Exams, Assessments and Reports

This is our final week of term and we have been extremely busy with exams and assessments. Our exam block finishes in the last week of school allowing just two days for Year 11 and 12 to hand back papers and check results.  It is therefore vital that students do not finish school early but end the term strongly with attendance right through until the last day.  Staff will now complete reports over the holidays and these will be emailed in that third and final week.

The Year 12s will have Parent Teacher Interviews in Week 2 of next Term so you will be able to discuss feedback on reports prior to the critical Term 3 assessments and the Year 12 Verifications.  Information about the Parent Teacher Interviews will be included with reports and there will be a link to our online booking system.  For Years 10 and 11, Term 4 is the more critical as Year 11 Monitoring occurs at the end of the year.  Year 10 and 11 Parent Teacher Interviews will occur in Week 6 on Tuesday, 26 August.

 

Late Submissions of Assignments

It is disappointing to see some Seniors still getting after school detentions for failing to submit work in on time.  Students know that when assessment tasks are handed out and the due date is set then under no circumstances will work be accepted after this date unless an extension from the Dean of Studies is granted. Work after the due date will not be marked and only the work received by this date will be considered.  GCCC introduced a check date system this year where students must submit what they have done approximately one week prior to the due date.  This helps validate the work they are doing and demonstrate to the teacher that their work is in fact their own as well as providing something for the teacher to mark should assignments be handed in late.

The Fiji Mission Trip

On 9 July, 15 students and staff will fly to Fiji as part of the 2014 Fiji Mission Trip.  The students are doing their final practises before we leave.  We have met virtually every Friday afternoon as well as Thursday lunch times.  These are an amazing group of young people and we are excited by what God has planned for us in Fiji.  The students will arrive back to the College on Tuesday of Week 1, 22 July. Please keep us in your prayers particularly for safety and that we will recognise God’s leading.  I also want to thank everyone for their support as well.  The Mission Team through the Glasshouse Country Baptist Church have also organised a container load of equipment to be shipped over to Fiji for the locals.  This includes a tractor.

An evening with Dr Kaku

On the 5 June, one of our Year 10 students attended a special presentation with Dr Michio Kaku, possibly the world’s leading theoretical physicist.  Duane Botha asked me if he could attend and after I spoke with him and saw his passion for Science, I realised this was an opportunity too good to miss. Below are Duane’s thoughts of his meeting with Professor Kaku.

“I went to the Brisbane convention center to see Dr. Michio Kaku live. Dr. Kaku is a world-renowned theoretical physicist, he has three New York times bestsellers and has been my inspiration for the love of Science for the past six years.  The moment he came out on stage the crowd went wild. Dr. Kaku sat down on stage and was questioned by a lady.  When he answered these questions I got really excited. Hearing him deliver his speeches right in front of me was fantastic.

“He spoke deeply about the future of the human mind at the beginning of the seminar. This was all new information to me but he described it so clearly, it feels like I am an expert on it now. Halfway through the seminar, Dr. Kaku started talking about time travel and infinity. All these theories of his took years to develop and he explains it so well in his many books and TV shows.

“My love of science started when I saw him on the Discovery Channel talking about Einstein and the speed of light. I would stay up late watching his shows and then started discovering YouTube channels that he would appear on and I expanded my knowledge from that day on. The trip to watch him talk was well worth it.”

by Duane Botha Year 10

2014 Indigenous Australian Science and Infrastructure
Development Winter School

I wish to congratulate Hayden Snow in Year 11 for being accepted to participate in the 2014 Indigenous Australian Science and Infrastructure Development (SID) Winter School.  Hayden will be attending the Queensland University of Technology for four days over the holidays.  The SID Winter School is a fully-supervised and funded four day, residential program designed to inspire Indigenous Queenslanders in years 10 and 11 to consider higher education studies that can lead to career pathways in: biological sciences, earth sciences, environmental sciences, chemistry, Information Technology (IT), urban development, urban planning and stakeholder engagement.

 

David Heyworth, Head of Middle School