Year 9 Boarder Orientation

On Monday 27th of January we welcomed in 23 new year 9 boarders to the JMC community. We started off with a Chapel service with the parents and year 13 leaders and followed this up with a dinner and a chance for parents to mix and mingle.

The new boarders have been busy with cricket trials, rugby coaching clinics, Ross Creek runs, boarding house sports days and a bus trip looking at the local hot spots and sports grounds of Dunedin and a number of other activities.

One of the activities that we have trialled for the first time this year was on Sunday where we went on a rafting trip with Wild Earth down the lower Taieri from Henley to Taieri Mouth. Steve Brown put all the year 9 and 10 boarders through their paces and did 5 team building/leadership activities with the boys. The boys were split into mixed teams and the activities varied from raft flips and races, to filling up a bucket with a number of holes in it. The boys learnt to work together and to get to know some of the year 10 boys while doing it.

On Waitangi day we also had a busy day swimming at the local waterhole, ten pin bowling and hosting the boarding house sports day. Yesterday the four boarding schools in Dunedin all came to JMC and had fun mixing and mingling and doing a number of activities together (touch rugby, a quiz, picnic day races and multisport). We concluded the day with a shared afternoon tea. This was a great opportunity for all of the kids to talk to friends from the other boarding schools or make connections with some new people.

This weekend is the last weekend that the boarders will stay in before they all go home next weekend. With a number of activities planned for this weekend I am sure the new boarders will have a great time enjoying each other's’ company.

A huge thank you to all the Year 12 and 13 boarders who have made these activities possible and helped to settle in the new boarders.