Dear Parents, Caregivers and Friends of St Mary’s School,

Last week I was lucky enough to accompany the senior class on their annual camp. This year it was a winter camp with winter alpine activities a major focus.

As always it is a real privilege to watch the development of our pupils over the week attempting and
succeeding at challenges which at first overawed them.

It is the real nature of outdoor education that makes it so important in our pupils overall education. Too much of what young people do now days is done in a virtual or contrived sense. Reality shows are not real they are stage managed to appeal to popular myths and conceptions. There is nothing contrived in tramping or luging or sailing. In skiing if you don’t have the correct technique and skill then you fall and you hit the ground. If you are faced with getting from point A to point B without falling then you problem solve, you improvise, you use what skills and equipment you have to reach the desired outcome.

Technology is a tool albeit a powerful one, but a tool none the less. Tools require a person using them who: knows what he is trying to achieve, how to use the tool and which type of tool is best. Michelangelo didn’t use a screwdriver to carve David, he used the appropriate tools, he obviously had great skill and he knew what he was trying to achieve.

One of the key factors for success in life is resilience; that is getting up when you are knocked down.

People who succeed in any field know that they wont always win. Sometimes you lose or aren’t selected. Some people at this stage quit or move on but winners refocus and re evaluate. Set new goals and move forward. I have mentioned before about my daughter Grace and her success in hockey and she has achieved a lot for someone so young. But the thing I am most proud about are the two major times that things have not gone her way. The two times she wasn’t selected in teams. She put the obvious disappointment behind her said I’m in the development team and I’m going to do the best for that team. She did and proved her doubters wrong. But more importantly she showed resilience and proved to herself that she was able to overcome adversity.

Have a great week

—Mike