Chrissy Ryan’s Speech to the Prep 100 Days Assembly

Prep 100 Days Assembly

A few months ago, I visited our oldest Old Girl. She is 104 years of age. 100 years difference in age from our oldest old girl and our youngest Prep girl.

Recently I have been thinking about my time at St Catherine’s and in particular my time in Barbreck.

As today is the Assembly to celebrate the Prep’s 100 days at St Catherine’s, I decided to calculate how long ago I had my 100 days. Armed with a calculator, and a lot of sums, the number appeared on the screen – 19080. 19080 days ago I sat in the Barbreck hall. It was two buildings ago but the uniform was much the same, except we had to wear a school hat and gloves in winter and a straw hat in summer.

When I was in Prep, we drank little bottles of milk every recess before we headed out to the playground to play on the old tram. We had monkey bars, swings, and slides. We traded swap cards, we played hopscotch, handstands and elastics, and every afternoon we had nap time. Just half an hour to recharge the batteries before the next activity or lesson. We read books like Dick and Dora, Nip and Fluff. We did cutting and pasting, and learned maths with queezanaire blocks.

St Catherine’s girls are extraordinary and very special. We have Old Girls who are vets, doctors, astronauts, artists, musicians, Olympians, politicians and charity heroes. St Catherine’s girls can be anything they want to be. There are 7500 of us. Dreaming big and striving to be the best we can be in whatever we do. That’s what matters.

Last year, SCOGA introduced a Red Steps badge. This badge is now given to all the Year 6 girls who graduate from Barbreck. It was so well received, that we decided to do something special for the Prep girls from now on.

Today, SCOGA is giving you a very special present. A Teddy Bag Tag. This tag will signify that you started at St Catherine’s in Prep. I hope that every time you see your tag swinging on your bag, that it will remind you how fortunate you are to be St Catherine’s girl.

 

 

Mrs Chrissy Ryan, President St Catherine’s Old Girls’ Association