Shawnigan Lake School | News & updates

Decisions, Decisions: The 360 Fair

9/13/2024

One of the biggest choices a Shawnigan student will make at the start of the school year is selecting their 360 option. 360 is Shawnigan’s co-curricular after-school program, and the annual 360 Fair on September 6, the first Friday of the year, gave students an opportunity to check out this year’s offerings – more than 30 in all – before making that all-important selection.

360 operates separately from regular classes, but it is still a key aspect of the Shawnigan Journey. It started with a focus on fine arts, but has evolved over the decades to include a wide range of activities, from Figure Skating and Fly Tying to Film Production and Robotics. Some programs run for the full year, while others run for half a year, giving students an opportunity to try out multiple 360s over the year.

Feel the Thunder

9/13/2024

Young rugby players from across western Canada gathered on campus in August for a powerful camp that marked the 10th anniversary of the partnership between Shawnigan Lake School and Thunder Indigenous Rugby.

The camp was led by Mr. Clay Panga, a rugby coach at Shawnigan and the School’s Indigenous Engagement Coordinator, who has been part of Thunder Rugby since its inception in 2013 and a coach with the program for the last five years.

“I feel incredibly honoured and privileged to have witnessed the transformative growth of both the program and its participants,” Mr. Panga said.

Lake Omar Remediation Project

9/6/2024

A major project got underway in August to begin the remediation of Lake Omar, the natural centrepiece of the Shawnigan campus.

Located in the heart of the school grounds, Lake Omar – one of two catchment ponds on campus – overflows into Hartl Creek, which then flows into Shawnigan Creek and eventually the Pacific Ocean. Lake Omar is the heart of a thriving ecosystem with a plethora of water and riparian plants, invertebrates, insects, birds and mammals. It supplies water to the Mark Hobson Hatchery on a seasonal basis, and in past years, it has also been stocked with trout and has been a favourite spot for students to flyfish. Unfortunately, Lake Omar is only a shallow pond and thus cannot sustain the life of fish year around as during the summer months the water becomes too hot to sustain fish life.

In 2013-14, a group of like-minded people with backgrounds in biology, fisheries, and water quality got together with some Shawnigan science teachers to discuss how to improve the year-round health of this water body and how to ensure it could sustain the year-round life of fish. On Founder’s Day 2023, Kevin Tutty ’14 (Lake’s) and his father Brian, a retired fisheries and oceans biologist, brought up those discussions from a decade earlier with Head of School Mr. Larry Lamont, who put a plan in motion.

University and AP Highlights

9/6/2024

As the 2024-25 school year begins, we are excited to see nearly all members of the Class of 2024 begin the next stage of their education and personal journeys at universities across Canada and around the world. We are also celebrating the success in AP exams of students who were members of that graduating class and who are still at the School.

Of the 140 students who graduated from Shawnigan last spring, 90 percent have gone on to university, while the other 10 percent will pursue a gap year. The primary reason for taking a gap year is to pursue a sport, with hockey being the most popular. Of those students who are in university this fall, over 40 percent will pursue arts programs (including humanities and social sciences). Science is the next most popular program, followed by business.

Students in the Class of 2024 submitted on average 7.55 applications each, and 58 percent of these applications resulted in offers of admission, which is in line with 59 percent in 2023 and 57 percent in 2022. Most students accepted offers to study in Canada (73 percent), followed by the US (14 percent), and then the UK (one percent). The most popular institutions for graduates from 2024 are Queen’s University (16 students attending), the University of BC (13), the University of Toronto (12), the University of Victoria (10) and Western University (eight). The Class of 2024 received a total of $3,235,144 CAD in scholarship offers.

5 Year Dinner

6/24/2024

Following the Shawnigan Journey from Grade 8 through to Grade 12 is an experience like no other. Students who complete all five years at the School develop unique relationships with each other and with the School in general.

Every year, the students who started at Shawnigan in Grade 8 and remained here through to graduation are celebrated with the 5 Year Dinner, hosted in the back gardens of the Head’s House.