Month: October 2012

Northwood’s Grade 11s joined businesses around Durban for Work Experience from 26 to 28 September 2012 to gain some practical knowledge of the work environment.  This annual event forms part of the young men’s Life Orientation Careers curriculum.  The learners were encouraged to select a company that offers opportunities closely related to their future career interests.

The boys were exposed to a wide range of careers and the hosting institutions were incredibly accommodating, going to great lengths to ensure the Northwood students would make well informed tertiary choices.  As Joshua Janse van Rensburg, who visited SiVEST explained, “It gave me a better idea of what the different types of engineering are about”.

 

At Speech Day on 12 October 2012, after our prize winners had been given their trophies, the new Student Leader’s were announced.  The Headboy is Matthew de Sousa who will have the support of his Deputies: Yastheel Devnarrian, Simon du Plessis, Sakhile Mazibuko and Dale van der Merwe.

Northwood are very proud of Philani Thusini, a Grade 11 learner, who came second in a province-wide Financial Literacy Speech contest held on Wednesday 19 September 2012 in Esikhawini. The event attracted entries from 1500 schools throughout KZN and he ended up a mere one point behind the winner at the finals, in front of the MEC of Finance, Mrs Cronje, and the HOD of Education. Philani received a thunderous applause for his speech on Financial Planning. He concluded his speech by saying, “Failing to plan is planning to fail” which was then quoted by the honourable MEC Ina Cronje in her closing address! His prizes included a full bursary for a diploma in Information Technology with PC Training and Business College, a laptop, an 80cm flatscreen TV, a DVD player and a Postbank account with R300. The school was also awarded a monitor.

Northwood are very proud of their U15 team who, having beaten Glenwood Boys High School, Westville Boys high School, Michaelhouse and Durban High School, in the pool games at the Top 10 Waterpolo Tournament held at Kingspark recently , went on to beat Kearsney 7 – 4 in the semi final and eventually, in a very tense final, concluded beat Clifton 2 – 1 to become the Top Ten winners of 2012.

Northwood  would also like to congratulate the following pupils who have been selected for KZN Waterpolo Teams (l-r):  Clayton Holland(U15), Brandon Mottram (U15),  Ryan Symington (U15) and Dean Fouche (U16). These teams will compete in the SA Schools Water Polo Tournament to be held in Port Elizabeth in December.

Northwood was one of eighteen schools from around the country invited to the prestigious Oppenheimer Michaelmas Cricket Week hosted by Maritzburg College recently.  They saw themselves up against Pretoria Boys High School , Afrikaanse Hoër Seunskool (Affies), St David’s Marist Inanda, Sandton and Grey College, Bloemfontein (Grey Bloem) during the Festival.  Northwood had a very good win over St Davids and were the only side to bowl the powerful Grey Bloem side out .  Pretoria Boys , Affies and Grey Bloem remained unbeaten throughout the four days.

At the end of the tournament the Northwood Boys were congratulated on the way they conducted themselves in a letter from the organisers that stated,  “ It was an absolute pleasure hosting Northwood and the boys bowled us over with their good manners and behaviour. At the end of the festival they came to thank and shake hands with us, and we were touched by this gesture.  Northwood was one of only two teams to do so – the other being Westlake from New Zealand.  You can certainly be proud of them – they were true ambassadors to their school.”

Back l-r: Jonathan Scruby, Wesley Maritz, Dale van der Merwe, John Riekert, Jason Wessels, Chris Holmes, Sereshin Moodley, Rawdon Capell, Andrew Proctor and Grant Hodnett

Front l-r: Nazeer Jaffar, Justin Govender, Dale Moolman, Bevan Williams and Jason Forge

 

The Northwood Brass Band, made up entirely of school boys, has played at three high profile events over as many weeks.

Mrs Gail Teunissen, the Headmistress of Addington Primary School, and an educator of 42 years experience, was paraded into the school and serenaded by the Northwood drummers to mark her retirement on Tuesday 31 July 2012.  This was a bitter-sweet affair, celebrating the incredible life of service “Mrs T” has given to the school and community.

There was little room to rest as eleven of the band members moved straight into rehearsal for the Corobrick Orchestra 2012, performance held on Sunday 5 August – a massed orchestra put together every year at UKZN Westville, under the baton of well-known conductor Richard Cock. A challenging program including classical and popular pieces, allowed the band boys to really show their talent, and earned the band and Northwood a commendation from the Maestro himself.

As if this wasn’t enough, the whole band joined forces with the Brass Band from Ferrum High in Newcastle on 11 August 2012, to perform at the well-supported Highland Games up at Fort Nottingham in the KZN Midlands. Performing both marching and concert displays, the combined band performed incredibly well, giving a great showing next to the SA Army Band and the KZN Pipe Bands, even receiving an invitation to perform at the annual “Music from Scotland” evening at the end of September.  The band ended a very successful weekend with a snowball fight on the way home.

Stedon Venter, in grade 11 at Northwood, fought his way into the South African Judo Team on Friday, 10 August 2012. He will be representing his country at the Junior African Championships to be held in Botswana in October 2012.

Update:

Stedon came 4^th against 11 other countries at the Junior African Championships held in Botswana in August and has been selected to represent South Africa at the Zone Six Youth Games to be held in Lusaka, Zambia from 04 December to 17 December 2012.

 

On Friday 17 August the Northwood chess team competed in the Durban and Districts High School Chess League Finals held at Clifton. On the day of the tournament, the boys made a conscious decision to bring the trophy home with one of the boys saying, “It’s Mr Jordan’s last year and we are taking the trophy for him!” Compared to Glenwood Boys High School’s team of ten, which included five grade 12 boys and an additional five reserves, the Northwood Chess Team appeared inexperienced.

The team of three grade 11’s, two grade 10’s, two grade 9’s and three new grade 8 players surprised Glenwood, in the third round, with a victory of 34 out of 40 and a three point lead. After Round 3, the tournament director (Glenwood’s Mr Jonathan Bentham) decided that Northwood was the clear cut winner and that there was no need to have more than four rounds. He also made a point of mentioning that it took ten years for Northwood to beat them!

The final results were as follows: Round 1 – Northwood beat St Henry’s Marist College 10-NIL, Round 2 Northwood beat Westville Boys 10-NIL, Round 3 Northwood beat Glenwood 5,5 – 4,5 and finally in Round 4 Northwood beat DHS 8,5 – 1,5. Northwood’s winning team, listed as per their board numbers, was: 1. Yasteel Devnarian, 2. Luke Joseph, 3. Thomas Meadows, 4. Yetish Ramsurrup, 5. Shayur Hansraj, 6. Kyran Appana, 7. James Meadows, 8. Taish Ramkisson, 9. Ukyle Bezuidenhoud and 10. Deshaj Parthab.

CONGRATULATIONS to the following boys who have been selected for the KZN side for 2012 and will represent KZN in Cape Town from 15 to 21 December at the Junior Chess Championships (SA Trials 2012):

Shayur Hansraj (tied 1st place at the Closed U16) U16A

Kyran Appanna (U16A)

James Meadows (U14B)

Yasteel Devnarrian (U18A)

Ukyle Bezuidenhout (RESERVE)

Taish Ramkisson (RESERVE)

Northwood’s 1st soccer team played Peterhouse Boys from Zimbabwe on Saturday, 18 August 2012 at Michaelhouse. A great free kick from Cameron Du Plessis put Northwood on the scoreboard 1-0 at half time. Peterhouse soon came back with a great goal in the 2nd half to make it 1-1. Stephen McManus scored late in the 2nd half with a left footed volley to win this competitive game 2-1 for Northwood.

Northwood are very proud of grade 11 player, Matthew de Sousa, who was recently selected for the South African U18B hockey side at the U18 Inter-Provincial Hockey Tournament in Johannesburg.   In this year’s Indoor Hockey season, Matthew, the captain, never lost a game!

Steve McManus, also in grade 11, was the top goal scorer at the same tournament.