe, Andrew Kemp, Tim Hickman and Tom Kelly as well as Stephen Muirhead and Andrew Curry of Year Eleven were recently involved in a United Nations Day for students. Organised by the UN Youth Association, the boys formed part of a mock Security Council and over the course of a day discussed two resolutions. Particularly successful candidates may gain the opportunity to represent Australia in an International version of the day, held in New York.

Social Services at Scotch continues to assist our local community ‘beyond the School gates’ with boys lending their help at libraries, child care and aged care centres in the Boroondara area. The School Prefects have begun a mentoring program with the Junior School to complement the highly successful Year Nine Mentors Program. In Term 3 Scotch Collegians have represented their School off-campus in debating, chess, Robocup and athletics, just to mention a few. Notably, Scotch has recently joined The Oak Tree Foundation, a body formed by Young Australian of the Year Hugh Evans, who spoke during Mission Week. The Foundation is Australia’s first entirely youth-run aid and development agency, providing relief for drought and AIDS in South Africa.

As students at Scotch, it is important that we continue to achieve ‘beyond the School gates’ as well as inside. In doing so, we gain a strong sense of social justice; a desire to help others. Old Scotch Collegians are well known for lending their time to better the wider community, and as current students we aim to follow their example.

Ed Tudor
School Captain