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Dear College Parents
“You’re braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think”: Winnie the Pooh
There is a very different rhythm to the school as all the boys are well into their mid-year exams. The rain on Sunday night and Monday was fantastic and we hope that the dams in the catchment areas also received substantial inflows.
Bishops Future Fitting Documents
Over the past two years we have worked tirelessly towards developing a Bishops Future Fitting Document that is geared to the Bishops environment and which commits us as a school to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in a practical way. This document is the outcome of many hours of research, consultation and collaboration and we can be proud of the final “Future-Fitting Bishops” framework and policy statement.
Following the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership Conference at Bishops in 2018, the Future Fitting document has been updated with a new pillar to include social diversity, transformation and inclusion, which we term social sustainability. This is in line with the SDGs and with the understanding that without meaningful social transformation, the school and society is not sustainable.
The Bishops Council, Executive teams, staff and boys are committed to this programme and we challenge every member of our community to fully embrace this initiative. Please follow this link to the website which highlights this very important strategic initiative: https://college.bishops.org.za/FutureFitting/
German Measles
We have a few boys who have recently contracted German Measles. Please monitor your son as early detection is essential to prevent spreading.
2018 School Magazine
To all those who ordered a hard copy of the 2018 school magazine and were invoiced on their 4th term’s invoice 2018, please note that your sons have been asked to collect their copy from reception. Please remind them to do so.
Social Media
The appropriate use of social media continues to be a problem for many of our boys, and indeed for all of us! There has been much discussion and screen time about this at our PA meetings. The BSU and the PA have facilitated a gaming workshop and a social media presentation respectively for parents this year. At our PA meeting on Monday evening, our Director of IT, Sally Bowes, and Head of Life Orientation, Bev Morris, came to the meeting to inform the PA about the safety measures in place at the school and what the boys are actually taught in LO and other subjects about the “good, the bad and the ugly” of social media use.
The PA were suitably impressed and suggested that in my newsletters we highlight what we are doing and give some advice to parents.
This week our advice is that you get the message to your boys that the cellphone belongs to you. You have given it to them to use, but you own it as you have paid and continue to pay for its monthly contract. This gives you the right to take it and inspect it at any time. We know that boys hide inappropriate content behind icons which you will not recognise. If an icon requests a password when it is clicked, it may not be what it appears!
Emma Sadleir, a social media expert, has excellent advice: when wondering about what is and isn’t appropriate to post on social media, always bear the 5 Ps in mind and ask yourself if you are happy for these people to view your post. (Principal, Parents, Police, Potential employee, Predator). Remember that what you post online is like a tattoo- it is there forever.
It is a fairly quiet weekend, with hockey against Pinelands and a weekend break for our soccer and rugby players.
Please see the following attachments: Assembly Notices, Principal’s Assembly Message, Bird Identification Course and Mad4Waves.
Yours sincerely
Guy Pearson
PRINCIPAL
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