Senior School Thursday, 23 June 2022

Collective Shout Presentations

On Tuesday 21st June, the Aquinas P and F sponsored four presentations from Collective Shout. The first two were during the day for Year 9 and Year 10 students and given by Daniel Principe, a 2005 graduate from Trinity College, and now a health professional, with a background in PR, marketing and media. Melinda Tankard Reist ran the presentations for teachers and parents. She is an author of six books, media commentator and advocate for young people and is world renowned for her work addressing sexualisation, objectification, harms of pornography, sexual exploitation, trafficking and violence against women.

Both Daniel and Melinda spoke to the question “How does pop culture shape your attitudes towards gender, sex & sexuality, social media, body image, ideas of manhood, mental health, violence etc?” They dissected the impacts of harmful messaging from media, advertising, pop culture and the global porn industry and discussed how cultural forces fuel distorted ideas and attitudes about bodies, relationships and sex. Daniel’s message empowered boys to navigate these cultural challenges and step outside the ‘Man Box’ resisting the harmful masculine stereotypes. He encouraged boys to be courageous and resist these harmful messages as they aspire to become good men.

WHAT DID THE BOYS THINK?

“During the presentation I thought that the speaker (Daniel) was really good and he kept me entertained in the topic. After the presentation I realised how bad pornography is and how women really feel about us men, and it also made me think that I need to make a change as well by being more respectful towards women and to not be tempted to watch pornography. I learnt from the presentation how badly women are portrayed by the media almost as if they are objects. Daniel showed us advertisements from real world shopping malls and posters, and it was very bad how women were always half naked and men were always dressed. A positive action that we can take to step outside the “Man Box” was to stop thinking of women as objects and to stop thinking of women only in a sexual way.”
Lucas Ali

“Before the presentation I was feeling a bit awkward about the whole thing and didn’t know what to expect. The presentation made me feel sad and shocked about the things that people do as jokes about women and how some people only look at women like objects. What I learnt from the presentation was that pornography is bad for your body and your mental health, it can affect the way you approach women and the relationships that you have throughout your life. I also learnt that we shouldn’t look at women as objects but for who they are as a person. What Daniel said was to be yourself and not get pressured by anyone to do stuff that you don’t want to do and to try to do the right things and make the right choices.”
Mitchell Pentony

“I honestly was not sure what to expect from the presentation, but during the presentation I was shocked to see all this info about just how women are sexualised to sell goods. After it made me feel educated and aware of what people do to women and how they feel themselves about this. I learnt how women are exploited and what girls my age feel about boys doing things like making sexual moaning sounds, or just inappropriate things in general.”
Jack Lee Steere

“From the presentation I learnt many things including: women are expected to live up to expectations that surround them every day, women are advertised as sex objects. I also learnt that many women are pressured into doing things that they don’t want to do such as sending nudes. We also got stories and quotes from young girls about how boys want to sexualise everything and that they can’t have a normal conversation. A positive action I can take, is to respect women for who they are.”
Brady Gardiner

“Before the presentation, I did not know that the world compares men and women differently. I learnt that women are usually treated poorly by men and the world is targeting underaged children towards pornography which makes them go down to the wrong path. The main thing I learnt from the presentation is to treat women with respect, as nowadays men tend to treat women as an object. Daniel said a couple of positive actions that we could take to step outside the ‘Man Box’ was to understand better what the actual problem is and be more educated about this for us to snap out of the cycle. We could also educate others on the danger of pornography and how it could affect our mental health.”
Jason Sutisna

“Before the talk I felt this is going to be so boring spending over an hour listening to some guy talking about pornography and I didn’t want to go because I thought I wouldn’t relate to it or not have any idea about what he’s talking about. When he started talking and doing his presentation it was good and related to me and wasn’t what I was expecting, he sounded like he really knew what he was talking about and did lots of research and everything in the PowerPoint was related to my kind of age. While he was doing his presentation, I was taking it in and going woah with all the facts that were stated. I realized that watching porn online can cause things like erectile dysfunction and bad relationships between you and your partner. I learnt the pornography industry is messed up and they force young women into doing porn and they don’t care about what it does to your brain they only care about how much money is going into their bank account.”
Luca Capararo

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Senior School Wednesday, 22 June 2022

Bugsy Malone Production

This has been a production season like no other and when recognising the hard work of this amazing cast, the students who so willingly understudied throughout the rehearsal process should be congratulated and acknowledged. Without the assurance of playing those roles in performances, students enthusiastically volunteered to cover unavoidable absences to ensure we have a production to share with you today – my sincerest thanks to a cast that kept this show going. The ‘Bugsy Malone’ rehearsal season had been about a spirit of inclusiveness and a strong team culture towards a common goal. The cast members were generous, kind, thoughtful and hard-working during a season that fluctuated with uncertainty and an ever-changing rehearsal environment.

There are many parents, colleagues and theatre professionals who assisted in putting this show together – thank you to all who supported our 2022 Aquinas College Production. I am extremely appreciative to have worked with an incredibly talented staff and student Creative Team, who’s vision and ideas were the driving strength behind every scene, moment, song, and choreographed movement within the show. Their combined student-centred approach and attention to detail is what has made this experience dynamic and worthwhile. I’d like to especially thank our Musical Director, Mr Chris McMillan, who’s expertise and outstanding musicianship have raised the calibre of this production to a standard worthy of the Heath Ledger Theatre.

‘Bugsy Malone’ is a musical that has everything – fun songs, memorable characters, and a quirky script. It is a musical that somehow connects so well with young actors. We hope you enjoyed it!

Sonja Vaswani
Director

This production marked the beginning of another chapter in the College’s long-standing history of musical theatre productions, and we welcomed Mrs Sonja Vaswani to the Arts team at Aquinas in the role of Director.

Beginning the year in the grips of a pandemic made the rehearsal process for this show a challenge. Our students rehearsed outdoors in small groups in the early stages. They covered each other’s roles when some were in isolation and learnt their parts online where necessary, displaying admirable versatility and persistence. Whilst many schools made the decision to cancel their show for this year, we are proud to have persevered and to have finally arrive at the point of production at the incredible State Theatre.

Our admiration and thanks to all students in the cast and their families for being prepared to work with us in these unusual times. My thanks also to the incredibly talented staff who so willingly gave their time and expertise.

Musically, the preparation for our show was interesting. When Alan Parker decided to direct Bugsy Malone for film in 1976 using child actors, many of the young stars cast then were younger than most of our cast members are. Consequently, many of the resulting recordings of the show feature children’s voices. Our challenge was to produce a more mature sound than the original recordings – another task which was willingly accepted by our students! We hope you enjoyed their efforts in bringing ‘Bugsy Malone’ to life.

Chris McMillan
Music Director

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Senior School Monday, 20 June 2022

Essential Skills for Visual Arts

Recently we had the pleasure of having local artist Jenny Davies hold several portrait workshops with our Senior School art students. Jenny is a Lester Portrait Prize finalist and passionate about all things art. She worked with the students on creating a portrait from beginning to end, focusing on things like compositional techniques, drawing from life and photographs, recognising tonal value in images and how to translate that into a painting, as well as workshopping colour theory. All these skills are essential for the students to better develop their visual language, and how they progress in the art program. They had a great time and produced the beginnings of some wonderful artworks.

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Senior School Wednesday, 15 June 2022

Year 10 Outdoor Recreation Camp

Over 70 Year 10 Outdoor Recreation students recently had a wonderful experience in the Margaret River & Busselton Region on their camp! The boys completed a hike along the Cape to Cape Track, mountain biked at Pines Trails and did a high ropes course at Forest Adventures over the 3 days.

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Senior School Tuesday, 31 May 2022

Sorry Day Assembly

On Thursday 26 May 2022, Aquinas students Tre Healy and Tremaine Baxter-Edwards attended the Perth College Sorry Day Assembly to give a speech.

"They delivered a powerful, moving and emotional speech and they should be proud of themselves, their school and the Indigenous people."

“Tre and Tremaine were super compelling, and I found the whole Sorry Day Assembly meaningful and moving.“

“What a credit they are to themselves, their families, people and Aquinas.“

"The boys were phenominal yesterday. Thank you for allowing them to come and share the deep meaning of Sorry Day for them. I felt an honour to MC the assembly with such strong role models."

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Senior School Tuesday, 10 May 2022

ATAR Visual Arts Excursion

On Monday 9 May 2022, Year 11 and 12 ATAR Visual Arts students visited the Art Gallery of WA and checked out this year’s amazing PULSE perspectives exhibition, which showcases about 50 select year 12 art students from WA from last year. The students then had an amazing tour through some of the AGWA collection and discussed critical thinking in relation to visual art. After this, they hit the streets and had a tour of Perth’s street art, and discovered all of the public art available in the city. Thank you so much to Jenny and Adie who were their tour guides for the day!

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Senior School Tuesday, 10 May 2022

UWA Young Leaders' Council Event

Over the break, myself and three of the other captains attended the UWA Young Leaders Council Event. This event took place on the second Friday of the holidays and involved various workshops which discussed ideas relating to inclusivity and accessibility, as well as the correct language to use when referring to people of different social groups/backgrounds. Partaking in these workshops were many student leaders from schools across Perth, and the format of the event allowed for insightful discussion to take place amongst these student leaders. Ideas were shared regarding specific student led events which have taken place so far, as well as events which we are planning to hold in the future. Personally, I gained a great deal of knowledge from the event in terms of how other school leadership groups are run in comparison to ours, as well as the best way to run events in an inclusive and accessible manner. The Young Leaders Council will meet again in the term two holidays where workshops will be run regarding mental health. I look forward to the important conversations which will be had at this event.

Ashton Teixeira
College Captain 2022

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Senior School Tuesday, 03 May 2022

Photography Competition Results

Congratulations to all the students who entered this years photography competition. The theme this year was “A moment in time”, and everyone interpreted this in their own way to produce some amazing photographs. Official awards will be handed out at the formal awards ceremony at the end of the year.

The winners are:

First place: David Scott Year 11 for his photograph ‘Stadium at Capacity’

Second Place: Logan Nixon Year 8 for his photograph ‘Sunset 1’

Third Place: Marcus Taylor Year 12 for his photograph ‘Pinkys’

Highly Commended: Noah Myers Year 7 for his photograph ‘Restful Repose’

Peoples Choice Award: Akashan & Anoshan Ganapathipillai for their photograph ‘Untitled 1’

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