The Thistle - An E-Newsletter of Scotch College, Perth, Western Australia

From the Head of Middle School

A few weeks ago at our Middle School Assembly I introduced the boys to Bluewater State School, a small primary school 30km north of Townsville.  During the Northern Queensland floods in January, Bluewater Primary School was inundated and as a consequence their school library was swamped, with over 5,400 books being ruined.

At Assembly I asked if anyone wanted to help and as a result we have a 'small' committee of 20 boys who have planned some activity over the next three weeks to raise funds to send to Bluewater Primary.  The goal: to help Bluewater Primary restock their Library.  To date we have had two very positive responses from Dymocks book store in Claremont and QBD Books in Townsville about matching the funds we generate.

Key activities include:

  • Free Dress Day: Wednesday 10 April.  We hope for a gold coin donation from each boy for this activity, but always happy to accept more than that.
  • Cup Cake Stall: Week 10 Monday-Friday, Iced Vanilla Cup Cakes on sale.  A roster has been made up of volunteers to bake.  I am hoping it is the boys themselves who do the baking.
  • Second Hand Book Stall: Week 9-10.  Pre loved books we can resell for between 50c - $3.  Donations can be left at Middle School Reception.  We will not be accepting donations of second hand books to send to Bluewater as we wish for them to be able to select their own replacement books.
  • Zooper Dooper Icy Pole Stall: Week 8 looks a nice warm week for icy poles, $1 each.

These are the ideas the 'committee' have organised to date, but already we have had boys who have been mowing lawns, washing cars, organising lemonade stalls with the aim of generating funds to help another school out.  When organisations talk about culture and the importance of it, I am continually impressed to see how quickly the culture of coming together, forming a team to help someone else, rises to the surface in our students.

Congratulations to our Middle School boys who represented Scotch College at the Inter-School Swimming Carnival last week.  I suspect it was pretty exciting to be a part of one of the College's big PSA teams.  Good luck to our Year 8 rowers who will be stroking their way down Champion Lake in their first Head of the River this weekend.