2009-2010 SJK Annual Report - St. John's-Kilmarnock School

e-staged at the Registry Theatre in Kitchener in May
so that members of the SJK community had the
opportunity to see it performed.
One of the major achievements in drama for 2010 Priscila Uppal,
was SJK’s hosting of the Conference of Independent SJK’s 2010
Schools’ Drama Festival. Although SJK has
Writer in
participated in the festival for more than a decade, Residence and
Olympic Poet in
the absence of theatre facilities here at the school
Residence
has always made it impossible for SJK to serve as
host. When no host school emerged after the 2009
festival, however, SJK agreed to keep the festival alive
by hosting off-site at the University of Waterloo.
Although this presented a number of unique
challenges, the festival held in April was a great
success, with 12 schools participating in workshops
and performances at the university’s Theatre of the
Arts. SJK also chaired the annual directors’ meeting of
drama teachers held at the festival, at which a
process was put in place to ensure the continued
success of the festival in the coming years.
The annual Arts Around Us evening in May provided an
enjoyable venue for student talent to round out the
Our Country’s Good
year, with a performance of Alan Ayckbourn’s one-act
comedy, Table Manners. All in all, this was another
busy, productive, and highly successful year for the SJK drama program.
Creative Writing: SJK was privileged to have as Writer-in-Residence
Priscila Uppal, novelist, poet, and professor during an important year for
her professionally. Priscila was chosen to be the Poet in Residence for
the Canadian Olympic Team. The grade 11 classes studied Ms Uppal’s
wonderful novel, To Whom It May Concern. Ms Uppal joined the class
several times to discuss aspects of her novel. In return, the classes
produced a Reader’s Guide to the novel which is now online. Our
creative writers ended the year with an Evening of Readings at Whispers
Restaurant in Elora, co-hosted by Mr. Hoad-Reddick and Priscila Uppal.
Our students won several
awards, including taking two of
three senior awards for creative
writing in the InCITE publication,
judged by acclaimed Canadian
author Nino Ricci.