Service is a great way to connect with the community and get to know people.

The rush of endorphins after completing an hour or more of service is unrivalled, plus you are contributing to a good cause, whether it be through planting trees and digging up invasive species on the Mt. Henry Peninsula, raising awareness for MND at Marathons, collecting money for Cancer Research in the city or ridding our beautiful beaches of rubbish.

My name is Charlie Backhouse and over the past 2 years at Aquinas, I have completed over 60 hours of service and am aiming to reach 100 hours by the end of Year 9. Through all the service I’ve completed at this College, my favourite service activity is the Beach Clean-Up. I love getting up early in the morning on a Saturday, driving down to Leighton or Port Beach and feeling the sea breeze, hearing the seagulls squawking, knowing that I’m positively contributing to the longevity of some of Western Australia’s most beautiful beaches. Not only this but some of the things we find are just a bit strange. Last weekend, some of the boys stumbled across a keg of cider about 1/3 full, others found a bikini top and Mr Rich claims he stumbled across the best find of the day – a rubber banana. Some of the normal finds included beer bottles, plastic bags and utensils and the occasional cigarette bud and lighter. This is a photo of the boys once we had completed our service hours:

A few students in the Middle School failed to complete a minimum of 10 hours last year. Boys, If you don’t know where to sign up for service, go to level 1 of Mt. Sion and I’m sure there will be plenty of open spots for you.

Were your PE classes this cool? Because ours are. 😎

PE and Outdoor Ed classes are more than just playing a sport, they seek to improve performance and fitness while teaching students survival and life skills. Students learn about the skeletal, muscular, cardio-respiratory and energy systems, investigate the various methods of training, and are involved in fitness activities and skills for physical activity.

In Senior School, classes can add towards ATAR or be used to gain certifications.

A term that new Aquinas students become promptly familiar with is the CAT – abbreviation for Common Assessment Task.

Essentially, a CAT is the ‘test’ that students sit once they have completed a topic in class and have spent time revising and preparing. Each core learning area prepares and sets a CAT each term in Middle School in Weeks 7-8 (CATs are less routine in Senior School courses) as part of the Middle School term rhythm.

Why do we have CATs?

CATs are an important assessment tool that gives both student, parent and teacher information and feedback on how the learning of a particular topic or timeframe is tracking. They are an opportunity for students to put into practice what skills and content they have covered in class and demonstrate what they have learnt. Most importantly, the CATs are an opportunity for students to learn from their marked assessments, and to review what they accomplished well and not so well in the lessons.

How can we navigate exam stress?

Staff understand that the CAT weeks can be an anxious time for our students. To help reduce stress and concerns, students should prepare by using the course Success Criteria as a proforma to write quality revision notes. This will improve the recall and understanding of the material covered in lessons and alert the student if he needs clarification from his teacher for certain content. Parents can assist by asking to read their son’s notes at home and by testing them on the current Success Criteria (these documents can be found on SEQTA course pages).

Due to a shorter Term 1, the CAT weeks will be scheduled one week earlier. We wish your son success in the upcoming Middle School CATs.

About school

So far it has been fantastic the size of the school is a bit worrying when you have a class on the other side of the school you might be one or two minutes late. My old school had all the classes in one class so it was a bit different moving between the 6 periods we have for the one day. A good thing is having the older boys helping you to your class and risking them being late for there class and getting there self in trouble.

After school activities

The best thing is having us do sport every week. Like on Monday we could do co-curricular activities like skill-based training, sprint training, strength and conditioning, drumline, drama club, art club, media, music, dance, photography and welding. With a game on Friday against a different school, like last Friday, we played against Scotch.

About the boarding community

The boarding community is a good place with our mentors coming and checking up on us when we are not feeling the best. We get to stay and talk to the year eights and they will tell us how things go up in the other year so we are ready for it. The Brother House was a good idea because it doesn’t put the year seven and new year eight in the big boarding house yet so we can get a feel on the community before we move in with the senior and older kids.

Term 3 saw the trial of the Middle School Co-Curricular activities on Monday afternoons. Students were given the opportunity to test multiple streams of extra learning. The success of the program will see it cemented in the school program in 2021.

Aquinas College was deeply honoured recently when word came through that Andrea Corr (of the Corr’s fame) wanted our Schola Choir to perform in her Christmas album. The boys jumped at the chance and spent a long evening at Crank Studios in Northbridge recording and rerecording their part of the song “Begin Again”. To make the evening even more challenging, Andrea and her team were in lockdown in Ireland and working with Hugh Lydon and the boys through Zoom!

Andrea Corr “Christmas Songs” is now live on all streaming platforms - https://lnk.to/andreacorrchris...

The College would like to formally thank Andrea and her team at Spoke Records for their faith in our boys and the opportunity granted to them.

As part of the Odyssey Program, Year 9 students undertook a hike and camping trip across New Norcia.

2020 was a very different year. Here's a quick wrap of what went on in Junior School.

A look back on COVID-19 and what happened in Middle School during Western Australia's lockdown period.

Year 12 students reflect on 2020 and the impact COVID-19 had on their final year.