A couple of weeks ago, I had the privilege to take a group of six boys to The Kings School to represent Newington College at the 2013 Social Action Expo. Hugh Holm, Liam Wyatt-Smith, Tane Blessington, Sam Gresham, Finn Rose and Angus Webster represented the school with distinction. I had numerous comments about the boy’s conduct and attitude towards the intent of the day.

The 2013 Social Action Expo was designed to heighten primary student’s awareness of Social Issues and contexts for Social Action at their school. The day has given our boys a plac

to start. The boys have already started brainstorming initiatives, ideas and directions that we can take at Newington to start to think about issues that directly or indirectly affect many people in our society.

The major focus of the expo was centred around encouraging awareness, advocacy and action in the students.

Awareness – finding out

Advocacy – speaking up

Action – advocating change

The Expo featured presentations from Amnesty International, Boxes for Christmas and School For Life. The boys were also privileged enough to take the opportunity to chat with students at others schools about programs that they have put in place or ideas that they have started thinking about in terms of a social issue e.g. poverty, climate change, homelessness, pollution, injustice etc.

It was enlightening to see the boys thinking about broader issues beyond their social realm. The passion and enthusiasm that the boys have brought away from this experience has been wonderful to witness. These boys now plan to collaborate with the staff and boys about designing a Social Action Program for the school so that we can all be involved in helping others in need.

 Joel Weekes
Teaching and learning Team Leader (PYPC)

Social Action Day at The Kings Preparatory School

On the 26 July, six Stage 3 boys, Hugh Holm, Liam Wyatt-Smith, Tane Blessington, Sam Gresham, Finn Rose and I went to The Kings Preparatory School to watch speakers talk about specific charities they have started and how they have taken Social Action for starting it.  To also interact with students in regards to how we can start Social Action Projects within our schools. The main speakers on the day were from ‘Amnesty International, Boxes for Christmas and School for life’.

Amnesty International defends people who are not given adequate Human Rights. Eliza gave us some thinking activities to do where we had to put ourselves in other people’s shoes and make decisions on what is most important to us. We learnt about how truly blessed we are and that there are some people in the world that don’t have a life like ours. I love that Amnesty International tries to help them have a better life.

Margaret Chivers was our next speaker. As a child, she was an orphan and was adopted by a loving family. She started a charity later in life called ‘Boxes For Christmas’. This charity is for people who have no family and wake up on Christmas Morning with no presents. ‘Boxes for Christmas’ sends presents to people who have nothing on Christmas Morning to make them happier because at least they received a present for Christmas. Margret made us understand the value of giving, other than receiving. She made us understand the value of just one 5c piece! It all adds up.

After Lunch was my favourite session. We were fortunate enough to listen to a lady by the name of Annabelle Chancey. She spoke about a charity she and a friend named Dave started called ‘School For Life’. This charity helps children in Uganda have a better education and the two of them started a new school one class at a time. When Annabelle finished speaking she showed us a video of the Ugandan children learning at their new school – it was quite an emotional experience!

Our last learning opportunity of the day was to chat with other students from independent schools about Social Action. We spoke about what they were doing in their schools and reflected with Mr Weekes about what we possibly could do to start our own Social Action Group/s. Some Student Expos that other schools had set up made me start to think about how important it is to help one another and to think about how we as a school can help those in need.

I look forward to our journey ahead in starting our first ever Social Action Program.

 Angus Webster 
Year 6 Student