Maris Stella School

Two weekends, two galas, and quite the collection of medals for our Zara Oganisian. 🏊‍♀️ 🏊‍♀️ 🏊‍♀️

At the recent EDA Gala, Zara raced in seven events, taking five 1st places in the 200m Free, 50m Free, 50m Back, 100m Fly and 50m Fly, as well as two 2nd places in the 100m Back and 100m IM.

Zara also competed in the Westville Swimming Club Gala, where she won gold in Free, Fly and 100m IM, silver in Backstroke, and even raced up in the 12-year-old Fly category, bringing home a bronze.

That’s a LOT of laps. We are so proud of you Zara - giving your best even on the off season! 🐠 🏊🏾

RESPECT. A SMALL WORD WITH A BIG REACH. ❤ 💒

At yesterday's Mass, we welcomed a very special guest back to Maris Stella, Fr Rocco Sekweyama, from St Catherine’s Parish in Chesterville.

The theme of our Mass was respect, and we were invited to think a little more deeply about what that really means. Respect for God. Respect for His creation. Respect for one another, for ourselves, and importantly, how we choose to show it.

Fr Rocco’s visit also brought with it a rather lovely full-circle moment.

During our 125th year in 2024, we reflected on the generosity of those who helped build Maris Stella all the way back in 1899. So, when Fr Rocco approached us for help in building a church for the Chesterville community, it felt especially meaningful to pay a little of that kindness forward.

Our Maris Stella community raised R15 000 towards the building of St Anne's Church. And next month... the doors are opening and the people of Chesterville now have a church to call their own.

A beautiful reminder that respect, kindness and generosity have a wonderful way of travelling. Sometimes, even across 125 years. Thank you to everyone who contributed. ❤ 💒

Our Grade 11 girls, Katelyn Allorto, Holly van Hussteen and Taya van Deventer recently put their heads, and hard-core engineering skills together at the SAICE KZN Bridge Building Competition.

The challenge? Design and build a bridge from a supplied kit, then put it to the ultimate weight test.

Their awesome bridge carried an impressive 140 Newtons, placing them 4th out of 20 high schools in KZN. But there was another amazing result too…

🏆 The girls were awarded the Phil Everitt Trophy for Innovation and Design.🏆
We are so super proud. Well done you three!

**BUILDING BRIDGES TOGETHER** ⛪
Our Grade 6 girls recently spent the day with our Grade 1 friends from St James Primary School, pairing up to read, draw, write, play, share prayers and quite a lot of singing and dancing too. 😊 👩🏻‍🎤 🎤 👨🏾‍🎤

Laughter, lots of chit-chatter and some very sweet new friendships were made along the way; but it was such a lovely reminder that connection doesn’t always need a grand gesture or agenda. Sometimes it starts with simply sitting down on the carpet beside someone and saying "hi". We think that's the best way to build beautifully meaningful bridges, don't you!

NATIONAL FINALS, HERE SHE COMES! 💃 🎤

A very big Maris Stella well done to Murphy Kidwell who recently competed at the Regional South African Championships of Performing Arts (SACOPA). Murphy has been selected to represent KZN at the National Finals next month.

She will be competing in 7 vocal solos, 3 dance solos and 2 group performances. That’s a whole lot of singing, dancing, rehearsing and courage packed into one very talented Maris Stella girl. We are so proud of you Murphy! ❣ 🙌 ❣

Enjoy every minute of that national stage. We’ll be cheering loudly from home.

Our girls like to argue... and we love that for them! 😜
A huge congratulations to Ines Canciani, Siddhi Maharaj and Alehra Naiker, who represented the DCDL at the KZN Provincial Debating Tournament recently.

👏 Alehra and her team debated their way through to the Junior Open quarterfinals.

👏 Ines was named the 7th Best Junior Speaker and has been selected as one of just 40 speakers invited to trial for a place in the 25-member KZN Junior Squad.

👏 Siddhi was named the 6th Best Junior Speaker, with her team finishing as Plate Runners-Up. She too has been selected to trial for the KZN Junior Squad.

Quick thinking. Strong arguments. Plenty of courage to stand up and have your say.
We are very very proud of you, girls. For these achievements and for bing such great role models to your peers.

🎭 **THE VERDICT IS IN…**
And we’re rather proud of this one.

In the very first week of term, our budding thespians headed to the inaugural FEDA KZN Festival with *The Accused* – a wonderfully absurd courtroom drama in which the accused has one fairly significant problem… she has absolutely no idea what she’s been accused of.

Written, directed and brought to life by our girls, it was brave, funny, clever and completely their own.

And the adjudicators agreed.

Maris Stella finished in the **Top 5 schools in KZN**, with nominations for:

🎭 Best Directors – Faye Bullen, Kate Fobo, Mpilwenhle Ndlovu, Catherine Stewart & Yuvanka Pillay
🎭 Best Set Design
🎭 Best Comic Performance / Comic Ensemble
🎭 Best Lighting Design
🎭 Best Social Media
🎭 Best Actor in a Cameo Role – Faye Bullen

And then came two very special wins:

🏆 **Best Behind-the-Scenes Crew**
🏆 **Best New Writing (Original Script) – Faye Bullen**

That last one deserves an extra little cheer. An original script, written by one of our own and performed on a provincial stage. How super cool is that?

A huge congratulations to every school that took part, to all the award winners and to overall winners Kearsney College. What a privilege for our girls to share a stage with young people who are creating, experimenting and taking risks with their craft.

Thank you to the FEDA organisers and the UKZN Centre for Creative Arts for creating such an exciting platform for young theatre-makers in KZN.

And to our cast, crew, backstage team, parents, staff and the brilliant Maris Stella supporters who came along to cheer them on… take a bow young ladies. 👏

**CAST**
The Accused – Inés Canciani
Prosecutor – Amy Barnes
Judge – Anele Ndlovu
Defence – Alwande Mathonsi
Witness 1 / Danielle Jones – Faye Bullen
Witness 2 / Kevin White – Kate Fobo
Witness 3 / Taylor Smith – Yuvanka Pillay
Boss 1 – Callia Perkett
Boss 2 – Azande Biyande
Waiter – Mpilwenhle Ndlovu
Salesman – Zion Jayiya

**TECHNICAL CREW**
Rebecca Sutcliffe, Catherine Stewart & Aphiwe Mthethwa

**BACKSTAGE**
Faye Bullen, Mpilwenhle Ndlovu & Natasha Mutize

**POSTER DESIGN**
Catherine Stewart

Case closed. 🔨🎭
Until next year, FEDA!

FEDA UKZN College of Humanities

Today, we celebrate the women in our Maris Stella world. ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ ❤️

The women who teach, guide, encourage, listen, lead and show up. The mums, grannies, teachers, staff, old girls and friends who quietly shape the lives of our girls in a hundred different ways.

And perhaps that’s the loveliest part of being a girls’ school. Every day, we get to watch the next generation of women finding their voices, backing themselves, looking out for one another and becoming more and more themselves.

HAPPY WOMEN'S DAY!

Could 2028 be her Maris Stella year? ❤. ❤. ❤. ❤ .

It might feel a little way off, but the journey to Grade 8 starts sooner than you think.

Our Grade 8 2028 applications and scholarship applications are now open, and between now and then, there will be plenty of opportunities to come onto campus, meet us, play some sport, ask all the questions and get a real feel for life at Maris Stella.

Because choosing a school is a big decision.
We don't expect you to make it from a website or a prospectus.
Come and get to know us.

We've popped all the important dates above 👆🏼

And if Maris Stella feels like it could be the place for your daughter, we'd love to start the journey with you.

Visit www.marisstella.co.za to get going.