News Archive

Shawnigan celebrated Day of the Dead this week with a moving Chapel service and decorations in the Friesen Centre.

 

Day of the Dead (Día de los Muertos) is celebrated in Mexico and Central America on November 1 and 2, but with students away for November Break starting this Friday, the School marked the special occasion in the Chapel gathering on Wednesday.

 

As Patricio G. explained last week, Day of the Dead is a time to remember family members who have passed on. November 1, el Día de los Santos Inocentes, is a day to remember the souls of children who have passed on. Everyone else is honoured on November 2.

 

One of the biggest choices a Shawnigan student will make at the start of the school year is selecting their 360 option. 360 is Shawnigan’s co-curricular after-school program, and the annual 360 Fair on September 6, the first Friday of the year, gave students an opportunity to check out this year’s offerings – more than 30 in all – before making that all-important selection.

 

360 operates separately from regular classes, but it is still a key aspect of the Shawnigan Journey. It started with a focus on fine arts, but has evolved over the decades to include a wide range of activities, from Figure Skating and Fly Tying to Film Production and Robotics. Some programs run for the full year, while others run for half a year, giving students an opportunity to try out multiple 360s over the year.

 

The end of the school year has given Shawnigan’s musicians, artists and actors several chances to display their talents and the projects they have spent the last few months working on.

 

On Wednesday, June 5, we celebrated our 360 (arts and activities) groups with colours and awards in the Chapel Gathering, followed by the 360 Fair later that afternoon. The fair included performances by the senior and junior rock bands, displays of art and photography, and demonstrations of everything from fly fishing to search and rescue. In the evening, the annual Cabaret featured performances by the Broadway choir and dance crew.

 

Roll out the red carpet for Shawnigan film students!

 

Students in both the curricular and 360 film programs came home from the BC Student Film Festival in Vancouver on May 24 and 25 with a total of three prestigious awards.

 

Curricular film class students Kenzie G., Charlene K., Owen L., Patricio G. and Adam A. won the award for Best Senior PSA for their impactful film Least Expected.

 

The 360 group won Best Junior Documentary for their moving film about Mr. Melvin Gómez, who was Artist in Residence at the School last fall, and Ash B. earned the title of Best Junior Director for the same film.

 

As always, visitors to the Shawnigan campus this spring and summer will be greeted with blooms of every colour in gardens and hanging baskets.

 

There is a twist this year, however, as many of the flowers were grown here at the School by our students. All of the annuals in the gardens and baskets were grown in the Growing Dome, about 3,500 from plugs and 2,500 from seed. Although students have grown vegetables and herbs in the past – and continue to do so – this is the first time they have grown flowers as well, an initiative of Environmental Lead and Horticulturalist Ms. Patricia Hanbidge.

 

It was a historic weekend for Shawnigan at the 2024 VEX Robotics World Championships in Dallas, Texas on April 25-27.

 

The team of Colton B., Martin H., Dave P. and Zach P. achieved the School’s best-ever result at the world championships, placing eighth out of 82 teams in their division and making it through the first round of elimination before bowing out in the quarter-finals. It was also the best result for a school from Vancouver Island in the past decade.

 

With more than 800 teams of four divided into 10 divisions, all packed into Dallas’s Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center, it would have been easy for the Shawnigan students to get caught up in the hectic atmosphere, but they remained focused and professional.

 

Shawnigan’s rising stars of theatre took their talents to a big stage on April 26-28 at the National Star Festival West hosted by Douglas College in Vancouver.

 

“The festival is an opportunity for theatre students to perform in front of their peers, test their skills against an adjudication board with the opportunity to receive recognition, and take workshops in many performing arts fields from instructors across BC,” theatre teacher Mr. Sal Interlandi explained. “It also allows them to meet and see what other performing arts students are doing in other schools.”

 

Four teams of Theatre Company students qualified for nationals through the provincial Star Fest at the University of Victoria last December, where they each performed a single scene from a play: DJ B., Bailey S. and Pascal G. in The Philadelphia by David Ives; Gabe B. and Charlie G. in Lone Star; Reo T. and Aava N. in Fight Over Fuchsia by Lindsay Price; and Talia S. and Sora R. in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard.

 

Students fanned out across the globe over Spring Break – many to their homes both near and far, but some on a variety of School-sponsored trips and tours related to their academic, athletic, and artistic pursuits at Shawnigan.

 

 

Seven students and two staff members flew to Jamaica as part of the EDGE (Engagement, Development, Gratitude and Experience) program, where they took part in projects to improve the lives of children there. They first visited the SOS Children’s Village, a sanctuary for children ages six to 17 who have been separated from their parents. The village houses 40 kids in all, six or seven to a house with an “auntie” who oversees them. The Shawnigan students painted one of the houses, including sanding and preparing the building, and spent three days engaging with the kids.

 

Over an intense three days before Ski Week, the cast and crew of Grease staged four phenomenal performances at the McPherson Playhouse in Victoria, demonstrating boundless talent, imagination, creativity and energy as they took the audience back in time to tell the tale of teenage paramours Sandy Dumbrowski and Danny Zuko, the T-Birds and Pink Ladies, and the rest of Rydell High School in 1959.

 

A stellar cast, with Grade 12s in most of the key roles, rose to the occasion and put on brilliant shows night after night. And it wasn’t just the stars, but the entire cast, who stepped up.

 

Josef J. and Ariel M. starred as Danny Zuko and Sandy Dumbrowski, respectively, returning after taking lead roles in last year’s production of The Addams Family. But they were far from the only standouts in an ensemble cast that also featured outstanding performances from – among others – Georgia G. as Rizzo, Keegan L. as Kenickie (“He killed every night,” said director and co-producer Mr. Salvatore Interlandi), Sharm P. as Marty, Grant N. as Doody, Luke V. as Roger, Emmett N. as Sonny, Clara P. (stepping up in her first and last year at Shawnigan) as Patty, and Grace S. as Frenchy.

 

A mutually beneficial collaboration between Shawnigan Lake School and Cowichan Search and Rescue saw students going over the edge — literally — in a slope rescue scenario at Stoney Hill Regional Park west of Duncan.

 

Nine students, three Cowichan SAR members and two Shawnigan staff members took part in the session, the 10th of 16 sessions the School SAR team is conducting with Cowichan SAR this year.

 

“Upon returning from Ski Week we will complete our sessions, still focusing on rope rescue but also adding in aspects of swiftwater rescue, such as throw bagging, foot entrapment procedures, and what live bait rescues entail,” explained Outdoor Education Coordinator Ms. Jessica Dick.

 

Shawnigan’s robotics program earned its first tournament win of the season last weekend, and the victorious team is hoping to build on that success in a bid to reach the VEX Robotics World Championship.

 

The team of Kathryn Y., Esme L., JD P. and Zekai L. brought home the top prize from the tournament at Claremont Secondary School in Victoria, the third of five tournaments this year, and Shawnigan’s first win since the 2022-23 season opener at Shawnigan in November 2022.

 

After the first two tournaments of the year, the Shawnigan team was more familiar with this year’s game, VEX Robotics Over Under, and was better able to prepare for the competition this time.

 

Tiny Adirondack chairs produced by Shawnigan’s senior woodworking class will add some homemade whimsy to the Montessori preschool on campus and help enhance the relationship between the School and the youngsters.

 

The woodworking class explored batch production techniques and processes during the project, teacher Mr. Declan Bartlett explained.

 

“A major part of good woodworking is planning and preparation,” he said. “By understanding a systems approach to guaranteeing quality, students were able to frame the project as a series of attainable steps that they could focus on, divide the labour and track the progress of the build.”