York House School
Encyclopedia
York House School is an independent
Independent school
An independent school is a school that is independent in its finances and governance; it is not dependent upon national or local government for financing its operations, nor reliant on taxpayer contributions, and is instead funded by a combination of tuition charges, gifts, and in some cases the...

 girls school for junior kindergarten through grade 12 located in Vancouver
Vancouver
Vancouver is a coastal seaport city on the mainland of British Columbia, Canada. It is the hub of Greater Vancouver, which, with over 2.3 million residents, is the third most populous metropolitan area in the country,...

, British Columbia
British Columbia
British Columbia is the westernmost of Canada's provinces and is known for its natural beauty, as reflected in its Latin motto, Splendor sine occasu . Its name was chosen by Queen Victoria in 1858...

, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

. It is located in the Shaughnessy neighbourhood in the heart of Vancouver. Founded in 1932 as a Canadian school for girls, it adopted an English motto as opposed to a Latin one: "Not for Ourselves Alone". The motto is the focus of the school's community service program.

Academics

York House is first and foremost an academic school, but is also able to offer a wide range of courses from Sewing to Computer Programming. It offers Advanced Placement courses to grades 11-12, and Honours courses in math
Mathematics
Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...

 and French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...

 for grades 8-10.

York House has maintained a number one ranking from the fiscally-conservative Fraser Institute
Fraser Institute
The Fraser Institute is a Canadian think tank. It has been described as politically conservative and right-wing libertarian and espouses free market principles...

's Report Card on Secondary Schools in BC over the past five years and had both top and high rankings prior to that.

York House School also offers many leadership opportunities. Student Ambassador, Student Life, and Student Executive are just some things York House students engage in.

Athletics

York House is known for its excellence in athletics. The athletic teams are the Tigers. In basketball
Basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules...

, the Tigers have won 8 AA Provincial Championships (1999, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2010 and 2011). The Tigers placed 2nd in 2007, 2008, 2009. They have one of the best high school basketball programs in BC and according to The Province's H. Tsamura, are "the most dominant program in all of B.C. high school basketball". In 2010-2011school year, The Tigers also won the BC Championship in Girl's Swimming and Girl's Alpine Skiing. Over the years, the Tigers have also placed top 5 in cross-country
Cross country running
Cross country running is a sport in which people run a race on open-air courses over natural terrain. The course, typically long, may include surfaces of grass and earth, pass through woodlands and open country, and include hills, flat ground and sometimes gravel road...

 including 3rd in 2005 and run strong programs in track and field
Track and field
Track and field is a sport comprising various competitive athletic contests based around the activities of running, jumping and throwing. The name of the sport derives from the venue for the competitions: a stadium which features an oval running track surrounding a grassy area...

, volleyball
Volleyball
Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules.The complete rules are extensive...

 as well as soccer, field hockey
Field hockey
Field Hockey, or Hockey, is a team sport in which a team of players attempts to score goals by hitting, pushing or flicking a ball into an opposing team's goal using sticks...

, swimming
Swimming (sport)
Swimming is a sport governed by the Fédération Internationale de Natation .-History: Competitive swimming in Europe began around 1800 BCE, mostly in the form of the freestyle. In 1873 Steve Bowyer introduced the trudgen to Western swimming competitions, after copying the front crawl used by Native...

, and ultimate. York House girls combine with boys from St. George's School, Vancouver
St. George's School (Vancouver)
St. George's School , of Vancouver, Canada is an independent boarding and day university-preparatory school for boys.-History:...

 in the sport of Ultimate
Ultimate (sport)
Ultimate is a sport played with a 175 gram flying disc. The object of the game is to score points by passing the disc to a player in the opposing end zone, similar to an end zone in American football or rugby...

 and have won two straight BC titles as well (3 in the past 5 years). York House also has many successful athletic alumni such as Leslie Cliff who won a silver medal in the 1972 Olympics in the 400m Individual Medley. Over the past 10 years, many Tigers have gone on to very successful CIS, NCAA, BCAA sports careers after high school.

Arts

York House is also proud of its arts programs. In music, the Senior Band has received multiple awards. Bands tour to places around the world every two years and compete at many top festivals including the Whistler Music Festival. York House's drama program stages a few productions each year, and is home to actress Aliza Vellani
Aliza Vellani
Aliza Vellani is a Canadian television actress, who currently plays the role of Layla Siddiqui in Little Mosque on the Prairie. Born in Vancouver to immigrants from East Africa...

 of Little Mosque on the Prairie
Little Mosque on the Prairie
Little Mosque on the Prairie is a Canadian sitcom on CBC, created by Zarqa Nawaz and produced by WestWind Pictures. It is filmed in Toronto, Ontario and Indian Head, Saskatchewan...

. The Clothing and Textiles department hosts a yearly fashion show at the end of the year. In 2010, the Junior School staged their first musical, the Winter Ballet.

External links

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