Throughout several days in Week 9, selected members of the Academic Excellence Program participated in the 'Da Vinci Decathlon'. This is a competition where several schools challenge themselves to answer difficult questions, make innovative creations and think outside of the box in the following subjects: Mathematics, Science, English, Art and Poetry, Engineering, Creative Producers, Cartography, Code Breaking, General Knowledge and Ideation, which is a new subject. The theme for this year's competition was 'power'. That being power in general, whether being in politics, environmental power or power generated by humans.

The College was represented by teams from Years 7, 8, 9 and 10, who travelled to Wesley College with a designated teacher to participate. However, prior to the competition, we attended many practice sessions, organised by Mrs Carvalho, preparing us for the day. We were given multiple practice questions to improve our skills in the several areas, but also attended early mornings, recess, lunch and afternoon sessions preparing. Some of our preparation included making gliders, inspired by Leonardo da Vinci's model, for the engineering task, thinking of ways to build a school on Mars for the ideology task and being creative and unique for the art and poetry task. We would like to thank students, Madison Conley and Adriana Gough for giving us some tips on how to succeed in the Art and Poetry task and we also thank Mrs Davies who prepared us for Creative Producers. We greatly appreciate Mrs Carvalho's dedication and hard work in helping us prepare for the competition.

The Gala Day, although very challenging, was an all round fun and thrilling day. AvÐÔ°® teams embodied the values of the College, showing teamwork, unity and excellence.

Each team worked to their best ability to achieve as high as possible.

All teams placed in the top three of at least one or more individual categories. These include:

YEAR 7
3rd - Art and Poetry
3rd - English
3rd - Ideation

YEAR 8
1st - General knowledge
2nd - Engineering
2nd - Ideation

YEAR 9
1st - General knowledge
3rd - Art and Poetry
3rd - Mathematics

YEAR 10
2nd - Ideation
3rd - Art and poetry

A special congratulations goes to the Year 8 team, who achieved an outstanding 3rd place out of 17 schools, earning themselves medallions.

Overall, the 'Da Vinci Decathlon' was an amazing learning experience, giving budding students the opportunity to extend above their limits, thinking creatively and challenging themselves to show true academic excellence.

We would like the thank the following teachers for their support on the day and/or in the lead up: Mr Matthews, Mr Clark, Mrs Di Giuseppe and most importantly Mrs Carvalho, who organised and prepared the teams.

Below are the names of the students who participated.

YEAR 7
Michael Bovet, Hudson Craig-Power, Sophia Covella, Grace Harben, Hugh Livingstone, Sophie Oversby, Elke Ruane, Jennifer Tassone

YEAR 8
Ashton Chow, Steven Derbyshire, Thomas Erkes, Alira Malan, Shannon Marie Rees, Leah Nigli, Emma Runyon, Ella Waddy

YEAR 9
Mary Alamiyo
Dieter Cadzow
Deetya Charles
Edison Foo
Kalea Gowland
Thomas Nicholls
Konrad Rucki
Siobhan Stevens

Year 10
Annabel Biscotto
Joseph Damiano
Elizabeth Hart
Tiana Inman
Abbey Janssen
Brett Nigli
Bryce Rimmer
Sam Vincent