Penrith High Towers-Alumni

Dear Alumni and former staff,

Each term, when we put Towers Alumni together it is often at the peak of a busy time of term, but it is nice to look back at recent visits or success that have been shared with us. Of course, most recently, our focus has been around the 70th Anniversary of the school and two major events - the Open Day planned for the last Saturday of term one and the Luncheon to be held in September.

Of course, the Open Day was cancelled when the seriousness of COVID-19 was clear and we are all hoping that it ends so we can get back to some form of normality. I do hope among other things that we can enjoy lunch on the 19th of September. As well, our Alumni Night, usually held at the end of term two, is in doubt.

As you know being former students and staff, the school community is resilient, industrious and gets things done. We had a strong sense that students wouldn’t be at school and the staff moved quickly to up-skill each other around a number of technology tools to enable teaching and learning to take place whilst we ensured that any student without a device was allocated one from school.

In what felt somewhat like a holding pattern, lessons continued at school. Every teacher was given a spray bottle and paper towels and students wiped down their desks throughout the day. Since 2018, we have run a 6 period day, so in the even numbered periods the even number year groups would all head off to the toilet blocks to wash their hands while singing happy birthday (twice over of course) and in the odd number periods, years 7, 9 and 11 would do the same. It was somewhat comforting to hear Happy Birthday echoing down the hallways each period.

The morning after the Premier asked parents to keep students at home where possible, we started live lessons via Zoom & Google classroom at 9am and continue to run the school using the 2020 timetable. Science experiments are still run, the PE staff are still delivering practical lessons for students online to ensure that they are moving and sweating and the quality of each period is something that we are all proud of.

We are mindful of how the HSC will look and ensuring that Year 12 are looked after and they will be.

In closing, we received news last week that the NSW Government has provided a sizeable grant of nearly $40,000 for the Alumni Garden which is looking incredible at the front of the school. There are a number of pictures in this edition of Towers- Alumni and it is lovely to see the personalised pavers when walking along the path and of course ensuring that the two sandstone pieces from Towers sit securely in front of the new gazebo.

I wish you and your families the very best over these trying times and hope that we can all connect later in the year as we mark 70 years of the school. The school motto of Altiora Peto captures the spirit of everyone working on the solutions to COVID-19.

Warm regards,

Mark Long

Principal

At: Penrith Paceway

Date: Saturday 19 September 2020

Time: Midday (subject to change to meet catering requirements)

Capacity: Maximum 200 persons

Approx. Cost: $75.00 (excludes bar purchases)

Eligibility: At this time, invitation is only open only to those who attended PHS between the years 1950 and 2010 (this may be relaxed, depending on demand for seats)

Key Dates:

1 March 2020 - final details advertised

1 May 2020 - Ticket sales open

Facebook: Penrith High School 70th Anniversary Reunion

Contact: Jim Mason email <masomika@tpg.com.au>

Alumna, Miriam White (Class of 2000) is a member of the management team at the recently completed Quest Apartments in Penrith. Located on the northern side of Penrith station, the rooms and conference venue are modern, high quality and new. Although we know that events across the country are postponed during COVID-19, the discounted rate has been provided by Miriam to help reunion organisers and former students who are considering accommodation in Penrith.

Thanks Miriam!

The History Interest Club, led by our Head Teacher History are gathering information about all of our past captains. The plan is to create a book which has the male and female captain for each year on a double page. There will be the name and year on each page. Each page is intended to have a school photo of the captain (when actually the captain) and a more recent photo beside it.

Underneath this will be four questions:

1. What is your best memory of Penrith High School?

2. What did you think you would be doing after you left high school?

3. What are you doing now?

4. What is the best advice you could give to current PHS students?

We may be able to get some of these responses from the profiles in the back of The Towers but would enjoy hearing from as many former captains or their families as possible.

If you were a past captain or family member could you forward a suitable photo and your responses to the four questions. This will be passed on to the relevant students.

Each student in the History Interest Group has been allocated a five year period to research.

If you know the contact details of any past captain could you pass this information onto the school via the school email penrith-h.school@det.nsw.edu.au and make it attention to Clark Stone. Clark is our Head Teacher History.

The intention is to present this book to the school in 2020 for the 70th Anniversary with copies for sale and one to be placed in the school foyer.

Below is the information we have so far.

The names in yellow are contact details we have already received.

The names with asterisks have sent us their information.

NOTE: If you have sent us your information and your name is not asterisked our sincere apologies but is it possible to please send it through to Clark again?

Melinda graduated from Penrith High in 1997.

She topped the state in 2U and 3U Legal Studies and studied Commerce/Law at UNSW.

Recently Uber hired Melinda Roylett to lead its UK and Ireland operations.

Joining from Square, the fintech startup founded by Twitter chief exec Jack Dorsey, Roylett will be responsible for Uber's UK business across 40 towns and cities, as well as the Republic of Ireland. She will be responsible for more than 60,000 licensed private hire drivers and around five million riders.

Prior to being head of Europe for Square, Roylett spent close to a decade at PayPal, where she oversaw its small and medium business division.

She will report to Jamie Heywood, who was recently appointed general manager of Uber in Northern and Eastern Europe. Heywood said the exec's international experience working for highly regulated companies in regional offices and company HQs would be "invaluable" in helping write Uber's "next chapter".

"She joins at a particularly exciting time for Uber in London, bringing our platform vision to life with electric vehicles, in-app tube and bus transport and Jump bikes all in the same app," he added.

Email: penrith-h.school@det.nsw.edu.au
Website: https://penrith-h.schools.nsw.gov.au
Location: 158-240 High Street, Penrith NSW, Australia
Phone: 02 4721 0529
Facebook: facebook.com/penrithselectivehighschool