The Gift Box Appeal is an annual fundraiser that we do within Boarding to try and provide Christmas boxes for those less fortunate. This started with informing the students about the aims of the charity and who we would be supporting. We then raised money in order to buy the supplies such as toys, stationery, toiletries and sweets. The nicest part was our students coming together to pack and wrap the gift boxes. This offers a moment of reflection to think of the privileges position we are in and how we can give our time and effort in order to help those less fortunate.

For more information about it, you can find this Tik Tok video:

Video made by Mr Gordon.

Herman, Billy, Otabek and Artem enjoy lovely pancakes.

Herman and Louis discussed their experience in Concha, their ups and downs throughout Grade 8, the importance of being organised, keeping to the rules and the privileges the boys will earn later in the year. They also spoke about the transition from Middle School to High School and the responsibility they now have as Grade 9 students.

The 2nd takeaway point for this Pillar is;

Noticing differences is normal but there are many ways to be an ally.

When we first meet someone it is very easy to first focus on the differences – their ethnicity, what they are wearing, how animated they are, their speech, their physicality, their presence etc. We all have an unconscious bias that then forms an unfair first impression. This can be a positive or negative preconception.

It is only when we get to know the person, that we truly understand the similarities between us. Whether that is liking the same music, or sports club, or food or views.

Starting from the basics we are all human, all want to be loved and all want to be treated kindly. We should start with the thought that we should treat others how we wish to be treated, irrelative of first impressions or prejudgements.

This weekend our boys from Olympus enjoyed three days of pure fun with a lot of different activities, culminating in an awesome Laser Tag Sunday.

Here you have some pictures of the activities that our boys did:

Adi, Aoto and Ryunosuke showing their perfect volleyball skills.

Gary, Ivan and Tim formed the best imaginable badminton team.

Billy, Navi and Nikolai went to the cooking workshop to learn how to make a delicious and Italian “pana cotta”.

To end the weekend some of our Olympus warriors participated in a fierce Laser Tag match, in which they were able to test their marksmanship.