Branksome Hall EXTRACURRICULARS

I really think what differentiates the school is Branksome’s commitment to pushing you towards your passion. For example in the IB program, you have to do ‘CCAS,’ which is an acronym for ‘Community, Creativity, Action, and Service’.  Most schools would only have CCAS, which is in Grades 11 and 12. That’s it. Whereas Branksome instills those values in Grades 7 and 8, when you have to do the Principal’s Award.  After that, in Grade 9, you start doing the Duke of Edinburgh Award, and then you’re doing CCAS in Grades 11 and 12. So they’re really instilling in you the fact that you have to be doing extracurriculars. Some people might find that tiring—but without them, many people wouldn’t have found what they’re passionate about. They really find your passion at Branksome, and then narrow into your passion, and they offer so many different programs.

Sometimes, the idea of ‘hard-working’ is perceived as only about academics, but everyone had very unique passions, and seeing people pursue those passions was great. I think a lot of students were really excited to try different things that Branksome had to offer, and get involved in whatever ways that they enjoyed. As we progressed from Grade 7 to Grade 12, it was great to see people forge their own paths and be passionate about different things. ... Being hard-working is a common thread among Branksome students. I think all of my friends, and all of my peers, were just very driven. And that drive wasn’t always with the same thing.

Branksome Hall has always offered a high-quality education, where the faculty and staff have always been exceptionally knowledgeable in their field. ... I think of my rugby coach who helped me fall in love with the sport and gave me the encouragement to continue to play in college and my guidance counselor who always knew how to help me focus on my goals and not be discouraged by a low grade or a conflict with a peer. ... Even now when I go back and see a teacher I once had, they ask about certain family members or reminisce on moments from my Branksome days (15+ years ago!).

It’s the extracurriculars at Branksome Hall that make you have the most fun, and the most spirit. Branksome is a spirited school. They love involvement, they love leadership and extracurriculars. The way to make the most of your experience at Branksome is by involving yourself in different extracurriculars, and finding something that you’re passionate about.

The other thing that has been incredible for her is that she joined rowing this year, and she's the coxie for the Grade 9 class. And she's finding her voice and her leadership skills and all of her great skills that she's learned at Branksome in terms of being strong and being committed and being a good leader are all being put to test as she sits in the coxswain seat and she's doing a great job there.

I would say the biggest impact the school has had is in terms of their confidence in themselves, their leadership, and their desire to present, and make change happen. An example is  Branksome has a wonderful Noodle program, and both of my girls were really excited to apply into it.  So I would say those are the three big things that I’ve seen in my girls—they want to make change, they want to lead. They’re very comfortable presenting, working collaboratively with others, all those life skills that you see in a corporate world, in any type of environment.

We do appreciate that Branksome Hall has provided a very good learning environment for the kids, helped my girl to explore new skills and passion in different areas, and helped her to build up confidence and skills such as how to manage emotion control, and social and leadership skills. She loves to go to school every day and misses her school a lot during holidays.

We love the fact that Branksome creates these globally minded citizens with all the opportunities that kids have for global engagement, especially in the upper school, such as exchange programs, trips abroad, and just creating that awareness of ‘think globally, but act locally’.

You can go on exchange programs. You can go on service trips abroad. You can do an exchange when you get to Grade 9 with Branksome’s sister school in South Korea. There’s the Duke of Edinburgh program. There are just so many opportunities to get involved in, but it’s up to you to get involved.

The extracurricular opportunities are incredibly abundant at Branksome—through exchanges, different creativity clubs, service opportunities, athletic opportunities. My best memories from Branksome are being involved in co-curricular activities.

What surprised me the most was how much my daugther grew as an individual. Even in Junior Kindergarten, you get presented with this amazing portfolio of what your child has accomplished. And it's shocking and super impressive how much your children grow and how much they're experienced, how much they receive in terms of education, but also just opportunities for presentations, for art, for expression, even at the very youngest of ages.

There are so many things in the creative realm, the sports realm, the community service realm, and the academic realm that Branksome offers. To get the most out of your experience and to feel your best when you graduate, in my view, you need to try a lot of different things, and find a passion that you want to commit more time to. Being successful isn’t necessarily a one-lane street. There are a lot of different ways to be successful, and I think trying different things at Branksome, just to try different things, is the way to get there.

Besides the academics, they put a lot of emphasis around really good athletic programs. Everything from dance to sports is really well understood at Branksome and really well supported.

There are so many clubs that you can join. You can start your own club if the one that you want to join isn’t there already.

One word I would use to describe Branksome is ‘well-rounded.’ One of the things I appreciated the most about my time at Branksome was being able to participate in so many different activities that contributed to who I am outside of my education.

Branksome offers more arts programs than what I was expecting. There’s a wide variety. Visual Arts was one of the favourite subjects of my younger daughter when she was going into Grade 7. What I loved was she also had the opportunity to try different kinds of arts programs. In Grade 7 and 8, you do your Visual Arts, you also do drama, but in addition to that, you also have another Arts option in terms of music—whether you do an instrument, Band, or Voice. She opted to do the violin, never having played strings. She had two great years of Violin. She loved the Arts program, the actual Visual Arts, because they did sculptures, they did actual paintings, and they also did a unit on sewing, and they went fairly in depth with these items. And then the other thing is that my older daughter started in Grade 9 and was given an Arts option: she actually opted to do Dance. In Grade 9, you have to commit to two years for your Arts subject. And she said, ‘I picked dance just to be out of my skin and take on a new challenge’.

Branksome Hall provides a wide range of extracurricular opportunities that cater to diverse interests and talents. From sports and arts to clubs and community service, there is something for every student to engage in outside of their academic pursuits. ... The school's extracurricular offerings strike an excellent equilibrium between fostering healthy competition and ensuring that students can engage in activities for pure enjoyment. Whether it's participating in competitive sports, academic contests, or artistic showcases, or simply doing clubs and events for the sheer joy of it, BH offers a diverse range of extracurricular options that cater to various interests and preferences. ... I feel BH is providing the right context in which to develop well-rounded students.

I don't think it would be possible to list all the extracurricular activities I did at Branksome as a kid! ... In the Junior School, I loved being in the Nature Club, where we explored our own Woodlot and the critters and plants that call it home. ... Then, as I crossed the overpass to the Middle and Senior School, I was engaged in various extracurricular activities (Classics Club, rugby, Slogan, Environmental Club, SSUNS, debating -- just to name a few). Being able to participate in a variety of extracurricular activities allowed me to tap into all the different interests I had and explore who I was and which path I might want to take once I graduated from Branksome. There are two extracurriculars that have had a lasting impact on me, Best Buddies and photography. ... Photography helped me to develop my love of creating images from start to finish (from setting up the frame to developing the prints), and I continued long past graduation developing my own prints using the skills I was taught during my time at Branksome. Having a darkroom in our building and a knowledgeable teacher leading the group was remarkable, as I know many friends at other independent schools did not have the same opportunity.

Branksome offers a ton of extracurricular activities. There are endless amounts of clubs at Branksome that cover a wide range of interests. As well there are endless ways for students to get involved as well. There are athletics councils, service councils and arts councils that welcome students from the 7th to the 12th grade. The athletics at Branksome is also great, the rowing team is definitely a standout. But they also have teams that compete in the Division 1 level and the Division 2 level throughout high school.

Branksome has some incredible things to offer and endless amounts of opportunities and the students know they cannot waste it, they soak up every chance they get to get involved in the school.

The opportunities to meet other girls in different grade levels are phenomenal. I still have great friendships with girls that were many years ahead of me. I have friendships with girls that were behind me. I made the decision to study at Branksome very young, and my parents certainly had some input on it. But for me, I think when considering the school, if you do end up choosing Branksome and you do end up joining the Branksome community, I would say as advice to a new student to just jump in with two feet and to not wonder, ‘Oh, should I join that arts club or should I join that environmental club?’ I would say to really get involved and to join as many of the things that you can handle in your own bandwidth of being a student. 

The clubs offered by the school provided my girls with opportunities to meet other girls. I think the school did a good job as well by matching them up with a ‘buddy’. My daughter when she started at Branksome in Grade 9, she actually did meet and become friends with two girls who are in residence—one is from Germany, the other one is from Alberta. I think the school works with you in order to make sure that you do transition into the school really well.

With the challenge of the IB program, that you’re going through with friends, and the co-curriculars that you’re going through with friends, the friendships that come from those two areas are another reason to choose Branksome. I formed many friendships from those two areas, both curricular and co-curricular. I’m still in touch with so many of the girls from my graduating class, and I live with friends from high school here at university. Being able to still have that connection is so, so valuable because you get to see people grow and change, and that is nice and rewarding to see. You also have friends for life.

I think that Branksome has a really collaborative sense of community, a collaborative sense of education. I think collaboration is a huge value at the school.  The other thing I would say from a values perspective is being well-rounded. I think that we try to encourage our kids to be really well-rounded and to not just focus on one sport and to not just focus on one activity. And I think Branksome does a really good job of having an athletic pillar to the community and encouraging the girls on ‘Fit Fridays’ to wear different attire and to have a sense of fitness on Fridays.

I think back fondly on these teachers, and many other teachers I had the luck of having through the years, who went beyond the curriculum to learn about me as a person to help me navigate school (academically, emotionally, and socially). ... The clubs, sports, Spirit Week, Clans, Branksome Green, Big-Sister/Little-Sister all were favorite parts of my time at Branksome Hall. ... It is this pride that made me come back to work in the Junior School when completing my Masters of Education at the University of Toronto and why I continue to maintain my connection through my time on the Branksome Hall Alumnae Association.