The 2023 Chronicle

MESSAGE FROM THE RECTOR

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Generous friends of the school donated three padel courts to Michaelhouse, situated in the tennis and squash complex, and plans have been made for the widening of the Chapel to accommodate all boys and staff of our enlarged school. This is critical to the central mission and well-being of Michaelhouse. Solar power and sustainability were features of our growth and development in 2023 with the first panels being placed unobtrusively on the roofs of the Indoor Centre, Schlesinger Theatre and Junior Dining Hall as the initial step towards being self-sustaining. Load shedding and other difficulties in terms of the reliability of Eskom provided a further spur to our determination to progress in this important area. Boere maak planne . The Transformation and Diversity Advisory Committee grew in stature and prominence under the chairmanship of Mr Sibusiso Ncamani, Deputy Rector: Pastoral, who also engaged along with Board member Mr Ray Mkhulisi and our operational staff to understand some deep-seated concerns. Dr Imtiaaz Sooliman was welcomed to the school Ad Portas. A Development Office was established under Mrs Frances Fleming Bolttler to consolidate our fundraising initiatives, particularly with a view to raising additional resources to assist our boys financially over their tenure at Michaelhouse. About 40% of our families receive some scholarship or financial assistance and the aim is to increase this percentage substantially over the next decades. During the last quarter we were rocked by the sudden death of Zanda Cele, an E Block boy in Farfield. He had gone to the San with mild flu symptoms and died suddenly the next morning. The brotherhood of the boys was never more evident than on the occasion of Zanda’s memorial service, after which they linked arms in the Main Quad and sent him off with a rousing Michaelhouse war cry. Boys are expected to greet visitors, to demonstrate respect to adults, to look them in the eye and to give them a firm handshake, to display good manners, compassion, warmth, to care for those less fortunate than themselves, to serve and to exhibit what Andrew Woodland, Senior Prefect of 2023, called in his leaving speech “humble confidence”. Most of the time most boys get it right.

023 will go down in the annals as a memorable year for Michaelhouse: the school roll stood at 624 for the major ity of the year and, on the inevitable departure of some boys, others came off the bench from the long waiting lists to take their places. Boys value being here and, on the whole, gave of their best in every arena. One particularly poignant moment was the last-gasp victory in the First XV match at Hilton. Having been denied a triumph in our first encounter, we notched up our 100th victory over our friendly neighbours and rivals. Indeed, among our eight open rugby sides, there were only eight defeats all season; there is much that is true in the notion that the enthu siastic performance of the fifth and sixth XVs week in and week out is a good barometer of the health and spirit of Michaelhouse. On the academic front, some of our boys excelled on the international stage. One was Luke Kaufmann, a B Blocker, whose essay in the field of economics attracted the attention of professors at Princeton University and Oxford’s dons and saw him invited to parley with them at the John Locke Institute in Oxford. He and Seth Segal were also selected to represent South Africa in debating and public speaking. A future-fit curriculum was introduced for 23 D Block boys as an alternative educational programme to certain of their subjects; this took cognisance of the areas designated by the United Nations as the most significant with which all people should engage over the next ten years. Included in these were issues of sustainability, climate change and poverty, real- life issues concerning which our boys had to formulate and implement appropriate responses. The Todd Cup was introduced on the suggestion of the boys as a trophy to reflect the combination of all interhouse events, including success and endeavour in the academic arena. The trophy was won in its first year by Tatham. Indeed, Tatham boys prepared to move at the end of the year to the newly created Tatham bordering the Pennington Quad. The creation of accommodation for the Housemaster adjacent to the boys fulfilled the strategic objective of the Board to have all Housemasters accommodated alongside the boys. The old Tatham is to be the receptacle into which each successive House requiring an upgrade is decanted. A substantial upgrade of boarding facilities commonly takes place every 30-40 years in similar boarding schools around the world and so we are no exception in this regard.

(+27) 33 234 1000 info@michaelhouse.org www.michaelhouse.org facebook.com/michaelhouse.org @IAmMichaelhouse youtube.com/@michaelhouse1896

EDITORS: Murray Witherspoon, Nicola Kidgell, Dermott White FORMAL PHOTOGRAPH ADMINISTRATOR: Joanne Morrison DESIGN & LAYOUT: Shanice Cassim COVER PHOTOGRAPH: Seth Harie PRINTERS: LT Printers CONTACT: Private Bag X1, Balgowan, KwaZulu-Natal, 3275, South Africa

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