Nor'West News: September 30, 2021

6 Thursday September 30 2021
Latest Canterbury news at starnews.co.nz
NOR’WEST NEWS
Leaders in Learning
Well done to the BHS Community!
Kia ora whānau
Kia kaha, kia mau, kia haere tonu:
Stay strong, hold fast, keep on course.
This is our school mantra for 2021. We adjust and adapt to
living in a COVID environment, endeavouring to make the best
of the situation we find ourselves in.
How quickly things change. Term 3 began at Alert Level 1,
almost with a sense of normalcy. Learning, events, competitions
proceeded as usual. Then, overnight, on 18 August we were
at Alert Level 4. The 16 school days of lockdown brought the
challenges of online learning and forced the cancellation or
postponement of many key school events. I know a lot of the
school community were disappointed by the cancellation of
Winter Sports Tournament week, the National Big Sing finale
and South Island Cadenza, Drama and Dance competitions to
name a few.
Thankfully, we have returned to school at Delta 2 from
9 September. No school assemblies can be held. The Senior
School exams, which provide a practice exam situation for
students plus provide evidence for derived grades if needed,
were moved until late this term. NZQA announced that the
NCEA exam period will start two weeks later, to give senior
students more time with their teachers. This affected our
Term 4 calendar. Winter sports activities have restarted with a
shortened season; and we were very pleased that the Year 13
Formal could be moved into Term 4.
I do want to thank the students, the staff, and whānau for the
way they responded to the lockdown; and for the way that they
have now returned to school under restrictions, making the
very best of the situation we are in.
Our challenge as a nation right now is to stop the spread of
Delta in our communities. We have shown our determination
and strength of character as Kiwis before; and we can do
it again. Yes, we might be frustrated and anxious, but let’s
continue to all do our bit, and follow the government’s clear
instructions. We have so much to be grateful for; and let’s not
forget all those people in Auckland who have borne the brunt
of this outbreak.
Things will work out well!
Ngā mihi nui
Phil Holstein
Principal
Burnside High School
Outstanding Sporting Achievements
We are in the process of archiving past/present Burnside High School
students/staff members who have excelled in their sporting field.
This may be by either representing their country (age grades or
elite level), attaining national titles, or an outstanding achievement
as an athlete or in a management position. Once completed these
achievements will be displayed on an Honours Board within the
school.
Could you please paste this link: https://bit.ly/BHS_SPORT_GREATS
into your browser to complete the form. Please share this information
to anyone who may be helpful. Thank you for your time.
Helen Townsend (Tnh@burnside.school.nz)
Uniform Shop
The Burnside High
School PTA Uniform
Shop is situated in
A Block, adjacent to the
staff car park off Greers
Road. The shop stocks
a full range of new
uniform items along
with second hand items.
Opening Hours are
Monday lunchtime
1.00-2.00pm and
Tuesday after school
2.45-4.00pm.
Payment is by cash, eftpos and debit card only - no credit cards.
https://www.burnside.school.nz/uniform/
New Zealand Programming
Competition Success 2021
Burnside’s top team Steve++
The New Zealand Programming contest ran on Saturday 11th of September as an online
event just one week after our second lockdown ended. Burnside teams got together at
our own school with four teams coming to use the school lab.
The national event had 32 High School teams from all over NZ and a similar number of
Tertiary student teams competing with the same problems at the same time.
Burnside’s top team “steve++” consisting of Nicholas Grace, Isaac Siu and Hanan Fokkens
took first place in the High School grade with 342 points; an awesome total, managing to
answer all but one of the increasingly complex questions in the five hour competition.
This is Burnside High Schools 2nd year in a row winning the competition and we’re
continuing to develop a strong tradition of success.
The other teams from Burnside had some success also with a team consisting of Year
12 programmers coming in 4th overall. “Steven Script” who were leading earlier in the
competition scored really highly and students Matthew Mercer, Jacky Zhang and Tim
Fisher-Taylor should be very pleased with their final result.
Grady Kenix competed as a solo programmer ending up in 23rd place, another
impressive result considering he had to answer all the questions himself Ricky Chen and
Shivam Shankar, two Year 10 students had a great result, ending up in 19th place in the
first ever NZ Programming Contest.
The programming club has lots more students in training for these teams and we are
looking forward to continued success in competitive programming in the following years.
Office Hours 7am-5pm weekdays. Please telephone (03) 358 8383 for all enquiries. www.burnside.school.nz