Tevlin House Term 2 Report

From the Head of Tevlin House, John McCallum

Tevlin House has enjoyed a positive and rewarding second term of 2018, with students highly involved across our wellbeing, academic and co-curricular programs. The term began with all Tevlin boys participating in a highly successful May Procession, and concludes with Tevlin adorned in yellow and as a house chant says “going bananas” at the House Athletics Carnival.

House Sporting Achievements

Tevlin has enjoyed some further success across numerous sports activities in Term 2. Tevlin boys will have a highly enjoyable day at the Senior House Athletics Carnival on our last day of term, with a great opportunity to also welcome and involve our Junior School members to continue to be integrated into many of the great Tevlin experiences.

Men’s Health Week was also a fantastic opportunity for boys to challenge themselves in a variety of physical, mental and spiritual aspects, and many Tevlin boys and their fathers joined the Bondi Beach Pilates session. That week, Tevlin also competed with style in the House Basketball, placing 4^th in Juniors and 6^th in the Seniors divisions.

Leadership and Academic Achievements 

Oliver Small from Year 12 was inducted to the Tevlin House Prefect Body at an assembly early in the term, strengthening this group with his demonstrated leadership throughout the year. Oliver showed great resilience and the ability to lead in his humble but proactive manner, role-modelling many important virtues to younger students.

All year groups have been challenged to rise up to a higher level of academic focus and achievement, and we encourage boys and families to discuss their Semester One reports and for boys to reflect on how they compare to the goals and targets they established for themselves at the beginning of the year. There can be areas for boys to be proud of in their academic development, while also identifying key aspects to address in Semester Two.  All boys had a variety of half-yearly assessment tasks, while it was highly encouraging to see how well Year 5, 7 and 9 Tevlin boys worked through their NAPLAN tasks. Year 10 have been highly engaged in Allwell testing and Waverley’s Career Profile interviews, Study and Senior Subject seminars.  Boys derived much benefit from these subject-specific sessions, which included Tevlin’s Damian Lin providing an engaging account of the strengths and value of choosing Music as an HSC Subject.  Perri Quirk and Cooper Stynes were also presented with Head of College Academic Gold Awards, recognising their significant achievement, effort and leadership throughout the year.

Tevlin’s Wellbeing and Social Justice Involvement

Term 2 has seen daily meetings of Mentor Groups, with boys and their Mentors engaging strongly with some meaningful activities on the term’s theme of our School motto “Virtus Sola Nobilitat” – Virtue is its own reward.  This has included units and activities on understanding our own personal strengths and traits, identifying positive virtues of others and identifying character strengths of people we aspire to be like. Mum Shirl was an example of an Australian demonstrating strong virtues, with these outlined as a part of NAIDOC Week, and Harry Whitaker from Tevlin 7 also presented a great personal account at a school assembly with some of his rewarding experiences from the Red Earth Emersion last year.  In the upcoming holidays, 5 Tevlin students from Years 9-10 will engage in the 2018 indigenous emersion, including Ronan Schocher, Jackson Green, Leon Pallacio, Hugo Sewell and Barney Wilson.  In addition, Logan Ryan, Harry Whitaker and Angus McPherson are travelling to Timor Leste on their Emersion, and we look forward to all these boys sharing their unique experiences with our House on their return.  Refugee Week also presented many opportunities to better understand the issues surrounding the significant challenges of refugees and some of their contributions and benefits in our society.

Individual Term 2 Achievements and School Involvement

Collectively, Tevlin boys have been involved in significant Waverley events, with the School Production of Stories in the Dark showcasing both Waverley and Tevlin House’s talents. All boys and staff can be congratulated with the engaging manner and wonderful standard of the production. The two lead characters, played by Tevlin’s Ethan Vella and Riley Koltz, were outstanding in their character portrayals, and were backed up by very clever and often comical performances by Remy Crompton-Lamb and Perri Quirk. The hard work in preparation by these boys is to be commended, while Tevlin Mentors Ms Jinga and Mr Lamb were amazing in their co-ordination and direction of such a fantastic production.

A number of boys have made notable contributions and had some excellent achievements in Waverley sport, including:

• Jacob Tomasiello, Levi Milford and Conor Molloy from Tevlin all represented Waverley with pride in the 1^st XV Rugby in Term 2, with Jacob the Captain of Rugby, and Conor the Captain of our 1^st Conor’s exceptional work ethic and leadership at Flanker has been rewarded with selection in the CAS First side, while Levi Milford gained CAS selection in the centres. Zach Smith-Karim has been selected on the wing for the CAS U16 Rugby side, with all boys playing this week in the NSW Schools Championships.
• Marcus Cowan and Marco Arambasic in Year 10 are a part of the 1^st XI Football side also striving to defend the CAS title as they move into Term 3, and Marcus was selected in the CAS U16 Football side for the NSW CIS Championships.
• Nate Smith of Year 6 was selected in the CIS AFL Team that competed and won the NSW schools AFL championships. Harry Whitaker from Year 11 was also selected in the inaugural CAS AFL side, with Tevlin’s Mr Porter appointed coach of this side.

Upcoming Events: Tevlin House Mass (Friday Aug 3) and Tevlin’s Winter Sleepout (Friday Aug 31)

All Tevlin students from Years 5-12 will be attending our annual House Mass at 8am on Friday August 3 (Week 2 of term 3).  All parents and guardians are also warmly invited to join their boys on this morning as we celebrate the Eucharist.

Tevlin has its special House Social Justice issue in supporting homelessness and marginalised groups, and its major experience this year is the Winter Sleep Out. This event is an opportunity for boys to participate in an overnight stay in the Waverley College Gym, hear the real accounts of some people who have experienced homelessness and gain a greater understanding of a variety of its issues. This event is compulsory for Tevlin boys in Years 7,8,9,11 and 12.

Date and Time: 7pm Friday August 31, through to 7am Saturday September 1

Location: Waverley College Gymnasium

I wish all boys and their families a great term break and look forward to seeing everyone next term.