Gathering the Grands at the Boys’ School

This year’s Boys’ School Grandparents Day began in fitting style, with the skirl of the pipes welcoming guests to Shore Road campus. For the first time, the morning opened with a formal assembly held in JC Chalmers Hall, and the turnout was so large that the hall reached full capacity, with overflow seating outside.

Principal Peter Cassie set the tone with his trademark humour, reflecting on the special relationship between grandparents and their grandchildren. He quipped about his own grandchild’s supposed future as a genius and Olympic athlete, drawing knowing laughter from an audience well aware of the “rose-tinted glasses” that come with grandparenthood.

Musical performances from the Jazz Band, Junior Chorus, and Kapa Haka offered a taste of the talent within some of the extracurricular programmes which entertain at many school events, year-round.

After the assembly, grandparents joined their grandsons in classrooms to share in the year’s learning. They were read poetry, proudly shown artwork, joined in with science experiments and some coloured cartoons of themselves, before enjoying morning tea together. Many took guided tours of the campus, seeing first-hand the environment that shapes their grandsons’ days.

By morning’s end, grandparents departed well-fed, well-entertained, and perhaps even more convinced their grandsons are destined for greatness, and who could argue with that?