Dancers Entertain at Eden Park

Last Saturday, our very own MAGS Megacrew performed at the All Blacks v South Africa rugby game at Eden Park.
They were part of the halftime show – an organised performance with live singers and dancers. MAGS was one of four schools selected for the dance section of the performance.
HOD Dance Ms French said, "The students learnt the entire performance set a week prior and were brilliant on the field. It was an incredible opportunity for our dancers to be involved in a performance of that size with such a huge crowd."
As the winners of the Blueprint schools dance competition, MAGS Megacrew has been asked to perform at the inaugural Kahurangi dance awards ceremony to take place tomorrow at 7pm at the Four Winds Theatre at Due Drop Events Centre in Manukau.
If you would like to come and see them perform, tickets can be purchased from Eventfinda here

Students Rostered Home Next Week

Further to the industrial action of 20 August, many will be aware that the employment matters between the PPTA and the Government are unresolved, and there will be more industrial action next week. 

Rostering Home of Year Levels: The following advises of nationwide rostering home of different year levels as follows:

Monday, 15 Sept – Years 12 & 13
Tuesday, 16 Sept – Year 11
Wednesday, 17 Sept – Year 10
Thursday, 18 Sept – Year 9

This action means that teachers will neither teach nor set work for students on the days that their particular year level is nominated to be rostered home.
Any students rostered home are encouraged to complete outstanding work and Years 11/12/13 are strongly encouraged to continue to revise their subject materials in preparation for their NZQA exams that begin Tuesday, 4 November.
While YR12 and YR13 students will not yet have received feedback for their school practice exams, many will have an appreciation of where there is more work to be done.

New Student BOT Representative

Year 12 student Francesca-Eti Tonu’u has been elected as the new Student Representative on our Board of Trustees.
Within school, she is involved across all our pillars, immersed in numerous clubs, classes and extra-curricular activities, and is proud of the community within our school.
"The common denominator I find across all of these is that if students are supported, they will excel.
"Outside of school, I collaborate with public figures involved in positions of governance and public policy to bring the youth perspective to be considered for better outcomes for youth.
"Students are the focal point of MAGS and I believe that prioritising their wellbeing, addressing their needs and committing to supporting them should be a priority of those who govern our school. Every student experiences school in different capacities and every experience should be accounted for. While all students are unique, all students are capable of excelling."

Two Teams in Top 5 of National Geography Quiz

MAGS teams have finished 2nd and fifth-equal in the National Maatangi Whenua Year 11 Geography competition.
In August, MAGS Team 2 won the Auckland Central region round of the competition, with MAGS Team 1 coming in second.
The teams then had to wait for results from the other regions to see where they placed on the national leaderboard. King’s High School in Dunedin edged out MAGS Team 2, but with two teams in the top 5 out of 126 teams nationwide, that is an impressive result for our quizzers: MAGS Team 2 (Adam Gregg, Luke Bannan and Alex Cawsey) and MAGS Team 1 (Isabelle Kubala, Dhruvi Patel and Sudais Noman).
The Maatangi Whenua competition challenges students across rounds including map skills, Aotearoa knowledge, current events, and 3D modelling.

From the Archives: 75 Years Ago (Part 1)

Next year, the 23^rd Commonwealth Games are due to be held in Glasgow.
These Games were originally called the Empire Games, and were held in Auckland in early February 1950 following a 12-year hiatus caused by the Second World War.
The main stadium was Eden Park but other venues included the Auckland Town Hall (for boxing and wrestling), the Drill Hall (fencing), Lake Karapiro (rowing) and the Newmarket Olympic Pool (swimming). Western Springs was used for cycling events and for the closing ceremony.  

In 1950 here were only 12 nations competing and New Zealand was third on the medal table after Australia and England. The 1950 Albertian records the names of 18 former students who competed across a number of sports. Perhaps the most notable are:
Peter Hanan (1930-31) – Captain of the swimming team and New Zealand’s flag bearer (as pictured above, and at right competing in 1937 at the interprovincial championships).
John Holland (1940-44) – Silver medal in the 440 yards hurdles.
Fred Lucas (1945-49) – Bronze Medals in the 1650 yards freestyle and 440 yards freestyle.
The rowing eight, which was narrowly beaten by Australia, comprised five former students – Kerry Ashby (1943-46), Murray Ashby (1944-47), Thomas Engel (1942-45), Grahame Jarratt (1942-45) and Bill Tinnock (1945-47.)
Perhaps the best known was Arthur Lydiard (1931-1932), who came 12^th in the marathon.
Two others deserve special mention. Charles Cleal (1935-39) was organising secretary for the whole games, and Herb Towers (on the staff from 1922 to 1978) was a member of the Organising Committee and Manager of the Athletic Events. He may also have been responsible for measuring the track at Eden Park though this still awaits confirmation.
For further coverage of the 1950 event please visit here

– Greg Cave, Archivist

Three members of the New Zealand Eight were in the 1946 MAGS crew, pictured above, which won the Head of the Harbour. In this photo, Kerry and Murray Ashby are believed to be in the second and third seats from the top of the photo.

Physio Vacancy at MAGS

More Disruptions on Rail Network

There are more planned rail closures through the school holidays and throughout the rest of the year as the opening of the City Rail Link gets closer, necessitating essential track upgrades across the rail network.
You can see the summary of these partial and full closures on the AT website here