The annual St Lawrence College senior school swimming gala took place on Tuesday 4^th June and proved once again to be a fantastic display of skill and endurance, with some long-held records finally broken.

The new records were:

25m. Butterfly boys Yr. 7

17,66 Konstantinos Chachamopoulos. Previous rec. 27,00 Harutaka Ominato, 2018

50m freestyle girls year 8

31,66 Christina Dimitrakopoulou. Previous rec. 37,35 Sotiria Lourida 2018

25m Breaststroke girls Yr.  8

18,67 Christina Dimitrakopoulou. Previous rec.19,00 , Olga Egorova 2012

50m breaststroke boys yr8

39,20 Angelos Syriopoulos,. Previous rec. 42,80 Phaedon Philipopoulos  42,80 2018

25m backstroke Yr. 10 boys

14,83 Angelos Mylonas. Previous rec. 14,86 Panagiotis Georgopoulos 2008

And the final house point results from the competition were:

Attica 510

Epirus 1010

Macedonia 800

Congratulations to everyone involved and we'll see you again next year.

One more project undertaken by the St. Lawrence College Services Society this year was a quite feminine one! After the great success of the Shoebox Campaign coordinated by the Services Society at Christmas, a warm relationship has been established between the pupils of our school and the children of the FAROS charity organisation in the centre of Athens.

Before Easter the FAROS organisation opened a day centre for young women and girls, called ‘Horizon Girls’, with the aim to help unaccompanied refugee girls and young women getting back their confidence and aiming for a better life. In their centre, the girls have started learning Greek, English, the use of computers and knitting and sewing.

The Services Society, through a non-uniform day, managed to raise enough money for the purchase of three sewing machines which together with a lot of knitting and sewing material was donated to the FAROS educational and recreational centre for refugee teenage girls and young women, who were reportedly very excited and happy to receive these donations. A big thank you to all pupils, parents and teachers who helped once again so eminently and efficiently.

Friday 10^th May saw the St Lawrence senior school hold the annual Sports Day. As always, there were some amazing displays of strength, agility and determination. Some students even managed to break long-held school records. 

The new records were:

High jump:

Yr. 9 girls, DAFNE VOTSIS. 1,49

Previous record, 1,48 since 2015

Yr. 9 boys, MARIOS DJIONIS, 1,63

Previous record, 1,58 since 2015

Long jump:

Yr. 7 boys, SUNNY YUTONG, 4,30

Previous record 3,75, since 2018

Yr. 9 girls, DAFNE VOTSIS, 3,92

Previous record 3,75 since 2015

And the house points were:

ATTICA : 840

EPIRUS: 880

MACEDONIA: 1140

On Monday 13^th May 2019, our intrepid little explorers from FS1 and FS2 headed off to the fire station in Hellinikon. This was an important element of real life learning for their unit of study entitled, “People Who Help Us.” Such an experience was very engaging for the children as they experienced so many different sights and sounds from the moment they walked through the door! They got to meet the fire fighters themselves, they learned basic safety rules and they even got the chance to sit behind the wheel of a real fire engine!

On Tuesday 14^th May 2019, the pupils of the Early Years classes took part in a mini-tennis display lesson at the courts in school. Mini tennis is an exciting opportunity for children to learn valuable fine motor skills in a sporting activity while at school and the children loved having fun as they played.

During the weekend Friday 5^th, Saturday 6^th and Sunday 7^th eleven of our pupils took part in yet another Model United Nations in the American College of Greece representing three countries, DPRK, Slovakia and Equatorial Guinea, as Delegates in various Committees, as diverse as the Disarmament and International Security Committee, the Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Committee, the Special Political and Decolonization Committee, the Legal Committee and the Security Council. This time two of our pupils held the position of Chair of two Committees, the Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Committee and the World Health Organisation (WHO).

The theme of this Conference was “Digital Citizenship”, an extremely interesting and thought provoking area of discussion. Some of the topics that were debated in the Committees during the three days of intense work were related to the theme of the Conference, like assessing the security and privacy of digital footprints, use of artificial intelligence in medicine, artificial intelligence and robots embedded in the workforce, but others were as diverse as combating political propaganda, impact of military materials on the environment, rejuvenating the economies of former conflict zones, the question of the diminution of the birth index, balancing the roles of public and private sectors in economic growth, the issue of DNA cloning, combating the international obesity and diabetes epidemics, the return and restitution of cultural property to the countries of origin, or the journalistic responsibility and the fight against the spread of false information online.

Taking part in an MUN Conference has become very popular among our pupils, older and younger ones, as young as Year 7, who very bravely sacrificed a whole weekend, debating over long hours on topics that are really challenging for them. As for the old ones, they are used by now to be Chairs of various Committees and to help the younger members of the MUN Club of our school feeling excited as well as informed and prepared. We are all looking forward to our next participation in October, in an MUN Conference which will see one of our pupils as the President of the General Assembly! Well done to all!

On Thursday 11th April 2019, another marvellous evening of entertainment was held at St Lawrence College. The hall was packed with children from Year 3 all the way up to our most senior pupils, along with their families and friends.

The children took us on a musical journey like you've never been on before with a wide range of classical and modern pieces sung and played by our exceptionally talented pupils. There was everything from Bach to original compositions as well as Musical greats like Never Enough from The Showman and a Queen compilation from the Senior Show Club! ​

Greek dancing created a celebratory atmosphere, the choir warmed our hearts and the performance poetry of our youngest participants brought a smile to every face.  What an amazing way to bring recognition to all our hard working children and their very dedicated teachers. Bravo to all!

On Thursday 11th and Friday 12th April, the Senior School and Junior School in turn headed off the the Stavros Niarchos Centre in Faliro to participate once again in the famous charity event, No Finish Line. Even though the weather was not on our side this year, the children still made a valiant effort to run as far as they could in the adverse conditions, knowing that every lap counts! 

Bravo to all the pupils and teachers who ran, walked or traipsed around the lake, for once again giving it all you've got for a good cause!

On the 28^th – 31^st March, the SLC Forensics team of 28 travelled to Thessaloniki, to take part once again at the Panhellenic Forensics Tournament, hosted by Mandoulides School.

After three and a half days of performing and speaking at the various events, the SLC team had 5 finalists and 2 honourable mentions, as well as a debate team in the semi-finals, ranking 4^th out of 19 schools in total.

Congratulations to all the participants and their coaches for another very successful year at this prestigious tournament!

On Wednesday 3 April, ex-pupil Dimitris Samouris was the latest guest speaker at one of our careers mornings. He shared his career story, gave the pupils advice on how to make the most of their time at school and university, and discussed the importance of using the network of St. Lawrence College graduates around the world for advice. After the talk, the pupils broke off into smaller discussion groups. Year 10 spoke about how to identify strengths and interests, Year 11 about future careers, and Year 12 discussed university applications and how to go about choosing where and what to study when they leave school. 

During our March half-term, a special day was celebrated around the world on the 14^th of March, the International Pi-Day!  Pi is a mathematical constant having the value 3.14….. (that is the connection to the specific day of March) and is represented by the Greek letter “π”. It is the symbol used in Mathematics to represent the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter and it is one of the defining constants of our Universe.

Pupils and teachers celebrated Pi-Day the week after half-term with several events.

Pupils

·         measured the circumference of circles and, using hands-on activities, found the relationship with the diameter

·         investigated different relationships between angles in circles as well as areas of squares inscribed in circles

·         and passionately participated in several competitions.

Well done to all the pupils that took part in those competitions and here are winning pupils!

·         Haijie Su (Year 8) who won the competition of pi recitation by reciting the amazing number of 124 digits of π!

·          Delfin Saygi (Year 9) who won the competition of writing the most words beginning with pi in ten minutes, she managed to write 50 different words!

·         Dimitris Thodis (Year 10) who won the competition of inventing the most interesting word using π “rib-π-steak”! 

All the events were well enjoyed by both pupils and teachers. The celebrations ended with a very successful pie-sale. We, in our department, are very grateful to all pupils and parents who contributed generously to this unique pie-sale. We are happy to inform you that an amount of 410 euros was collected! All the money will be donated, through the Services Society, to charity and more specifically to the children in the Eleonas Refugee Camp.

It was a really insπring week!

On Friday 29th March 2019, the gymmnasium came alive with the buzz of all-things-scientific in our 3rd Annual Junior School Science Fair. There was a truly impressive level of participation from almost every pupil in KS2, and their efforts to show scientific study and learning was awe-inspiring. 84 projects from individuals and groups of friends were on show for all to see. Friends and families poured in to view these projects which varied in the science fields, encompassing biology, ecology, chemistry and physics. 

The judges, the senior school science department, worked tirelessly to interview every single participant and we thank them for their gargantuan effort to closely examine all the projects and then make the extremely difficult decisions about winners in each year group. Not an easy task at all! 

Once again, what we saw was the significant effort and huge amount of learning that this science fair created so a very big 'Well Done' to all who took part. 

On Tuesday 26th March 2019, our littlest tots in St Lawrence were certainly horsing around in the sunshine! As part of their "Animals" topic, FS1 and FS2 classes visited the Antoniou Farm in Kouvara, Attiki. The children were very excited to see a range of ordinary and rather extraordinary farm animals which call it their home. They also had the opportunity to go horse riding which they loved. What a great experience that was!

On the last day of this half term, Friday 8th March 2019, there was a wonderful carnival atmosphere as all the pupils and their teachers dressed up for a day of celebration and fun. With a parade around the playground for all to admire each other’s costumes, disco music blasting from the speakers across the playground and party foods including cupcakes, pizzas and all kinds of goodies, the children thoroughly enjoyed a day of special treats before the Bank Holiday weekend for ‘Clean Monday.’

The celebrations ahead of the long weekend for Greek Independence Day got off to a wonderful start in the Junior School at St Lawrence on Friday 22nd March. The pupils working together with the teachers in the Greek department put on a delightful and touching performance that told the story of the struggles of the Greek people in the fight for independence in 1821.

The children sang, danced and acted their way through a heartwarming performance that brought smiles and tears to their family and friends.What a way to bring history to life! Bravo everyone who participated!