T3 HORIZONS 2017

Board Chair Report
Being a bit of a “laat lammetjie”
compared to my two brothers, I
have been visiting The Ridge School
for most of my life. As a young child
I remember the current Rose field
having no grass on it at all, a cricket
mat was used for the pitch and
the pavilion was a three sided tin
shed. Even when I left the school
in 1981 our standard 6 (Grade 8)
classroom, yes they offered it in
those days, was a semi-tin, semibrick
building with a woodwork
studio as the entrance to our actual
classroom.
The point is that over the years
that I have visited the school its facilities
have changed substantially.
Today we have a campus that is the
product of some excellent Governors
who had a vision, followed
through, and delivered something
that The Ridge alma-mater can be
proud of when they re-connect
with our school.
It is clear that the way young children,
in our case boys, are taught
is evolving. STEAM is a great example
of this! We are proud of the
fact that other schools are coming
to our school to understand how
we have successfully implemented
STEAM into the Grade 5 curriculum
this year. STEAM, which combines
Science, Technology, Engineering,
Art and Maths, is “taught”
across three lesson times, has no
formal assessment, is overseen
by four teachers simultaneously
and the classes are broken down
into sub-groups. Quite a change
from the way my older sons were
taught at The Ridge - and they left
the school as recently as 2014 and
2016 respectively.
We are acutely aware that there is
a pre-requisite that Grade 7 boys
impress prospective high schools
with academic assessments and
the likes, but the point is that the
way boys are taught will require
more flexibility going forward. The
current Junior Prep building has
done an adequate job to date, but
looking towards the future this is
highly unlikely to be the case. Certainly
every possible tweak, tuck
and extension that the architects
could think of has taken place since
it was built in 1973 and extended
in 1988. We are really looking forward
to the completion of the new
Junior Prep building which will provide
our boys and teachers with an
incredible facility that will enable
many Ridge boys to fully benefit
from the evolution of education for
decades to come.
The new JP building is on track to
get underway as soon as school
breaks up in December this year,
with the contractor having been
appointed this week, and the keys
for the temporary facility having already
been handed over.
The Ridge School 4 Horizons Term 3 2017