Beaconhills College

Year 9 Beaconhills College student Bailey Christie will represent Australia in the 2017 IWWF World Waterski Open Championships in Paris.

Bailey is the youngest person ever to ski in the Australian Open Team. He will train in London for three weeks, before arriving in France for the event in early September. Congratulations Bailey!

Bailey in action. Photo: Andrea Gilardi

Thanks to the Beaconhills community for the generous donations to our annual 4C’s Can Drive. The College is set to break the record of 6500 cans of food collected last year, with more donations still to come.

The 4C’s (Cardinia Combined Churches Caring) has thanked Beaconhills for the generous donations, which help make a big difference to the lives of families in need in the Cardinia Shire over the winter months. The organisation collected the cans in their van today, but will need to do more than one trip.

Pakenham Campus Senior Chaplain Rev. Peggy Kruse said staff and students did a wonderful job helping stack and count cans.

Years 3 and 4 students from Beaconhills College will bring the classic tale of Peter Pan to the stage on 17 and 18 August with the Peter Pan Jr musical. Six months of preparation has gone in to the colourful show, which involves 150 students from the College’s Berwick Campus.

Director and College Drama teacher Jesse Sheahan said Peter Pan Jr was quite simply shaping up to be “a showstopper”. He said students had rehearsed tirelessly for the past few months.

“As the costumes start to roll in, the performers are incredibly excited and can’t wait to show an audience what they have been working on,” he said.

The musical espoused a timely message about the value of fantasy stories and the importance of fostering creativity, he added.

Peter Pan Jnr is a great night out for the whole family and will be staged at the College’s Berwick Campus in Kangan Drive, Berwick. Come along and enjoy light refreshments, listen to the timeless music and be transported on a magical adventure to Neverland. Tickets are $15 for adults, $10 for children or $35 for a family of four. Bookings through the College Shop.

Berwick Campus student Chenuli Haththimuni (Year 7) has earned first place in the recent West Gippsland Music & Drama Eisteddfod.

Chenuli won in the category of ‘Classical vocal song in costume solo – 12 years and under’. She is coached by Beaconhills College Voice teacher, Anna Castle.

Chenuli (left) with her Voice teacher Anna Castle

Six Beaconhills students took part in the recent Junior Australian Floorball Open, NSW, the major international floorball tournament in Australia.

Congratulations to Sam Watt, Mitchell Hall, David Noney, Annie Lean, Liam Watt and Emily Noney (assistant coach) for scoring gold in U17s, silver in U13s and 5th in U15s. Mitchell and David were also invited to train with the U15s Accelerated Athlete Academy Program.

Visiting Japanese students from Osaka High School were popular with children at Little Beacons Learning Centre this week as they shared some of their traditional skills.

Little Beacons children in the Discovery programs learned origami, calligraphy and ayatori (a string game). The Osaka study tour is at Beaconhills until 24 July.

Beaconhills students are helping East Timorese children this week assemble solar-powered lights as part of the SolarBuddy program.

SolarBuddy provides lights to children and families in developing countries, to help children do their homework and avoid using dangerous kerosene lamps.

Our Year 10s were delighted to show children in Dato Rua how to build the lights. Head of Outdoor Education Sam Maddock said that while electricity was reaching remote areas of East Timor, power use had to be prepaid, meaning it was still too expensive for many people.

Beaconhills students have visited and volunteered in East Timor for many years as part of the Beacon Explorers program.

To all Beaconhills College Relay for Life team members – did you ever wonder exactly how Cancer Council Victoria is using your $50,613 of donations this year?

You’ll be pleased to hear that the funds are being put to good use by The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research.

The Beacon of Hope team donation will help fund a project led by Dr Gemma Kelly, which is investigating the role of the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) in certain types of lymphomas. EBV is associated with a number of human cancers, including lymphomas and carcinomas, contributing to 200,000 cancers annually worldwide.

The researchers have found that in one of the cancers, Burkitt Lymphoma, the virus can express a protein called BHRF1. They are now researching how BHRF1 interacts with cellular proteins to keeps cells alive, contributing to cancer growth and chemotherapy resistance.

The long-term goal is to design a drug against BHRF1 that could treat patients with aggressive lymphoma.

The Cancer Council’s Head of Fundraising and Communication, Andrew Buchanan, said the organisation relied on the generosity of the Victorian community to fund cancer research, prevention programs and support services.

“More than half our income comes from donations, bequests and community fundraisers, like Beaconhills College, who generously raise money to support our work,” he said.

Berwick Campus Visual Arts students created these striking ‘eggshell dragons’ with guest artist Rob Matheson last term at the South Eastern Independent Schools Association (SEISA) Visual Arts Day. The campus hosted 70 students and staff from the six SEISA schools in the region. Media students worked in groups to create a film.