Burnside High School

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Burnside High School (Waimairi-iri)

Motto	Recte Sic Dirige Cursum - Thus direct thy path aright
Type	State Secondary School (years 9 through 15)
Year established	1960
Address	Greers Road, Burnside, Christchurch
Principal	Ron Noordijk[1]
School roll	2572
Socio-economic decile (10 is high)	9
Ministry of Education Institution no.	319
Website	Burnside High School

Burnside High School (BHS) (Called Waimairi-iri in Maori), the second biggest high school in New Zealand with over 2500 students, is located in Burnside in Christchurch, New Zealand.

The school believes in the policy of placing emphasis on individuals and meeting the needs of individuals rather than groups and an emphasis on achievement and doing a 'personal best'.

1 Academics
2 History
3 Notable Alumni
4 Structure
5 Motto, Crest and Colours
6 Grounds and Facilities
7 External links

[edit] Academics

Consisting of over 2500 students, Burnside High School is rated as a decile nine school[2], and retains many of its students through to Year 13, where most of these students then go on to tertiary education.

The school uses the NCEA assessment system for Years 11 through 13.

[edit] History

Main article: History of Burnside High School

[edit] Notable Alumni

John Key, leader of the National Party
Hayley Westenra, New Zealand soprano
Andrew Ellis, a New Zealand All Black

[edit] Structure

The school is split into four divisions to ease management. These are named North, South, West and Senior, where the first three consist of students from Years 9-12 and the Senior division consists of only Year 13 students. Each division has a guidance counsellor and two deans, excluding Senior division which has one dean. Also, the three junior divisions each have their own Divisional Principal. There is also a Principal, Second Principal and Assistant Principal, as well as 13 Head of Departments.

The idea of divisions effectively means, while each student belongs to the school, they are part of a 'smaller school' to help better individual care and attention to students. When a student enrols, they are assigned randomly to a division, unless they have a sibling currently attending, in which case they are assigned to their division (with the exception that a new student with a sibling in Senior Division would not be assigned to Senior Division too, unless they were also Year 13)

To aid the idea of individuals within the school, each staff member is required to know the name of each student they interact with, a decision made by the school very near it's beginnings.

[edit] Motto, Crest and Colours

The school's motto is Recte Sic Dirige Cursum, which means 'Thus direct thy path aright'

The school's crest is a cabbage tree, due to the historic importance of a group of cabbage palms situated on the school grounds. These trees were used as an important landmark by Maori travellers before European settlement of Canterbury.

The school's main uniform colour is green.

[edit] Grounds and Facilities

The school has well-equipped facilities to cope with its 2500+ population, consisting of 14 blocks containing usable classrooms, labeled alphabetically A through M, and X, a multi-million dollar Library and Administration Building (also containing a Sick Bay and Student Office), three gyms, a pool, a canteen (similar to a cafeteria), an auditorium capable of seating 750 people, and numerous sports fields and courts situated on the grounds, which are a total of 16.2 hectares (40 acres) in size.