Welcome back to the second term of the academic year! It is so great seeing everyone back on campus after a 3 week holiday. Bet everyone had some rest and fun and is now ready for this exciting term! Remember to always follow school rules and be respectful to everyone including your friends, teachers and people you see on the campus!
Last week on the 25th of April, 5 girls, Idamali Wickham, LangYing Zhu, Rebecca Tura, Silua Hia and Tashli Toito’ona were selected to take part in an annual event to celebrate Women in IT hosted by WITSI.
This full day event took place at Heritage Park Hotel, marking the 4th year that WITSI has hosted this event.
Representative students from all schools across Honiara gathered there that day to learn and share ideas on IT including Online safety, AI, and future career paths featuring IT.
The event started off with Guest speakers in which they motivated us to the thousands of job opportunities and ideas revolving around IT. Then videos regarding online safety were shown and afterwards questions were asked, which students would attempt to answer for small prizes. A Kahoot game regarding IT knowledge was hosted and in which Woodford managed to get a perfect score of 11/11 and came first! We ended up with gift bags from SIEA and BSP!
We then had a lunch break, then went back in to learn about AI, including lik4 Chat Gpt to write a song. Then we had a table activity where we used our innovative problem solving skills to solve a common IT problem with other schools. With the help of other schools, we created a poster filled with ideas which we presented to finish the day off.
Attending WITSI’s Women in IT allowed us to open a vision to more career paths and also learn new things from other schools and work with them too! A big thanks to WITSI and all participants for the lovely experience!
In the last weeks of term one, a new program had opened up for Woodford: Rugby. Kids from year 8 and up were all allowed to join the training and learn the sport, there would be two teams, one for boys and the other for girls.
Unfortunately, there have only been three girls who are participating, and we need at least four or five more participants to be able to join competitions and have friendly matches with other schools. Although the girls struggled to collect more players for their team, they continued to train with the boys team, earning experience and good skills throughout the training days.
The training consisted of warm-up exercises, several ball handling drills, tackle basics (No actual tackles took place, only explanations) practice games, basics of scrums, rucks, lineout practices and cool-downs. With these new learnings, the Rugby group began to get familiar with the game, working together more effectively with fewer mistakes and more strategies.
Thanks to the help of our coaches, Mr. Vincent Kuma, Coach Noel Hakopes and Coach Lale Latu, we have been able to improve ourselves the right way and to play with proper knowledge on how to avoid dangerous injuries. For that, we are grateful.
Also, thanks to Mr. Roylee Bella for communicating with the organisers of the Rugby matches to keep the team updated and ready.
Extra Curricular Activities (ECAs) for Term 2 have officially begun for all primary and high school students. To mention a few, the sports ECAs offered include basketball, rugby, and taekwondo, with the addition of new ones such as netball. Alongside sports, there are other ECAs offered crafty ones such as painting, textiles, sewing, or inspiring ones such as Life, Purpose and Jesus. There are many exciting ECAs to look out for this Term, however, students are urged to continue to be faithful to their mandatory tutoring and refrain from participating in ECAs on those same days simultaneously.
Over the three week break, Solomon Islands had its first joint national and provincial elections on the 17th of April.
Campaign after campaign took place days prior with people supporting different candidates in hopes of getting them elected, but all that had to stop 24 hours before election day.
In the lead up to the elections, Solomon Islands Electoral Commission (SIEC) carried out nation-wide awareness of the penalties of electoral offences.
Some of the offences include: Bribery, such as buying off votes, intimidation, such as threats, etc… The penalties to such acts was a 15 year sentence in jail, or, a fine of $15,000.
On polling day, the Royal Solomon Islands Police Force (RSIPF) with support from international forces patrolled different areas of Solomon Islands and were present at polling stations to help maintain peace and order.
As the first round of the playoffs comes near to an end, we can all now look back at the contents of this round. Probably the most upsetting part so far is the outcome of the Phoenix Suns against the Minnesota Timberwolves, in which a starstudded Suns team were swept 4-0 by the Timberwolves making many fans feel disappointed and dissatisfied. The Oklahoma City Thunder also had an expected win over the New Orleans pelican with yet another 4-0 sweep.
Laos born man; Cheng Saefan who is battling cancer has recently won 1.3 billion US dollars in the Powerball. There is a 1 in 13 million chance of winning the Lotto. Cheng says that he is blessed and can now get a good doctor and that he feels that he can get lucky again.
As the new term commences, the school campus has been bustling with students, and we have spotted a few new faces amongst the crowd. To our new friends, welcome to Woodford!
Be sure to greet our new friends and make them feel warmly welcomed into our school, and do not hesitate to lend a helping hand if needed.
As of this past week, on Tuesday, April 30th, Ms. Shain taught her final classes and departed from WIS. Ms. Shain has spent 5 years educating middle school students at WIS, teaching subjects such as SOSE, global perspective, and briefly, English as well.
The WIS secondary assembly last week, on April 26th, was dedicated to Ms. Shain. During the assembly, gifts and speeches were presented to Ms. Shain, along with the traditional Solomon farewell song, which all students sang along to.
Ms. Shain shared a few words, expressing gratitude to her students and colleagues for the experience she gained during her time at Woodford. She explained that the experience she gained will help further her career, possibly in Australia or Fiji.
Secondary Principal, Mr. Alex, also suggested the idea for departing teachers to plant a tree somewhere on campus, starting with Ms. Shain. We are unsure if Ms. Shain has planted a tree yet, but hopefully this potential WIS tradition will continue to be pursued.
We wish Ms. Shain all the best in her future plans and hope she has enjoyed her time teaching at WIS.
What better way to entertain yourself than to do fun games?
