With more participation and excellence comes a raised expectation and I would like to remind all parents that although Knox strives for excellence, we always need to keep the best interests of each boy in the School at heart. The reason Knox has a sporting program is to ensure that our young men develop a sense of belief in themselves, experience the exhilaration of winning and the disappointment of not achieving their goals. Boys need to develop resilience in the face of adversity and be courageous enough to realise when they have dropped the ball, figuratively and literally. Sport gives them the opportunity to collaborate in a team environment and to develop an understanding of how to work meaningfully with others to further the team’s cause.

There are both positive and challenging times in the sporting environment and it is important for parents to support their sons (and other team members) at all times, no matter the circumstance. As we enter another competitive season, I encourage parents to ensure that they are there for their sons and to reaffirm and encourage our boys to be resilient, focused and determined to achieve their goals.

School sport is a wonderfully encouraging time of a young man’s life and I’m excited to partner with you as we seek to raise healthy, well-balanced, determined and resilient young men. I look forward to supporting your sons as they step out, once again, to represent the Black and Blue this season.

Scott James

The mentor program this term is designed to best reflect and support the boys during this stage of their HSC year, with a focus on connection, healthy mind and body and the best preparation and sense of direction for their time after Knox.

The program provides a mix of seminars and mentor sessions to allow the boys to engage with nutrition, UAC and careers, composing references and, of course, time to connect with their mentors and fellow mentees. Over the course of a number of presentations, Mrs Gomez will skillfully unpack the intricate workings of the UAC process and provide some invaluable insights into the plethora of opportunities available post-HSC. In the pursuit of a healthy mind and body, Mr Shaw will be continuing on from the Term 4 incursion with a series of presentations championing the important role nutrition plays in both wellbeing and cognitive performance. These sessions will be accompanied with a number of extremely useful resources that are designed to create further discussion both in mentor sessions and on the home front. Finally, this term will also afford the boys an opportunity to reflect on their own personal achievements and path throughout their final years at Knox as they work in conjunction with their mentor and parents to compose their exit statement that will be issued at the conclusion of their HSC year. As this process progresses, further resources and information will be provided to parents by the mentor team.

Shifting from the classroom to the sweat and toil of the Black and Blue arena, Term 2 presents us with the bittersweet excitement of the final winter sports season for the Class of 2021. This was celebrated during our Assembly with the announcement of the 1st Teams of each respective sport, and their newly appointed Captains. Firstly, our congratulations go out to all of these students on their sections and appointments and finally, we wish all competitors across the range of sports a great final season.

The Stage 6 team is enthused to support your son throughout this term and please, feel free to contact a member of the team if you have any questions.

James Stubbs- Mills

Congratulations to James Simmonds who won a Bronze medal in the U19 Champion Lifesaver event at Nationals held in QLD during the term break. The Champion Lifesaver competition includes a surf race, board race, beach sprint, tube rescue, theory exam and resuscitation. Well done, James!

Congratulations also to Grant McAsey for passing his 'Night flying' portion of his pilot license.

Sam Luo was invited to perform a bugle call for an ANZAC Service today at Thomas Nursing Home, UPA Sydney North, which was warmly appreciated by the residents.

A reminder you can use the link at the top of the newsletter to access the Assessment booklet. This can also be found on the Year 12 page of the portal.

Debra Barnard

The data for the first interview included all assessments throughout Year 11 and enabled a KAI to be generated using a range of assessment strategies. The KAI range boys will receive next week is based on only a limited number of assessment tasks. Most subjects have only had one assessment to date.  Furthermore, in a task out of 20 or 25 (which many tasks to date are out of), a 1 or 2 mark difference can have a significant impact on the ranking that the Knox Academic Mark (KAM) is based on. For example, a student who got 20/25 in English Assessment Task 1 was ranked 159 while a student who got 19/25 was ranked 199. As the KAMs are based on ranks it is important to keep the numbers in perspective. The third round of KAI interviews after the Trials will include data based on all completed assessments across all subjects. Our hope is that the interviews will provide an opportunity for students to reflect on results to date and more importantly plan for the term ahead.

The interviews will be booked through the PTO online booking system and Zoom links provided. On Wednesday parents would have received an email from Mrs Billington that provided full details on how to make a booking. Bookings opened yesterday on Thursday 22 April.

Gregory Nunan and Beth Goddard

Save the Date
Below is a list of internal career events organised for Year 12 during Term 2. These events are for students only, however, I encourage parents to remind their sons to make note of the following dates:

Week 2
• 26 April - Uni of Wollongong (UOW) - lunch time, WSA Lecture Theatre
• 27 April - Uni of Sydney – lunch time, WSA Lecture Theatre
• 29 April - Macquarie University Business School Breakfast Seminar – 7am, WSA Lecture Theatre

Week 3
• 4 May - Bachelor of Accounting Co-op Scholarship (UTS) – lunch time, WSA Lecture Theatre

Week 4
• 10 May - Careers in Engineering online seminar (Zoom) – 6pm
•  11 May - UNSW – lunch time, WSA Lecture Theatre

Week 5
• 20 May - UTS Faculty of Science Breakfast Seminar – 7am, WSA Lecture Theatre

Week 6
• 25 May - Knox Careers Night – Great Hall – from 5.30pm. Knox students and parents and members of the local community are welcome to attend.
• 27 May - UNSW Faculty of Engineering Breakfast Seminar – 7am, WSA Lecture Theatre

Week 7
• 31 May - UTS – lunch time, WSA Lecture Theatre
• 2 June - Bond University – lunch time, WSA Lecture Theatre

Week 8
• 7 June – Careers in Science online seminar (zoom) – 6pm
• 10 June - Co-op and Scholarships – lunch time, WSA Lecture Theatre

UAC Update
A series of presentations on UAC and university applications commenced this week. Students will participate in my presentations during mentor over the coming weeks.

UAC have provided an update about applications, Schools Recommendation Scheme, Educational Access Schemes and University Open Days. Click here to access this information.

Linda Gomez

4. Is your son playing away? Which school is he playing against?

Waverley College
• 2 spectator parents/guardians per player for all outdoor sports
• 2 spectator parent guardian per player for all indoor sports

St Joseph’s College
• 2 spectator parents/guardians per player for all outdoor sports
• 2 spectator parent guardian per player for all indoor sports

Sydney Grammar School
• 2 spectator parents/guardians per player for all outdoor sports
• 2 spectator parent guardian per player for all indoor sports
• Canteens will NOT be open.

St Pius X College
• 2 spectator parents/guardians per player for all outdoor sports
• 2 spectator parent guardian per player for all indoor sports

The Scots College
• 2 spectator parents/guardians per player for all outdoor sports
• 2 spectator parent guardian per player for all indoor sports

As always, any sports cancellations due to wet weather or late changes will be announced via the Knox app (make sure you have subscribed to alerts for your son’s summer sport).

Doctor on-site
Each Saturday throughout the winter season we are fortunate to have Doctor Jomaa here on the Senior Campus. The Doctor is available to attend to any Knox student of any age, playing any sport that may have had a serious injury from any venue – requiring assessment. Please consider coming to see our Doctor between 11am and 2pm this week as this may save a long wait at the local hospital. Dr Jomaa is also available here on campus each Monday morning from 7am for follow up or assessment of all head knocks and other serious injuries.

Holiday news
The action just did not stop over the break with so much to be proud of and I would like to share all of the special news.

Track & Field Nationals
Knox had as many as nine students qualify for the Nationals – a big number that we are very excited about. To qualify for Nationals is a huge achievement and full credit to Matt Fowler and his team of coaches. Congratulations to Sean Williams, Alex Sherlock, Archie Saunders, Chester Swaffer, Ewan Burns, Hamish Hart, James Harden, Maks Saravanja and Dylan Hall who all competed.

Knox’s first medal of the event came from Maks Saravanja in the Under 14’s High Jump. Maks cleared a height of 1.68m to take out 3rd place in the event. Congratulations on your first national medal, Maks!

The highlight of the competition came from Dylan Hall. Dylan claimed a total of three medals across the competition. Dylan claimed the silver medal in the Under 15’s 100m in a time of 11.26, a bronze medal in the Long Jump with an impressive jump 6.06m and was part of the NSW 4x100m relay team that placed 2nd in a blistering time of 43.73. Incredibly Dylan also qualified for the 200m final, where he was in medal contention, but sensibly made the decision to withdraw due to soreness from such a massive program of sprinting.

Congratulations to all Knox athletes that competed at the Championships. Just qualifying alone is a huge achievement and we look forward to your continued and promising development within the sport.

Swimming Nationals
Knox had as many as 16 boys competing for the Knox Pymble Swim Club on the Gold Coast in the break and came away with many more medals. Most exciting are the boys that competed for the very first time at the top level. The results were outstanding.

Congratulations to: Henry Anderson (Y9), Tane Bidois (Y11), Jason Buddee (Y10), Joshua Collett (Y12), Nathan Gladman (Y9), Joseph Hamson (Y12), Tyler Krenkels (Y12), Justin Lee (Y11), Kai Lilienthal (Y10), Will McDonagh (Y11), Toby Peknice (Y12), Daniel Rigby (Y8), Ben Rothery (Y12), Daniel Seo (Y9), Benjamin Shen (Y12), Dylan Zhang (Y12).

Knox Pymble finished 2nd in the country and we could not be happier for the Club and all swimmers.

AFL tour to Newcastle
Our 1st XVIII AFL pre-season tour to Newcastle went extremely well. Nearly 30 boys continued their preparation for this coming CAS/GPS AFL season as well as some games back here in Sydney vs Riverview and Newington.

Over the break many team arranged trial games and training sessions. Our footballers played Scots and are well prepared for another big season whilst the Rugby teams visited St Pat's and also had a great day.

Camps
A good number of boys attended sport camps in the holidays and had a great time staying fit and healthy and continuing to pick up some tips along the way. Well done to all who attended the Volleyball, Squash, Tennis, Rugby and Football camps.

Australian Squash Junior Open
Marcus Wang (Y7) entered and won the Boys Under 13 at 2021 Australian Squash Junior Open. Marcus overcome a fellow Queenslander in a tough 45mins 5 sets in the semi final, then went on to beat a player from Hong Kong in the finals, coming back from a match point down to win the thrilling fifth set 12-10.


Great work, Marcus!

Finally, good luck to everyone for this weekend and please remember to update your Knox app and ensure you are only receiving alerts for the sport(s) your son has chosen to participate in this winter. Our alerts are extremely important and we don’t wish for them to be lost among any notifications that are not relevant to you.

I look forward to seeing our Knox supporters around the fields and courts this weekend positively supporting our boys who will be proudly wearing the Black and Blue.

Martin Haywood

Tuckshop volunteers will be required to adhere to the following COVID-19 requirements:

• Do not attend if unwell, even with the mildest of symptoms
• Sign in at main reception, 2 Borambil Street, prior to meeting a Sodexo Supervisor in the Middle Academy Canteen
• Gloves, hair net and apron to be worn - provided by Sodexo
• Face mask to be worn – please bring your own
• Practise good hygiene (hand sanitisation etc.)
• Maintain a physical distance of 1.5m from other adults
• Comply with food safety requirements as instructed by Sodexo

All volunteers are also asked to please read and comply with the Knox Volunteer Code of Conduct.

If you have any questions about volunteering in the tuckshops, please contact Caron Suleyman, Senior School Tuckshop Convenor.

General Stationery
Slim Wallet Folders (display folders), Double Sided Tape (to hang pictures), Blu Tac, Blue Pens, Black Pens, Black Pencil Cases (large with letter inserts to spell student names), Copy Paper, 12 x A4 Display Folders (for resumes), Plastic Zip Up Folders (A3 and A4), Clear Plastic (thick) Document Protector Sleevs (A4), Sticky Page Tags.

Toiletries
Hand Wash, Hand Cream, Hand Lotion, Shampoo, Conditioner, Toothbrush, Toothpaste. Please note that all items can be small. No need for large bottles. (An example of size may be the shampoo and conditioner bottles from hotels).

Shoes for the Philippines
We are collecting school shoes in good condition (small sizes for children up to age 14) and clothing in small sizes. COVID-19 has had a huge impact on the communities around Manilla and the need is greater than ever. Please deliver any shoes or clothing to the SAOs.

Helen Clarke, Head of Diversity Justice and Stewardship