2024 Donation Appeal – Helen Edwards, Principal Aaron Parker

Every November we ask you to continue supporting the Alumni Association with your donations. We are grateful for each of you who stays connected through this newsletter, your reunions, your lifelong Vic High friends. At least two-thirds of you regularly read our newsletter, and your donations of funds and time
are responsible for everything the Alumni does. Principal Parker once said that he hopes today’s students look back on their Vic High days with as much affection, loyalty, and gratitude as so many of us do. That’s quite a tribute to us all.

Dear Vic High Alumni,

What a year it’s been so far! The students are now home at the Grant Street campus in a seismically safe building that manages to combine the best of the old with the technology of tomorrow. What a marvellous job the tradespeople, many of them Vic High grads, did on this project. Thanks also to the school district and the provincial government, which provided much-needed funds for the rehabilitation. We hope you were able to tour the school during the spring. If you were unable to join us, rest assured that there will be more tours in the future!

I am thrilled to chair the Vic High Alumni Board and to share our work with all our grads. We send out regular newsletters to inform you, while our dynamic website has all the information you need. Volunteers operate our Vic High Archives and Museum, and we oversee thousands of dollars of scholarship and bursary awards. We also support extracurricular activities like sports and the fine arts and hope to increase our funding in these areas.

We are excited about the number of reunions this year and those scheduled for the upcoming months. My class of 1964 had a wonderful reunion in the Vic High Multi Purpose room and had self-guided tours of the school for those who wanted them. It is times like these when the love of our school brings us together. As a bonus, we raised some funds for students’ activities.

In 2026, we will celebrate the 150^th anniversary of Vic High with reunions and gatherings. We are gathering stories and information, which I will use to write Vic High’s next history book, focussing on the years after 1976. I honed my writing skills during my time at Vic High and will use them to produce the best book possible. This is natural for me as a historian who has been writing seriously for decades. Please send in your stories from any era – photos are most welcome! communications@vichigh.com to make arrangements.

We volunteers could not do any of this work without your tax-deductible donations. Your generosity means we do not have to charge a membership fee, allowing former staff and students to be members for free!

Please help us to support our amazing students, the leaders of tomorrow!

Helen Edwards, VHS 1964

Dear Vic High Alumni

We are well into our first full school year in our beautifully renovated building. Two personal highlights, possibly of my career, include ending every day to the sounds of the joyful activity that dominates our artificial turf, training track, and sand volleyball courts at all hours of the day, and the emotional re-opening of the Wallace Auditorium.

As a high school principal I find my days often end long after the dismissal bell. Regardless of the late hour in the afternoon, or evening, that I leave our campus, students are training, competing and playing. No sound is more inspirational than our students thriving on their state-of-the art home court. I have no doubt that the donations, support and advocacy of our Alumni has resulted in a facility that will lead to a new era of Vic High excellence. In fact, our Jr. Boys Soccer team won the city championship here at the school in front of their friends and supporters just last month. For me there is no need to wait for the championships and accolades this generation of Vic High athletes will bring to the school in the coming years. They are my champions – every day.

Speaking of inspiration, we have successfully re-opened the Laurie Wallace Auditorium. This iconic space is the heart of the school, featuring countless performances, assemblies and events over the years. We were able to test out the impressive technical capability of the space this month with the Provincial Teacher Librarian Conference, the student council All Candidates’ debate, and our November 8 Remembrance Day assembly. I have sat in several emotional assemblies in my time at Vic High. The deportment of our students and quality of the Remembrance Day presentations, in this space that staff and students who served our country would have sat, were experiences I will not forget. Students from all over the world and from all walks of life, share and observe a beautiful moment of reflection and respect in this iconic space.

Vic High is a special place. Whether it is directly supporting our robotics, guitar, theatre or athletic programs, attending one of the alumni tours of Vic High in the spring that raised over $3000 for school activities, or simply advocating for Vic High, your actions directly impact the lives of our community’s most promising, diverse and worthy students. If you ever want to feel the impact of your donation to the Vic High Alumni Association, join me in my end of the day walk through our campus.

Come Give A Cheer!

Aaron Parker

Victoria High School Principal

2017 – present