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High Notes, Vol 27 No 22, July 31 2026

From the Principal

High Talent

Grace Guan has been honoured with the 2026 Public School Parent and Volunteer Award. The Public Education Awards officially launches Public Education Week and celebrates the remarkable achievements of students, staff, parents, volunteers and schools across the NSW public education system. Through close collaboration with the P&C, school staff, executive and fellow parent volunteers, Grace has helped strengthen canteen services that support student wellbeing, community participation and an inclusive school environment for six years. Since 2022, she has volunteered 142 days of service, while also taking on the substantial responsibility of coordinating volunteers and supporting canteen operations as Canteen Volunteer Coordinator. In addition, she has supported Open Days, Orientation Days and Graduation Ceremonies, and contributed to both the Basketball and Rugby Sub committees, including coordinating basketball canteen activities and helping organise the annual Basketball Dinner. She is certainly a very worthy recipient of this award.

Our High Volleyball team was successful in the CHS Knockout Competition last week, defeating Chatswood High School to regain the state title that we like to think is one we can win each year. Roger He was judged Most Valuable Player of the tournament. The High team comprised: Athithan Mayuran 12F (Captain), Luke Liu 12F, Axel Lam 11E, Adam Flocard 11E, Anthony Ly 11E, Aaron Jin 11R, Roger He 11E, Ethan Huynh 11M, Ethan Yu 11F, Kevin Bui 11R, Rihu Kim 11M, Kevin Lin 10S and Isaiah Goh 10E. Our congratulations are extended to these boys, along with their coach, David Zhou, and team Manager, Wesley Beare. Well done, indeed!

Our Target Rifle Shooting Team was runner-up in each of the GPS matches contested last week – Rawson Cup, NRA Shield and Buchanan Shield. The boys shot very well, with scores in some matches that would have won in most years. This year, SGS set a record in second grade and beat High narrowly in each of the three first grade matches held at Hornsby Rifle Range. Lachlan Yuen was selected in the Combined GPS team – a significant achievement. The boys shot well – very consistent, disciplined, supportive and methodical. They brought honour to our school in their team demeanour, sportsmanship and results. Our second-grade boys set a new school record of 525.24/560. First Grade: Tristan Dean (Captain), Lachlan Yuen (Vice-Captain), Felix McAllan-Yem, Om Kothari, Muhammad Zeeshan, Matthew Ryder and Jensen Wang. Second Grade: Anderson Lee (Captain), Marcus Zhu (Vice-Captain), James Diao, Avneet Singh, Lance Denigan, Owen Trinh, Ethan Trinh and Sidney Bi. Congratulations to Mr Terry Fong for his success in his first year as MIC of Rifle Shooting and thank you to our multiple long-term coaches and volunteer Old Boys.

Congratulations to our latest Duke of Edinburgh Awardees: gold - Oliver Boije (12M), bronze – Jason Kwok (10S), Tenzin Lama (10F) and Daniel Qian (10M).

Mobile Phone Policy

At our Staff Development Day, we renewed our SBHS Mobile Phone Policy, because staff were concerned at the number of recorded breaches of the protocols by students. DOE Policy is that the use of mobile phones is banned in NSW Public Schools. Students and parents need to know and respect these restrictions on mobile phone use. Our School Policy states that students may carry mobile phones, but they must be ‘off and away’ (in school bags) during our school day, usually 0850-1510. Our response to breaches by students has four phases.

First breach – negative incident recorded in Sentral and teacher detention. Second breach – negative incident recorded in Sentral and Head Teacher detention. Third breach – negative incident on Sentral and Deputy Principal detention and student completes Reflection and Agreement - Breach of Mobile Phone Policy on school grounds. Fourth breach, Negative incident recorded in Sentral and referred to Deputy Principal who issues an Intention to Suspend letter and contacts the students’ parents. This policy is quite lenient on the face of it, but if a student has four breaches in one or two days, our response will be escalated to the Intention to Suspend level, because incidents are cumulative in effect.

Public Education Week- August 3 – 7

The  is a celebration of Public Education during this first week in August every year. This year’s theme is Inspiring Excellence – a concept at the core of the ethos at High. During next week we should take time to promote the achievements of public education, particularly its positive impact on so many lives. We expend many resources, human, physical and financial, endeavouring to inspire excellence in our boys, supported by our heavily engaged parents and dedicated Old Boys. The High diaspora can be justly proud of the outcomes.

Valé Steve Ashcroft

The High tennis community was saddened by the sudden passing of veteran tennis professional Steve Ashcroft. Steve was licensee of the nearby tennis courts on Cleveland St. for many years. Our students still play tennis there on weekdays and Saturday mornings, but there is now a new licensee. Not only was Steve a very good coach, but also a strong supporter of public education. Often, he would fail to send an invoice for the hire of the tennis courts for our summer program – a considerable saving for us. He just loved tennis and coaching people a lot more than he loved money – a rare and admirable characteristic. He was still coaching casually with David Deep on the school courts until his passing. A good man gone.
Dr K A Jaggar
Principal