Dear Parents and Guardians,

Last Saturday our boys competed at the AAGPS Athletics Carnival at Sydney Olympic Park. There were so many outstanding performances from Newington’s athletes, resulting in the College winning both the Junior and Intermediate Trophies. In particular, we acknowledge our new GPS record holders: U13 Relay Team – Renato Pane (8/JN), Jake Goodhand (8/KL), Stefano Ottavio (8/ME) and Siteni Taukamo (7/ME); and our U15 Relay Team – Tolu Koula (9/FL), Kaeo Weekes (10/MA), John Ballard (10/PR) and Lachlan Best (9/MA).  Renato Pane (8/JN) broke the record for the U13 Long Jump and Angus Beer (10/ME) broke the 800m and 1500m.

Today we welcome our boys back from camp and thank Mr Matt Holdgate for his leadership of the Newington Challenge and Major Rod Wood for his leadership of the Cadet Program.  Our Cadets have been in the Colo Valley this week.  The objectives of Cadet Camp are to engender a feeling of unit identity and to support the cadets to improve their familiarity with the natural environment amongst other things.  Our Newington Challenge boys have been at Murramarang National Park.  I was fortunate to join the boys earlier in the week and they were having a great time surfing, fishing and hiking.  This camp had a special focus for each Year group, geared towards building character, growing as men of substance and learning how to lead through service. 

Tomorrow we farewell the Year 12 class of 2017.  It is a very special day for our community and an opportunity for us to thank our graduating class for all they have contributed to the College.  We have many events planned for the boys tomorrow and as such school will finish at 12.50pm for boys in Years 7 to 11. 

I wish all of our families an enjoyable holiday period and look forward to seeing the boys again on Monday 9 October for the start of Term 4.