Bulletin, Hockey, Rugby

Senior Rugby and Hockey Festival

Our Senior Rugby and Hockey festival ended on a high note with a great win for our rugby boys. Our girls only lost 1 game during the tournament.

Thank you to our sports men and women for working so hard to provide spectators with such great entertainment!
Thank you to our coaches and managers who gave of their holiday time to be with our children.
Thank you to our parents and Old Unionites who supported them wholeheartedly and positively and who gave so much of their time to cook, cook and cater, sell drinks and provide sustenance.
Thank you to all past pupils who popped in for a visit.
Thank you to our ground staff who were up at sparrow’s each morning, who cleaned and watered and fetched and carried even with load shedding and water outages.
Thank you to our friendly and efficient kitchen staff who worked tirelessly from dawn to midnight.
Thank you to our wonderful boarding houses who accommodated so many without a complaint.
Thank you to our first aiders who were at the ready through each and every match.
Thank you to our media team who recorded and assisted with sound and video capturing.
Thank you to our ball boys and those learners who gave of their holiday time to to gate duty and who worked at the coffee stations.
Thank you to schools from neighboring towns who supported Union teams with such great spirit!
Thank you to our Sports Department who did so much for months to make this festival run so smoothly and effectively.
Thank you to our Union Team – together we achieve so much!

Results were as follows:

Rugby
Union vs Charlie Hofmeyer lost 12 – 28
Union vs Andrew Rabie won 43-0

Hockey
Union vs VG won 1 -0
Union vs Paarl Gim Inv won 2 – 0
Union vs Settlers won 3 – 0
Union vs Kingsridge lost 3 – 4
Brandwag withdrew against Union

Union Invitation vs Cradock won 1 – 0
Union Invitation vs Merrifield lost 2 – 3
Union Invitation vs Brandwag won 1 – 0
Union Invitation vs Stirling lost 0 – 4
Union Invitation vs Nico Malan lost 0 -2

Academic, Bulletin, Student Life

RCL Training – Global Leadership Consultants

On 13 March 2019 the RCL had a training session with Global Leadership Consultants.

There are not many things that warm the heart of an educator more than when a past pupil ploughs back into the very community which shaped him or her. This was what could be sensed when Luphumlo Joka conducted training with the Representative Council for Learners of Union High School at Profcon yesterday.

The vision of Global Leadership Consultants is to build authentic leaders to effectively change society generationally. The values of the company, excellence, integrity, passion, discipline and stewardship was really the golden thread throughout the session.

Global Leadership Consultants was officially started in 2015 by founder Luphumlo Joka whilst he was studying Law at Nelson Mandela University. GLC was birthed out of genuine love and passion for the development of organizations and high performance individuals.

The team specializes in strategic management and leadership development and business leadership support. Their competitive advantage is in their new approach to leadership development birthed by our young innovative team of professionals.

A fun-filled, jam-packed half day session addressing topics like the purpose of leaders, the ultimate leader-shift and the duty of authentic leadership was enjoyed by fifteen excited leaders. We are looking forward to see our leaders finding their purpose and expanding their sphere of influence even further.

We are grateful to Global Leadership Consultants for this invaluable experience which our Representative Council of Learners thoroughly enjoyed!

Hostels

AKH Quiz & Arm Wrestling Competition

Last night saw the highly anticipated General Knowledge Quiz and Arm Wrestling competition taking place at Arthur Kingwill House! The Quiz was very exciting with Arnott House coming out tops in the end. Damon Fouché emerged as arm wrestling champion for 2019! Thanks to Mr Hamilton and Mr Koeberg for overseeing such a fun filled evening for our boarders!

 

Bulletin

Spar Hockey Challenge

The Spar Hockey festival took place at Union in festive, warm conditions today and much fun was had by all! We are proud of our girls who made it to the final, but were unfortunately beaten 0-3 by a polished DSG team. Thank you Spar and our sport’s department who made this such an enjoyable day.

Sport Results

Archery

Over the weekend Matthew McNaughton and  Daniel McNaughton participated in an archery competition and achieved the following results:
Matthew came 2nd in the 3D category with a score of 274/300.
Daniel came 2nd in the Bull’s Eye competition with a score of 270/300.

Rugby, Sport Results

Snr Rugby – St Andrews Bloemfontein

1ST XV vs St Andrews Bloemfontein

On Saturday 9 March Union took on St Andrews Bloemfontein in our first home game for the season in what is proving to be a highlight derby day which is eagerly awaited from both schools.

The day started well with the junior teams and 2nd XV putting on remarkable performances which set the perfect platform for an all-out clash between the two schools 1st XV’s.

As expected the game started with a bang and was played at an astounding pace with both teams attacking and defending with everything they had. In the end it was Union that managed to breach the defences first with Luke Mc Naughton crossing the line after excellent ball retention and superb backline play.

St Andrews then hit back with a well- worked try to even the scores out at 5-5 all. Union then capitalised on an excellent build up just before half time where Brett Amsterdam took a quick tap penalty with an excellent run which set Junior Duba up for Union’s second try under the poles which was converted by Jayden Brotherton. Union took the lead at 12-5 at the half way stage.

The second half started as we all expected with aggressive attacking and big hits in defence. Union took the first advantage early on in the second half scoring a fantastic well worked team try through amazing backline play that put Bladen Jacobs away in the corner for our third try to make the score 17-5. Without the hard grind from our forwards up front these platforms cannot be laid for opportunities such as these and credit needs to go to them for showing their dominance in phases against a much bigger pack, making these tries even more spectacular.

From that moment on Union was put under tremendous pressure as St Andrews showed amazing skill with excellent ball retention setting up wave after wave of attack which really tested our defensive grit, forcing Union to make over 100 tackles for the match. Despite the barrage of runners Union’s defences held true with the boys throwing everything they had in stopping St Andrews from crossing the try line. Mention must be made of Mack Rubige, Ebben Johnston and Cleathon Koeberg who lead with the highest tackle counts for the match. In the end it was an out and out team effort on defence which was only breached in the last minute allowing St Andrews to score which ended the match with the final score at 17-10 in favour of Union.

https://www.facebook.com/unionhighschool/videos/2359727964059006/

U14s won 27-25

U15s won 33-5

U16s drew 19-19

2nds won 38-0

Well done guys!

Hockey, Sport Results

Snr Hockey – Greg Beling Festival

Greg Beling Festival 8-10 March
Union’s first team hockey girls traveled to East London to take on some top opposition this weekend.
Results:
Union 3 – 4 Kingswood
Union 1 – 4 DSG
Union 1 – 6 Eunice
Union 3 -2 Eldoraine
Out of the 4 games played, the girls proved to be true contenders and were unfortunate not to walk away with a win against Kingswood and DSG. However, this was a major learning experience for the team and there is no doubt that the girls will bounce back this coming weekend.
Well done to the girls on humbly accepting defeat and playing the game in good spirit.

 

 

Bulletin, Cultural

Annual production: The Jungle Book

“I believe arts education in music, theater, dance and the visual arts is one of the most creative ways we have to find the gold that is buried just beneath the surface. Children have an enthusiasm for life, a spark of creativity, and vivid imaginations that need training – training that prepares them to become confident young men and women.” (Richard Riley)

In Union’s ongoing bid to educate the whole child, the Middle School staged a brilliant production of ‘The Jungle B…ook’ last week, and on Friday night the audience was thrilled by excellent acting, singing and dancing that filled the packed hall! With increasing demands on teachers to complete the syllabus in very little time, we commend the learners, staff and parents for all that they did to make the production such a success.

One only has to look at the faces in this post to see how our young learners embraced and relished in the roles they performed. It is wonderful to know that such talent is nurtured in our learners. Union is so grateful for the incredible vision of Mrs Avrille Putter who produced this excellent show, backed up by Mrs Sanette Brink, the staff, and of course our wonderful thespians without whom, this would never have happened!

 

 

 

Sport Results, Swimming

Top 8 Gala

A group of 7 Union High swimmers participated in the Top 8 Invitational Gala on Saturday 9 March, which pits the top swimmers of schools in the province against each other. Our Union High ladies won 4 medals in total and they were well rewarded for all their hard work during the season.

A congratulation to the following swimmers on their medal wins:

Elia Railton: Silver 50m Breaststroke;  Bronze 50m Backstroke

Amber Binney: Silver 50 Breaststroke

Megan Doyle: Silver 50m Freestyle

 

Hockey, Sport Results

Jnr Hockey – Lorraine Festival

On Saturday our 1st junior hockey girls travelled to port Elizabeth to participate in the Lorraine Tri-sports festival. The girls played three matches in wet and miserable conditions, but performed very well over- all. In the first game we played against Outeniqua Primary from George. The girls took some time to get into the game after the drive and went down 1-0 very quickly. This proved to be the necessary wake-up call and the girls, while not managing to equalise, limited… the score-line to that.

After re-grouping between games, the girls bounced back with 2 fantastic wins. They beat Charlo by 2 goals to 1, with goals coming from Soso Mroro and Chloe Erasmus. Our best performance of the day was undoubtedly against Herbert Hurd who thrashed us last year. The girls played a lovely attacking game with some beautiful passing to end the day with a 4-0 victory. Goals were scored by Soso Mroro (2), Chloe Erasmus and Xarah Hoffman.