Lentern Appeal: Marist can collection

Marist delivered the goods over Lent with a can collection for local food banks. The School collected 3811 cans. Marist accounted for 1039!!A new 'one day' record of 820 cans helped us place second in the tally. An incredible effort backed by some ingenious, clever planning from our leaders. Jason Jarvis floated the idea of a bbq. This was backed and organised by the students who are also members of the 'Young Vinnies'. The bbq was supported by Miranda (St Pat's catering) who persuaded local suppliers 'Active Marketing' and 'French Maid' to donate product. This enable the students to raise enough to purchase over 300 cans from New World, Lower Hutt (through Mrs Law's connections).'

Another example of Marist quality.

Cross-Country

We struggled again in the cross-Country due mostly to the large number of boys who finished at the end of the tail.

Standouts were once again: J Clegg, winning Yr 10 and S Smith coming second in Year 11

Top Photo: Gerard Faitoa making his way around the course.
Bottom photo: Jeremy Clegg nailing the Year 10 race.

Athletics & swimming

House Athletics, was, once again, a disappointment. Our participation inproved; due largely to our Year 13s leading the way, motivating and organising the juniors. Unfortunately, a number of Year 11 and 12 did not participate as fully as expected. A number of Maristians completed valiantly in the finals on Wednesday evening and a number made Old Boys. Josh Kurton, Mealofa Lauvi, Jerome Betham, Jeremy Clegg, Shaun Smith, Patrick Carson, Attila Ropati-Va'a, Aniseko Sio, Durran Misa, Gareth Hitchman, Henry Walsh, Jake Johnston and Gerarg Farrell all contested passionately at Newtown Park.

The Next big event is the swimming champs this week. Full participation should ensure success.

Welcome back. It's 2009 and Marist have hit the ground running. Marist's rich vein of leaders has been recognised with the appointment of Attila Ropati-Va'a as Head Boy and Vincent Ringrose as Head of House and Head of Special Character. The College has created new positions: heads of the four pillars of Stream: Special Character, Academic, Sport and Cultural. The Houses have realigned their councils in the whole-school model and Marist has eight Year 13s leading the way. Vincent and Jerome Betham head up Special Character. Gerard Farrell and Dylan Van Opdorp lead Academic. Dan Close and Dan Walkin lead Cultural and Tom Asin and Taiso Silafai-Leaana.

A large number of seniors have already taken the lead and have been modeling our values and standards in their everyday actions.

Marist Men Annihilate Gallagher

Just like the Mcleod Cup several weeks before, Marist House affirmed their status as the School's primary public speaking House in the Senior Oratory Competitions for the Gallagher and Meo Cups.

The Meo Cup is for intermediate Oratory (Years 10 and 11) and it was hotly contest by 5 talented orators. Two of these were from Marist House, James Scoon and Nethran Pathmanathan, and they both received placings. James Scoon came Third, with a speech on the Parihaka movement. Nethran won the Meo Cup, with a speech on the Boxing Day tsunami of 2004. The adjudicator mentioned this speech's true oratical appeal and Nethran's technique that allowed to him to really move his audience.

The Gallagher Cup, the School's oldest award (first being presented in 1924, when both Town and Stream were still combined), was contested by four students. One Marist student entered the competition, House Leader Richard Law. He spoke about genetic screening and the rights of the disabled in society. Richard ended up winning the competion, which according to the adjudicator, was very close indeed.

Mr. Watterson, House Dean, was visibly excited when he found out that Marist Men had won both competitions, despite needing to ask what oratory was to begin with. Of course he then went away to tell anyone who would listen that it is another example of Marist House proving themselves as the finest

Marist Dominate McLeod Cup

Marist men dominated the McLeod Cup prepared speech contested today. Three of the four competitors were Maristians: Richard Law, Nethran Pathmanathan and James Scoon.
Richard won the competition and James placed second: another example of the abilities and commitment of our Marist lads.

Answering Mary's Call - House Singing Champions!

Friday the 4th of July saw Marist House awaiting eagerly to take the stage in the House Singing competition.

We had just come through a bunch of frustrating 2nd places to Trinity House... second in weekly notes for term 2... second in House Indoor Football...

Marist needed to win to take out the term and finally overtake Chanel House in its death throes.

Marist had prepared thoughouly to win both the small group performance and the hymn competition.

The group would perform 'Apologise', origonally performed by Timbalanf ft. One Republic. Practices had been going well and the group, with the House behind them every step of the way, felt confident.

The House as a whole would perform 'Mary's Call', which is an adjusted version of 'Ireland's Call'. Mr Jarvis changed a few of the words and lines in the song to make it relevant toMarist House and Silverstream. A very detailed 'plan of attack' was drawn up as to how we would move onto the stage to sing the song. Marist, breaking the trend followed by the other, less inspired houses, decided to use the back door of the auditorium and apprach the stage from the side entrance by the music rooms. Led by Marist seniors Matthew Williams, Michael Williams, Kyle Htchman, Anthonie Clement, Ethan Merritt, Jason Woodward, Jamie Robinson and Dale Pavis-Hall, the house arranged into a staggered formation, with junior Marist Men seated or kneeling, and seniors standing on the stage and on bleachers behind them. This would create some sort of sound shell. The plan pulled off flawlessly. The groups performed their respective events and watched the other houses carefully. We all knew it would be a close contest, as all the houses exhibited sound (excuse the pun) performances in all their events.

The judges were left to deliberate.

First up was the group performance. Patrick House was marked down strongly for the way several of their members conducted themselves on stage, but Marist was nervous as to how Trinty had performed in the eyes of the judges. Mr Cole amde a comment about how Trinity suffered from using singers that "looked like they didn't really want to be there..."
But how had Marist done?

The results for the group performance were:
3rd= Chanel & Trinity
2nd Patrick
1st Marist
Cheers erupted from Marist, we had won one of two, but the House Song remained to be seen.

The judges made comments about entrance onto the stage, how far back singers were standing, and how they were looking for a house that actually sung, rather than chanted. Marist was absolutely silent, waiting for the announcements.

The results were as follows:
4th Patrick
3rd Chanel
2nd Marist
1st Trinity

However, due to Trinity's relatively poor performance the group section, Marist was first overall! Now, by a very narrow margin, Marist is in the lead of the House Competition; we had won term 2! This is an accomplishemt that every Marist Man can feel proud of and know that they were an indidspensable part.