Last
Edition for the Year
The
first edition of the 2004-2005 school year will be posted Wednesday,
22nd September
2004
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| Week 30 : 30th June 2004 | Last
Edition for the Year |
The
first edition of the 2004-2005 school year will be posted Wednesday,
22nd September
2004 |
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AWARDS DAY The final day of the school year for almost all students (only Geography 12, History 12, and Mandarin 12 were to be written the the following week), dawned with bright sunshine — the Brentwood standard expectation! Physically tired from the exertions of the House outings the evening before and mentally spent after a week of final examinations, the students had a ready excuse for any reluctance to rise and shine, but a sense of the imminent holidays worked wonders with energy levels in the first few hours. All students were set tasks in the preparation for the day, with a multitude of chores to be completed before parents arrived. Tidying the campus, relocating furniture, setting up the various gathering points, preparing to receive guests, yet still finding the time to pack a year's collection of books, clothes, and personal belongings all took place before lunch. |
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noon, the Graduation Ceremony is held on the lawns of the Head of School's
residence. This beautiful spot overlooking the calm waters of Mill Bay is
the ideal setting for the occasion, at which the graduating class of 2004
receive their high school diplomas. Also speaking at this ceremony was Dr.
Howard Mills, who, with daughter Alex graduating this year, ends a direct
connection with the school after five successive daughters attending the
school for five years each.
Following the ceremony, all graduates and their families enjoyed a buffet lunch. Traditionally, the lunch is served by siblings of the graduates who, no doubt, look forward to the day when they, too, graduate. At 2 p.m., the graduates and their families joined the rest of the school and all other guests in the Sports Complex for the academic and special awards. |
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The
text of the Valedictorian address by Dan Hincks can be seen at Awards
Day speeches |
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HOUSE OUTINGS On the Friday evening, after each House is thoroughly cleaned and students' belongings packed and ready to go, all students leave the campus for the traditional House outings. These expeditions ranging from visits to Shawnigan Lake, local parks, or restaurants combine pleasure and fun activities with the traditional passing of the torch ceremonies as Grade 12 students to say goodbye and those Grade 11 students with leadership roles are inducted into their positions. Right and Below: Mackenzie House at Shawnigan Lake and Alex House at the Fuller Lake home of Sarah and David Mais. |
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 Alex House Grade 11s gather on the lawn... in anticipation? |
 House Captain Patty Roach and Katie Toews |
Below:
the two faces of Ellis House — Formula 1 drivers in the making and
the paintball game expedition. |
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FINAL EXAMINATIONS All students in Grades 8-11write examinations in the final week of term. These papers are usually two-hours in length and required in almost all subjects. The examinations, which constitute between 25-40% of the students final grade, are held in the sports complex, with Grade 12 students sitting their Provincial examinations in the old auditorium. |
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Stephanie
Kral, Chance St Marche, and Sarah Laird
hard at work. |
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THAT TIME OF THE YEAR Some guys will do anything to get in to a girls house or get out of studying, not to mention an opportunity to flex their muscles! On Sunday June 19th. the ladies of Mackenzie House were fortunate to have an experienced moving crew from Whittall House help move and load their prize fridges, couches and special possessions into storage for the summer. With everyone working together,one hour of lifting, hauling and heaving went quickly and an entire storage container was full. The merry men of Whittall were rewarded with scrumptious sundaes at the Flynns! Thank you, gentlemen, for a job well done! Maggie Flynn |
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CAMPUS DEVELOPMENT The appearance of the front entrance to the school was radically changed on Monday morning as the long line of poplars by the side of A field was taken down. This was a sad, but entirely necessary step in the development of the campus, given that the root structure of the trees was causing considerable damage to the field, irrigation system, and water supply pipes. Recognising the drastic visual impact that this action to, head of school Andrea Pennells wrote an informative letter to all residents of the local area. The full text of the letter can be read at Letter to Friends and Neighbours. |
 Work in progress |
 The new view by the side of the tennis courts looking south. |
 Liquid Amber, the new boulevard tree. |
 The skyline over Whittall House: old... |
 ... and new. |
 Local wildlife on A field — not bothered by the change. |
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Redevelopment will take place almost immediately. Once the stumps are removed, repair work will be undertaken with regard to drainage, new water lines and irrigation systems. The overhead power lines will be relocated underground, then new pavement, sidewalks, and new trees planted. The new trees (13 on either side of the driveway) will be Liquid Amber, carefully selected for their growth characteristics as boulevard trees and their root structure. In addition, there will be over 40 katsura trees planted to complement the boundary around the playing field. The picture above right shows the Liquid Amber tree in fall foliage. The tree is naturally green in spring and summer. |
AROUND CAMPUS Director of Post-Secondary Planning Gerry Pennells was out and about around campus in the last week of the term, observing the many activities in place. Below are a few of his recordings... |
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THE LAST ASSIGNMENT... Three years ago, the illustrious white Brentwood van led me down Solarium Road, past the tennis courts and into a world of kilts and collars. Intimidating? Quite. However, I was soon able to look beyond this outer façade and see the many latent opportunities at hand for the students who wish to seek their potential. The Brentwood sports, fine arts, academics, and House events are some of the many foreign realms in which |
 'This Week' contributing writers: Jillian Stothart, Alison Gillespie, Jonathan Dunstan, and Vicki Ha |
students investigate with curious minds, and the priceless moments lived and enjoyed within these domains have been seized by the simple click of a camera. In this day and age, the availability of advanced technology allows us to capture such moments in order to remember the times gone by. I have had the privilege to express my views as a photojournalist for the Brentwood “This Week” Web Page, and by using the camera as my eyes and my words to articulate what I behold, I have been able to reveal and share the many fortunes of Brentwood College with students, teachers, and parents alike. It has been a pleasure. Thank you Mr. Crossley, farewell to all, and good luck to the prospective photojournalists of 2005. Vicki Ha (Grade 12) |
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| Every week for the last year, I have had few problems in coming up with new ideas and stories, but now I have been assigned to write a farewell paragraph and suddenly it has become more difficult. It is rather strange to think that this is my last piece for the webpage. I can remember at the beginning of this year, worried that I would not be able to meet the deadlines and spending hours thinking of what on earth I would be able to write thirty articles about. It did not take long, however, to get into the swing of things. Mr. Crossley became my biggest e-mailer, scheduling what would be covered and organising meetings. Every Monday was spent in the library writing in my last captions for pictures and formatting my piece in Dreamweaver. I suppose lessons have been learned in this process: my technological skills have definitely improved as well as my ability to cope with stress. I will never forget my article on the Eranos Symposium that turned into a nightmare. Numerous cameras malfunctioned and I even got locked out of the theatre! It is not easy to write about an event when you missed the first quarter. Although some aspects of the webpage put me on edge, most have been very rewarding. On Wednesdays, when 'This Week' was posted on the net, I always looked forward to reading my article. The first few weeks, I would find my article embedded with unfamiliar sentences, but, as the weeks progressed, so did my writing, and Mr. Crossley's editing diminished. I have also learned to master the art of summarising lengthy performances and events into condensed, coherent articles. Working for the webpage has been fun and has allowed me to see the different aspects of Brentwood, i.e. articles on maintenance, the Laundry Ladies, and coming up with a staff baby photo every week. If anything, It has pushed me to go to more school events and participate in more activities — even if I was the 'geek' with the camera. I would like to thank Mr. Crossley for always giving me positive feedback, and everyone for reading the webpage. Good luck to all of the new writers next year, and I would love to keep my newly acquired photojournalism skills in use by continuing to contribute in some fashion to 'This Week' next year. Alison Gillespie (Grade 10) |
One
of the most challenging and ultimately rewarding endeavours I have ever
been involved with is coming to a close. Time which I had previously sacrificed
to “the Webpage” is now mine again, to watch a reruns for the
umpteenth time, to surf the internet, to generally waste time and become
inactive for lack of anything better to do in spare blocks, if I so choose.
The prospect of this freedom startles me. Carefully planning, gathering
information for, and producing articles filled up time and gave my a sense
of direction. By motivating me to go out and interact with people for the
purpose of writing articles, the webpage has indirectly provided me with
high school experiences which I shall never forget. Seeing my articles published
week after week gave me a great sense of joy. I wouldn’t have traded
the pride I felt at the best of my finished articles for anything.
I would like to thank Mr. Crossley for all his assistance in finding ideas, and my colleagues, for providing a sympathetic ear, especially Jonathan, whose help with computer problems was invaluable. To prospective writers: plan ahead, proofread, check facts, and don’t be afraid to let your personality shine through. A terse, objective recounting of facts makes for boring reading, even if it is easier to write. Farewell everyone and have a fun summer. Jill Stothart (Grade 10) |
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year in the Brentwood Photojournalism 12 programme entails producing a total
of about thirty articles, one each week. In my opinion, the most difficult
part about writing for the webpage is finding a topic to write about each
week. The simplest to find are the “current events” type articles:
reports on sports matches or social events. More difficult to think of are
reports on a facet of the school, such as the library or computer department.
The difficulty with both is getting in-depth information that makes the
articles more interesting to read. When reporting a current event it is
easy to fall prey to giving a bland, objective description that fails to
tell readers a story and give them a sense of what it would have been like
to actually be there. When investigating some aspect of campus life or how
the school is run, it is easy to report only the facts that you find, without
attempting to make your own connections and speculations.
The fact that you are writing for a school newspaper, whose primary audience is parents, also makes the writing more difficult. You are wary about making a statement or comment which could could be interpreted as criticising the school in some way, nor do you feel comfortable writing down your own thoughts on the topic. It was not until the last two monthhs, when I had become more familiar with writing for the webpage, that I could effectively include a more prersonal perspective, and perhaps bias, into some of my articles. Once I did so, I found it made the process of writing an article easier and much more natural. Another aspect to choosing a topic is finding one with sufficent photo opportunities. When dealing with a “current events” article, there is plenty of opportunity to take photographs, but it is sometimes difficult to find one that really captures the event as a whole. The investigative reports are seldom very photogenic, and require a little more imagination to think of a photograph that will complement your article. Photojournalism’s emphasis on initiative presents unique challenges to those taking the course. Unlike other Brentwood fine arts, where you attend the course for one hour, three days a week, the photojournalism course has no set times. Students are simply expected to have an article ready for 2:00PM every Tuesday. This frequently leads to procrastination until Monday afternooon! Writing the articles can be done anytime, but when writing an investigative piece there are usually interviews that must be scheduled. After a year in Photojournalism 12, I am unsure as to whether I would take this demanding course again. It is a unique experience that requires students to combine initiative, basic computer use, photography and writing skills to produce quite a bit of reporting. Jonathan Dunstan (Grade 10) |
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| FAREWELLS |
| Reflections
of a Memorable Year
Ten months have passed since I joined the faculty of Brentwood College School as the occupant of the Nicholas Prowse Chair of Teaching Excellence, an academic year that has passed in the blink of an eye and, yet, has left me feeling an enduring and timeless sense of my place as a Brentonian. On Speech Day, a young woman – one of the grade nines – came up to me and said “I just realized that you had only been here one year. I always thought you had been here forever, you seemed so much a part of Brentwood.” And I have felt so much a part of Brentwood right from the moment of my initial interview with Andrea Pennells in her office last spring. This is, above all, thanks to the warm and inclusive nature of this community – students, parents, support staff, faculty and administration alike - that has been so welcoming and embracing of me ever since my arrival. I have so many positive memories, I hardly know where to begin. Many are framed or set in the beauty of the campus and its glorious natural setting. Images of early morning rowers gliding like elegant elongated water beetles across the pewter waters against the backdrop of the sun rising behind Mount Baker. Mental snapshots of eagles gliding in like precision parachutists to land on the rocks at the water’s edge beneath the cafeteria as I ate my breakfast. Silent movies of late-night walks back to my home from Whittall House, moonlight glistening on Mill Bay, silhouetting the sailboat moored there. Even more memorable, however, are the human connections I have experienced here at Brentwood. Great conversations, arguments, laughter and tears have flowed, eddied and swirled in wonderful profusion. Rich, deep discussions in the staff room with colleagues about what it means to be a teacher. Late night conversations with the men of Whittall House about politics, popular culture and life. Deeply reflective exchanges with educational leaders about the tensions between “bricks and mortar” and “brains and sinews” in creating a world-class school. Heart-wrenching dialogues with parents about deeply troubled sons or daughters. Courtyard conversations about Italian food, European travel and rap music in which I became “teacher” to many young people who were not enrolled in my classes. So many touching farewells on Speech Day. My memory of these highlights is a poly-vocal, multi-tracked tape loop that plays and replays in my mind, mixing and layering fragments of a multi-vectored conversation that is part of my never ending story as a teacher and a salient feature of the educational landscape I survey at Brentwood. Perhaps appropriately, most memorable of all my experiences at Brentwood this year was speaking to the November 11th Remembrance Day gathering in the newly opened T. Gil Bunch Centre. Facing more than 500 parents, students, colleagues and guests, standing on the stage and facing the intimate vastness of the theatre and the sea of then largely unknown faces, I felt humbled by the task of public speaking (something I have rarely experienced). Flanked by “Pip” Holmes, whose dignity and bearing spoke volumes about the qualities of individual dignity and collective responsibility that are the hallmarks of an “Old Brentonian,” shadowed by the spirit of Gil Bunch, whose eloquence and passion as a speaker had impressed me so greatly some 15 years earlier on my first visit to Brentwood when I observed him teaching Shakespeare’s King Lear during a Ministry accreditation, I was struck by the irony of topic I had chosen for that day: the construction of memory. Brentwood, I realized, is defined by the wonderful dialogue between the deep and enduring sense of history and tradition of the school and the powerful, forward looking sense of purpose embodied in the architecture of the T. Gil Bunch Centre. As I leave, only part of me leaves, and all of Brentwood travels with the part that leaves. I hope to remain a part of the Brentwood community in whatever form or fashions fate allows. I know that the conversations begun this year will continue – and that I shall continue to grow as a person and as a teacher as a result of that dialogue. Thank you, all of you, for inviting me into the Brentwood community. Stan Garrod |
| Well
I really never expected to end up in a place like Brentwood. It's kind of
funny when you think about it. Imagine going from high school to university,
back to high school and then back to university again. In September I will
be heading off to do a masters degree in economics. I can look back on my
year at Brentwood as a very positive experience. I have definitely met a lot of interesting people. Most importantly though, I have developed a lot of solid friendships with many of the students. It is definitely not easy being a twenty-four year old living in such an isolating environment. There were a few people who made this transition very easy for me. To the McCarthys and the Hardies I owe a tremendous amount of thanks for everything that you have done for me. From the Thanksgiving dinners to the boat rides and golf games your generosity and support have been endless. I also want to thank Mr. Flynn who allowed me to help out with his economics class. To the Ellis boys: I will miss you all and hope that you go on to great things. Josh Burk |
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order to sum up my year at Brentwood, I'm going to have to resort to quoting
the Grateful Dead: "What a long, strange trip it's been!" Seriously
though, I've encountered a lot of good times and great people here. I certainly
have a much better idea now of what a teacher's life is really like (no
further comment!) than I did when I first became one, fresh out of UBC's
Faculty of Education last summer.
Some of my best memories from ‘03/‘04 include “Mornings of the Living Dead” (breakfast duties), “The Exorcist” (grade 8 advisor group meetings), and “Apocalypse Now” (Wednesday prep duty in Privett – aka “Parr Night”). Not to mention class coverage (special nod to Mr. Ganley’s English classes and Ms. Melhuish’s English 9 class), ESL tutoring, jazz and concert choirs, running up mountains with the cross-country teams, and cruising around the bay with the sailors. The jazz choir girls made the Powell River trip a truly hilarious and unforgettable experience, and Java Hut was the highlight of my year. All year I have consistently been surprised and impressed by the immense amount of talent and potential at this school. I have no doubt that you will all go out into the world and do amazing and impressive things. Many thanks… to Mr. Neufeld and Mr. Rodrigues for their help on the Privett Battlegrounds, to the Privett boys for making me tougher, to Mr. Williams for making me a better singer, to Mr. Rose, Mr. Wardrop and Ms. Hardie for being awesome co-coaches, to Mr. Collis and Mr. Yaremchuk pretty much just for being them, to Ms. Peters for helping me to cope with the Canucks’ losses, to Mack House for the sing-alongs, to Big Bird for making sure I was NEVER without loud music, to Matt Wood and countless others for reminding me when things weren’t “quite up to Parr,” and to Mrs. Pennells for giving me this opportunity in the first place! At the end of September I’m off to Australia for a year of work and travel, and hopefully when I return, someone somewhere will actually hire me as an English teacher! Best of luck to all of you… peace out!! James Parr |
Mackenzie
house. Top floor. Last room on the left. I can now say that I know what
it is like living at a boarding school. Beyond the colour of the walls and
waking up by the sound of a bell, I have actually felt quite at home here
at Brentwood. Good times call for great memories: 1st XI Field Hockey, Mackenzie House girls (Miriam) and foyer time, pottery class, waterfront duty, evening duties, “cookie breaks” in the staff room, Grad, and cafeteria conversations. I’ll take these memories with me but I’ll also be around to make some more next year. Be sure to come by and say hello as you walk past the main Administration offices, or when I’m giving a tour, or when I’m up on the field hockey pitch. Thanks to all the staff for their support and friendships made throughout the year and thanks to the students for making my year so interesting and lively. Have a great summer and we’ll see you in September. Rachel Peters |
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“Don't
cry because it is over, smile because it happened.” Paige Zinn |
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