NEWSMonitorThe

www.themonitor.com.auTHE MONITOR - Your Community Newspaper Wednesday, January 22, 2014 -- Page 7

lassicsC FROM THE

Monday to Friday6pm-8pm

now streaming live atwww.roxfm.com.au

(hits from the 60’s to today)

with FROG

On Friday, 20 December 2013, Olympic Dam experienced a fault on the power line which in turn, tripped the protection system that we have in place. As a result, power supply to Roxby Downs was disrupted for six hours. Our teams worked quickly to rectify the issue and following a comprehensive review, have put a number of measures in place to mitigate against similar occurrences in future. Some of these include additional inspections on the components that contributed to this incident and the implementation of an improved design of the insulators. We sincerely apologise for the inconvenience this caused. Rest assured, we are taking this very seriously and will work hard to ensure that this does not happen again. Darryl Cuzzubbo Asset President Olympic Dam

By Millie Thomas

Four years ago Roxby Downs local Darcy Kraljev received news that has since changed his life

forever.

The now 18-year-old had been awarded a Councillor Governor’s schol-arship to Saint Peter’s College in Ade-laide, a scholarship that would cover 50 per cent of his tuition fees at one of Adelaide’s most prestigious boarding schools.

“I couldn’t really believe it, because it was unexpected to get the call, and then it was just joy I suppose,” Darcy told Th e Monitor last week. “I rang up Mum and Dad and they were jumping out of their seat, so I was really excited for the opportunity that lay ahead.”

Now, after completing Year 12 with an impressive ATAR score of 97.9 and being appointed School Captain, the move has proven to be worth its weight in gold.

Moving to Adelaide to complete the final three years of school in a completely diff erent environment is a challenge for anyone, but as Darcy ex-plained, the pros outweighed the cons.

“Because you live with 90 other peo-ple, the tight knit community- it made me feel at home, so it was fantastic,” he said. “I was always a little bit nervous about moving away from my family, but I got over it. I managed to adapt to it and now I’m used to it.”

School captaincy at St Peters is much more involved than at other schools. It requires the chosen student to take on a ‘Year 13’, undertaking partial study of one or two SACE Stage II subjects, and devote much of their time mentoring and assisting students, and also work towards the betterment of the school.

“I get the opportunity to further con-tribute to the school’s ongoing success,

and also work with the rest of the stu-dent body to determine how we can help not only the community, but also South Australia. Also, I have the oppor-tunity to mentor a lot of boys, wheth-er that’s in the senior school or junior school,” Darcy said.

“For instance I know that I want to support them and challenge them in the way that I was challenged in my time at Saints by teachers, mentors, oth-er school captains and obviously the boarding house. Th e boarding house challenged me and the scholarship gave me the opportunity to be challenged.”

The prestigious appointment has changed Darcy’s plans of heading straight to Adelaide University this year to study his fi rst preference of Mechan-ical Engineering, but he’s not fussed.

“At this stage all it’s done is pushed the plans back one year, which I’m okay with. My choices for Uni may change throughout the year, but regardless it’s only one year so I’m fi ne with it.”

Darcy’s advice to students looking at taking on Year 12 this year was simple: be consistent and work hard.

“You do need breaks, and you do need down time to spend shooting hoops of basketball or whatever calms you down. I would advise you to be consistent and get on top of things ear-ly and it will make it easier in the long run,” he said.

“Inevitably there will always be a cou-ple of late nights here and there but if you can minimise them and maximise your consistency that’s the best advice I can give.”

He encouraged anybody with the chance of applying for a scholarship or attending St Peters to give it a shot, saying it is ‘an opportunity to develop lifelong relationships.’

Consistency and hard work key to Year 12

F ederal Member for Grey Rowan Ramsey said the recent announcement of

funding to undertake a com-prehensive study into solar thermal power generation in Port Augusta is a real boost for the Alinta power station and the strong advocates of solar thermal power in the region.

Th e Australian Renewable En-ergy Agency (ARENA) has an-nounced it would partner with natural gas and electricity provider, Alinta, and the South Australian Government to undertake a $2.3 million full feasibility study into solar thermal power generation at Port Augusta.

Mr Ramsey said the funding

would enable a collaborative ap-proach to ensure the longevity of the Alinta power station by pro-gressing the research required to tap into our greatest natural re-source, the sun.

“I have always maintained Alin-ta is in the best position to deliver solar power to the grid in Port Au-gusta because they have the ability to capitalise on their existing as-sets”, he said.

“I was disappointed last year when ARENA rejected Alinta’s bid to support just such a study, however Alinta have gone away and reworked their proposal and ultimately been successful”.

“Th e funding will provide the opportunity for Alinta to look at the best and most advanced tech-

nologies in the world,” he said. “At a time when some of the

most advanced nations are reas-sessing their supporting programs for renewable energy, I believe Port Augusta has much to off er. After all, if solar energy does not make sense in Port Augusta, where is it likely to?”

“At the same time Alinta has announced it is opening up a low-er level in the coal mine at Leigh Creek and with the possibility of a hybrid plant this would extend the life of the power station past 2030 and bring many benefi ts to the region such as reduced coal dust pollution, reduced emissions, jobs and a positive impact on elec-tricity retail competition in South Australia”.

$1m for solar thermal study at Port Augusta

Darcy has developed valuable life long relationships

at Saint Peter’s College.