Maddingley

Year 8 Camp – Student Reflections

In Week 3, a large group of Year 8 students went on a hiking camp in the Brisbane Ranges. Over the week, we did activities such as high ropes, watched an animal show, rock climbing and hiking. One of my personal highlights of the camp was being able to touch animals during the animal show; I even got the chance to hold a snake!
On the first night we cooked our own dinner on the Trangia. It was fun until we had to clean and dry our Trangia’s, which took us all some time until it was perfect and up to standard. During the hiking, some groups had to hike a very steep and rocky hill – which was a challenge for all of us.
Overall, we had a great time, lots of laughs and great memories.
A big thank you to the staff from YMCA and our teachers who came and helped throughout this camp; we really appreciate your help and support.
Ruby R (8E)

During the Creswick Bike Challenge Camp we completed several bike trails and challenges including long rides, hills, and uneven surfaces, and very long distances. Some of the highlights of the camp were the playing around at the pump track, where we rode beams and cleared jumps. It was great seeing each other improve their skills of mountain biking and general camping.
One of the biggest challenges that all students and teachers had to overcome was the cold and the large hills that we had to climb. We could tell that we had overcome these challenges as by the last day we were riding uphill at a faster pace than the first day. To overcome the cold, we all put on gloves and more layers of clothes – and gathered around the fire. Another enjoyable part of camp was cooking our dinner each night. On the first night we had to bring our own choice of camping food. Most of us cooked different types of pasta or rice. I cooked a carbonara dish made from a packet of pasta carbonara, long-life milk and butter – it was surprisingly good. To cook our food, we used Trangia’s (small stove pots made for camping). This was a fun and challenging experience as we had to make all of our dinner from scratch.
The whole camp wouldn’t have been possible without the help of our YMCA staff and our teachers. I would like to thank them for their help and making our camp a lot more fun and easy.
Jack C (8B)

Woodlea

Student Achievement

We are thrilled to share the exciting news that Sumishka B from Year 7WB was recently selected to participate in the prestigious 2025 Young Women in Aerospace & Defence Program, a four-day STEM initiative hosted by RMIT University.
Throughout this unique opportunity, Sumishka embraced every challenge with enthusiasm and curiosity. She delved into the fundamentals of coding with Python, assembled a fully functional satellite, and programmed it to collect various scientific measurements. As part of the program’s final challenge, she attached her satellite to a drone and successfully carried out a simulated real-world mission, capturing live data in a highly authentic learning environment.
The program concluded with a competition and interview round, where Sumishka’s dedication and innovation truly shone. She proudly secured 3rd place overall and was awarded a trophy in recognition of her outstanding efforts.
We are incredibly proud of Sumishka’s achievements and can’t wait to see how her passion for STEM continues to flourish in the years ahead. Congratulations, Sumishka!

Mrs Sarah Hunter – Deputy Head of Woodlea Campus