MCLAREN HIGH
BADMINTON SUCCESS
On October 30, Fraser Banks competed in the Junior Central Schools Badminton competition, where he secured first place.
JUNIOR RANGERS
Last week pupils from the Junior Rangersl were presented with their John Muir Explorer Awards which are is given to young people who have undergone the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park four-day in School Junior Ranger programme, exploring visitor management, outdoor recreation and conservation.
Alongside the Junior Ranger Programme we completed a John Muir Award, for some of us we did our Discovery Award, the first level of award, but for many of us we had already completed this level. The award offers another two levels, so many of us took the next step up to Explorer Level.
For each award level there is a minimum time commitment, for Discovery it is four days and for Explorer it is eight days.
As we had already completed four days in school we had to plan another four days of activities on our own. With the help of Sarah McNeil from the John Muir Trust we planned out our challenge areas - discover, explore, conserve and share.
Lots of us chose wild places near to where we live like Callander Crags or Loch Ard. After choosing a wild place we had to explore it and learn about different aspects of the wild place. This could include anything from walks, cycles, camps or plant identification.
For the third challenge area, we had to put something back to the wild place. Like the other challenge areas we had lots of freedom to choose what we wanted to do, some Junior Rangers chose to build bug hotels or carry out OPAL Surveys, which will help scientists across Britain protect wild places.
The last challenge area is where we compile everything we have done. Like all the other areas we could also choose how we shared our award. I shared my work on Twitter, some shared with friends and families.
After all working hard on our projects over the summer and October holidays, we arranged to have a presentation gathering where we shared our award with the rest of the Junior Rangers and parents.
HALLOWEEN
Aidan Cronin (S5)
McLaren High raised more than £300 for Teenage Cancer Trust at its S1 and S2 Halloween disco. During the night staff and pupils helped to raise funds by competing in various events such as a pumpkin coin toss and dookin’ for apples.
With an array of costumes from Harry Potter characters to John Lennon – It was a difficult task for the judges however amongst the winners were Morgan Stevenson (S2) who dressed as Baby Shark and Will MacLellan (S2) who was dressed as the Spotty Man.