This week in The Vine…

• Principals Report - Parent investment in education
• Devotion - Amazing generosity again!
• Lost property
• MS Read-a-thon
• VCE Music Solo Performance  Recital - June 24
• Careers

Congratulations  to Taneka, Rebecca, Chelsea H and Chelsea D for fantastic results in the Glenbrae Equestrian Centre - Showjumping Day.  Your stellar effort saw Oxley placed third, a fantastic result against ‘equestrian schools’ with larger numbers of competitors.  Well done girls!

Download: The Vine - Edition 8 - 2008 (1.6mb)

Students from Oxley College have dug deep in an appeal to raise funds for those who have been traumatized by the cyclone in Burma (Myanmar) and the earthquake in Sichuan Province, China.

The response from the school community has been incredibly generous. In only one week students and families have raised $15,926.  With stories such as these repeated throughout the school: John Zhu in Grade 5 played his violin at Chirnside Park shopping centre and raised $112.20 which he donated. One family with two children, one in Prep and the other in Grade 1, decided to give all of their savings and birthday money to the appeal, a total of $70.00.

At an assembly the Oxley students were addressed by Mrs Thangi Dal, a school parent who migrated to Australia with her family from Burma and Zing Ran Huang (Russ), a Chinese International student, who actually lived in the Sichuan Province before coming to Australia. Both speakers told of their anguish and their burning desire to see their people helped through financial aide.

“The Oxley College community has always been very generous towards others in need and for this reason, we are mindful not to appeal for money too often” said Oxley College Chaplain, Pastor David Burt.  “Last year we aimed to raise $12,000.00 in 12 months so that we could build a pre-school in Cambodia. Amazingly, we raised $14,000.00 dollars in four months. This pre-school will be constructed in June and July, 2008.”

All money raised will be put straight to work through the Samaritan’s Purse International Aid Organisation who have access and approval to work in both countries.

Oxley College is a Christian School in Chirnside Park, Melbourne East - Committed to Excellence in Christian Education!

Semester 1 Exam Timetable for Year 7 - 11 is now available.

Download: Semester 1 Exam Timetable

Congratulations to the Unit 3 Drama class of 2008!

On the evening of Thursday 22nd May, the Unit 3 Drama students (comprising eleven Yr 12 students and two Yr 11 students), performed their Drama ensembles.

The theme of the work was ‘multiculturalism’, incorporating stories of people emigrating to other lands. The main stimulus for the work was the beautiful wordless book, ‘The Arrival’, by Shaun Tan. The 3 plays showed great diversity in approach and content. Particularly, satire and symbolism were used to great effect.

This is the students’ major VCE group Drama project for the year. It is totally self devised by the students, and requires careful research, enormous creativity and a high degree of teamwork. Needless to say, it is a demanding task but the students worked very hard and rose to the task exceedingly well.

We were treated to a terrific night’s entertainment. We laughed lots, we cried, we were spellbound. Our heartiest congratulations once again to these students for a wonderful evening - you did yourselves and Oxley, proud.

What amazing Drama students we have!

On Wednesday the 21st of May at 11.00am, Oxley College was one of over 300 Public, Specialist and School Libraries across Australia to take part in National Simultaneous Storytime 2008.

Mrs Kamphuis-Gall capitivated over 40 junior school students with her enthusiastic reading of the delightful story – ‘Arthur’. Grades 1- 4 had the unique experience of participating in this event held during “Library and Information Week”. Students later had the opportunity to make their own “Arthur” or other characters from the book.

Now in its eighth year, National Simultaneous Storytime aims to celebrate and acknowledge the vital work being done in libraries, schools and communities around Australia in the development of young people’s literacy and numeracy skills.

In 2008 Arthur will be celebrating 20 years of paperback publication.

Last Wednesday the whole school community celebrated the National Day of Thanksgiving by giving thanks to God for our mothers. Around 1000 students gathered together in the new stadium for a ‘Mega Chapel’ where Junior and Senior Chapel bands combined to lead the worship. Pastor Dave interviewed a panel of three mums and asked them what the best and worst things about being a mother were. The Grade 6 photography group had produced a fantastic power point presentation featuring photographs of many school mums with their children at Open Day. The main theme of the Chapel was that mothers give us an idea of the unconditional love that God has for us.

Our preps made special ceramic cups to give to their mums on Mothers day. It seems we have a problem with many mothers coming in to try and get a sneak peak before the day. Luckily Mr. Gahan hides them away safely! Thank you to all of our Oxley mums for all that you do for your children and for the contributions you make to the community of Oxley College. We hope you had a very special day!

On Saturday the 3rd of May 2008, Oxley College held it’s annual Open Day, with the school entering in to exhibition mode for its parents, visitors and the wider community to visit and appreciate what Oxley has to offer.  The day, running on the theme “The right pieces, the right fit…”, allowed for parents and visitors to listen to school choirs and concert bands, take part in science experiments, watch demonstration lessons and view many displays of student work. With fantastic weather and much to see, Open Day was a great success, with much of the credit going to the students who volunteered their time to help as ambassadors.

As a part of the ‘Right pieces, right fit…’ theme, visitors had the opportunity to win a laptop computer (kindly donated by Retravision - Chirnside Park) by collecting puzzle pieces from locations around the school and by submitting an entry form. We are please to announce that the winner, randomly drawn from over 200 entries is: Kailey Marchione (Grade 4). Congratulations Kailey, we hope you enjoy your new laptop and that it is of benefit to you as you continue your education at Oxley.

Many thanks to all of the parents and other helpers who made Open Day such a great day, we couldn’t do it with out you!

( Photo: Mrs. Sally Broadley (Principal) and Kailey Marchione )

As you would now be aware, Oxley College has a brand new website. The new site is designed to be more user friendly and more informative to our school community.

New features of the website include:

• User friendly navigation
• An Enrolment section for easy access to information regarding new enrolments
• A News section, providing our community with updates on school life ( News items, sports results etc.)
• ‘The Vine’, our college newsletter is now available to download online
• A new Past Students section
• Photo album
• Honour roll
• …. and more.

Please take the time to explore the site and inform us of your thoughts. Over time the look and feel of the website will change, but in the mean time we hope the current site is better at providing you with the information you require.

We gladly welcome any feedback you may have regarding the new site. Please email development@oxley.vic.edu.au

Matt Daly (Development Officer)

It is just a beautiful concept. To see the faces of children so full of joy”…

A group of eight students and two teachers from Oxley College visited Cambodia in January 2008. They were there to distribute thousands of Christmas presents as part of Operation Christmas Child, to orphans and needy children who would have otherwise gone without.

Students from Oxley College and members of Life Ministry Centre, filled over 500 shoeboxes during 2007. Filled with toys and more practical items, shoeboxes collected from around Australia were distributed throughout remote villages in Cambodia, Vietnam, Fiji, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands.

This is the third year that Oxley has sent a delegation of staff and students to assist the international relief agency, Samaritans Purse with their Operation Christmas Child project. Each child receives something to play with, write with, eat, wear and wash with. Many boxes also contain personal letters and photographs from the sender.

Mrs. Karin Baker, Head of Junior School at Oxley College said, “It is just a beautiful concept. To see the faces of children so full of joy as they open their shoeboxes, is truly special. The children can’t believe that someone would care enough to send them a personal gift for Christmas. It is amazing to see how something so small can make such a big difference.”

Year 10 Oxley students visited packing headquarters in Mornington during October to help check boxes collected from around Australia to ensure each child received an equally significant present. They then helped repack and organise the boxes for shipping.

The team of ten delegates spent ten days in Cambodia distributing the shoeboxes and helping with maintenance tasks in local orphanages and schools.

http://www.samaritanspurse.org/