There is no doubt that the highlight of the term was Chad le Clos’ Olympic Gold Medal which captured the imagination of the School community and indeed the whole of the country. The School gates at the top of Wandsbeck Road were painted gold to mark the historic occasion of Westville’s first old boy to achieve an Olympic win, and the School basked in Chad’s glory for weeks after his return.
There were a number of other events which we celebrated this term. The high quality and creativity of the School’s Visual Arts students was again evident at the Matric Art Exhibition thereby confirming our status as a national leader in this field. Our 1st Cricket team produced immaculate results at the Graaf-Reinet festival against top class opposition from other parts of the country, while our 1st Golf team again entrenched itself as one of the top schools in the country with its high placing in the Dainfern event. Our level of meaningful community outreach was taken to new heights through the Kwantabeni project on Saturday mornings which involves a number of motivated Grade 11 pupils.
The 3rd term is also the time when the Matric Trials examinations are held. The results this year were a cause for concern, especially at the lower end of the rank order, but we trust that the last-minute consolidation by the under-achievers will lead to improvement in the National Senior Certificate examinations.
Other matters which received our considerable attention were dealing with the misinformation surrounding the provincial Admissions Policy saga, and addressing the challenges of decreased State funding in the setting of school fees.
This edition of the Chimes covers more details on these and other stories, and I trust that you will enjoy reading these. My thanks go to all our Chimes sponsors for their on-going support which enables us to cover all the costs of this publication.
