A Springbank-based private school that offers educational programming for students in grades 4 to 12 who are striving to achieve both academic excellence and reach their full athletic potential hosted its annual Winter Olympics event on Feb. 23.
Landon Wesley, director of marketing at Edge School, said the school hosts the Olympics events each year, with a wintertime event held some time in February, and a summertime event in June.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the school was unable to host its Olympics event to abide with public health restrictions, but staff and students were eager to see its return in 2022.
“Last year we had Summer Olympics and that was the first time that was back in quite a few years, so it was nice to be able to host it again,” Wesley shared.
According to an Edge School newsletter, the last week of this February saw the return of the much-anticipated Edge Winter Olympics event.
“Mountain Team pride was on full display throughout the day with students giving it their all in a variety of events,” read the newsletter.
“From Snow-Pitch to Biathlon to Arctic Games, from Human Curling to the always competitive Ice Dance, it was amazing to see the engagement by our Mountaineers, young and old.”
Wesley explained the full one-day event featured a friendly competition between house teams, otherwise known as “Mountain Teams.” He explained the Mountain Teams are akin to the Hogwarts houses (Slytherin, Gryfindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff) in the Harry Potter books.
Mountain Team names include Everest, Kilimanjaro, Logan, and Makalu – inspired by soaring mountain peaks around the world. Wesley said at the start of the day on Feb. 23, students gathered together with their Mountain Teams to prepare for the day’s events and festivities.
“We do a bit of an opening ceremony where we pump up the kids and we get them all in their teams,” he said. “And then basically after that it’s just events that we have throughout the day where everybody signs up for events that they want to take part in.”
Some of the sports featured during the day-long event included badminton, dodgeball, human curling, bobsleigh push, and snow pitch (a revamped version of kickball).
“Basically, with dodgeball you had to have mittens with no fingers so you can imagine that was pretty funny to watch,” Wesley said with a laugh.
The day culminated with an “ice dance,” which is according to the school representative, a large dance featuring members from each of the Mountain Teams to finish the day’s festivities with a bang.
“We get together, they work on doing a dance with everybody, and then they present it in front of the school,” he explained. “That tends to be the event at the end of the day that everybody looks forward to – to see how much time and effort goes into rehearsal and getting the dances put together.
“So those are really fun to watch at the end of the day.”
The podium results at the end of the day featured Team Logan winning Gold, Team Everest placing Silver, Team Makalu placing Bronze, and Team Kilimanjaro in fourth place.
Regardless of how students performed, Wesley said the event is all about drumming up some school spirit and getting the student athletes together to do something they may not have time for in their busy schedule chock-full of classes, training, and travelling for competitions.
“It’s hard to get them all together for events like this, so I think it [helps to] build the school spirit getting everybody together,” Wesley said.
“And at the end of the day, it’s just fun to have everybody together for a day and not have to worry about school or sport, to have a good time... and that’s what it’s all about.”
Wesley shared the event also helps to build camaraderie between students and staff members in the school and helps to alleviate any pent-up stress. Students who are in various house teams get the chance to compete with students in other age groups and experience levels.
“It’s awesome for the kids to be able to interact with some of those age groups that they don’t necessarily get to hang out with all the time,” he said.
“It’s just a really fun day for the kids to get together.”
