News

Year 8 students at Pymble Ladies’ College were inspired by a presentation given by Daniel and William Clarke on their quest to help save the orangutan population at the College on 13 August.

Daniel and William reflected on the issues facing the orangutan and its habitat and helped the students understand the issues around illegal logging, western society’s demand for palm oil and the ways in which they can help save the orangutan.

The presentation included a video of baby orangutans and some of the antics of the larger adult orangutans. Daniel and Williams were impressed by the student’s questions during the presentation with the students seeking information on orangutans, palm oil plantations in Australia and what palm oil is used for. Daniel and William Clarke live in Sydney and share a passion to save the orangutan in Borneo and Sumatra. So far the boys have raised over $600,000 to save the orangutan and have been actively promoting the orangutan’s story throughout the media.

Daniel and Williams have produced a book, Tears in the Jungle, after they travelled through Borneo to see the orangutans in the wild.

Pymble has been fortunate enough to have not one but two ex-students competing at the London 2012 Olympics and both reached the finals in their individual sporting disciplines. Tess Gerrand (2005 leaver) was part of Australia’s Rowing Women’s VIII that made the final last week. Although Australia didn’t come away with a medal, it was a valiant effort from Tess and her teammates to reach the last stage of the competition.

Edwina Tops-Alexander (1991 leaver) had a fabulous start to her Olympic campaign this week in the Equestrian Jumping. Although the Australian team of four (including Edwina) missed out on competing for the team medals, Edwina’s faultless first two rounds, and  near-perfect third round secured her a place among the top 30 riders to compete for an individual medal.

Edwina finished in equal 20th position in a very competitive field.Edwina and Tess are to be congratulated on their tremendous achievements at the London 2012 Olympics.

Maddison Penn of Year 12 has been offered a basketball scholarship to the Australian Institute of Sport for 2013. She will be part of the women's squad in the lead up to the World Championships in mid-2013. Maddison has also been offered a place on the AIS Women's touring team to travel to the USA after her HSC. This is a truly wonderful achievement.

Pymble Ladies’ College Middle School students participated in a special webcast hosted by television personality, Jennifer Byrne to launch the 2012 Multiple Sclerosis (MS) Readathon. 

The MS Readathon has been conducted for 33 years and this was the first year that the program was launched by webcast. Students were encouraged to register on line and seek sponsors for books they read during August.  

Twenty Years 7 and 8 Pymble students participated in the webcast which featured MS ambassador Stephen Papadopolous, who has previously addressed students at Pymble about his experience with MS. The students also had the opportunity to post comments during the webcast.

The webcast was filmed at Sydney Grammar Preparatory School, Edgecliff and more than 90 schools from New South Wales, Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory linked up for the launch. MS affects over 22,000 Australians and more than 2,500,000 people around the world, and is most common in young adults.

Congratulations to Year 11 students Jane Liu and Theresa Yu who gained second and third places respectively in the Open Age Piano Concerto at the 2012 Sydney Eisteddfod. They performed against a field of 32 competitors, many of whom were tertiary students. This is an outstanding achievement among such strong competition.

Boyoung Jeong (Year 9) and Reena Oh (Year 8) both competed in the 18 Year/Under Acoustic String Instrument and 16 Year/Under Viola or Cello sections and were awarded second place and highly commended respectively in both sections. Congratulations to these two very fine young cellists.

Since beginning in 1933, the Sydney Eisteddfod has provided young performers an arena to showcase their talents in a variety of different disciples for almost 80 years. Widely regarded as the largest and most successful competitive festival of its type in the world, the Sydney Eisteddfod attracts around 30,000 participants annually from all over Australia, New Zealand and beyond with a program that includes almost 400 classical and contemporary events for singers, dancers, musicians and actors, dance groups, bands, choirs and orchestras.