St John the Evangelist Catholic High School Nowra eNewsletter

YEAR 9 NEWS

What a great experience we had at camp. We were blessed with blue skies and stars at night. Thanks to Frankie O’Neill who wrote the following recount of the camp experience.

Year 9 camp for 2024 started off with a cold morning and a long bus ride up to the Coolendel campsite. We were all sectioned into our groups and the camp officially began. After finishing setting up tents and blowing up air mattresses, we all started our activities for the day. For my group we did archery first up, then, it was all about the rope climbing activities, which used a lot of skill and determination. This included log climbing, crate stacking and leap-frog climbing. In the sunny afternoon we set out on the bush walk up the mountain top to a beautiful sunset. At night, year 9 was immersed in an Indigenous Australian culture lesson, teaching us about the importance and symbolism of dance to the Aboriginal culture.

Abseiling, rock climbing and more Aboriginal Lessons was on the schedule for the next day, and by night it was time for some fun. The night began with a respectful and engaging liturgy, where many brave students stood up to partake. Afterwards, it was finally time for what we had all been waiting for, Karaoke! There were so many students who gave it a go and sang with all their hearts, providing entertainment for all around. We even got the teachers to give it a go. All too soon the night was over and we all went to sleep under the stars, ready to finish the last day of camp.

The last day brought a fresh morning of team building activities and then it was over. We got to packing away our stuff, deconstructing tents and heading over to lunch, where we had iconic Aussie sausage sandwiches to finalise an amazing camp. This was an incredible experience for everyone and I’m sure that everyone has made some memories they will remember for a long time. A huge shout out to the Optimal Experience leaders who ran the camp, the teachers who gave up their time to look after us - Mr Dowdell, Mr Elton, Mr Christie, Mr Wilson, Ms Diaz, Mrs Frew, Mrs Renshaw, Mr Standen, Mr Chard and Mr Gray and Mrs Millington, and to Mrs Isemonger and Miss Walker who made the whole camp possible.

Thank you!

The camp goal was to focus on our year group motto - “with strong minds and gracious hearts”. In our camp liturgy, students were asked to reflect on moments at camp where they had experienced or witnessed a strong mind or gracious heart moment. Below are some of the experiences students reflected on:

STRONG MIND MOMENTS

Having to step out of my comfort zone to not only interact with new people but also participate in new activities that were unfamiliar.

Kilarni A

It was when I was a little scared to do the abseiling but I continued and pushed myself and overcame that fear.

Lex C

My strong mind moment was when i challenged myself to go further on the rock climbing and got to the top of each one.

Eden K

My "STRONG MIND" moment was when we did the team building exercise and had to solve problems.

Rebekah A

My strong mind moment was when I was going to do the abseiling I overcame my fear of doing it and then did it multiple times in a row.

Gabby K

My strong mind moment was when everyone was working together to figure out how to most efficiently do the team building activity where we had to make a square with rope and then be blindfolded.

Angela H

When people from my group tried their best to overcome their fears.

Maddy V

Doing the activities even though I was scared.

Emily N

When we were doing the rock climbing and we had to figure out where to place our feet.

Noah T

When doing the crates activity all the pairs worked together to try and beat the other team's height.

Scarlett C

My strong mind moment was in my opinion overcoming the nerves of the lily pad run because it looked really sketchy so I was nervous but it turned out to be very fun.

Hunter S