• Inter-school Theatre Sports Competition – students are challenged to improvise in teams
• School Musical – combining singing, acting, dancing and behind the scenes work for all Year levels

There are many options available for students who wish to extend their English studies. These include:

• Aspire English – an elective subject centred around project based learning for Years 9 and 10 – this includes learning to write for newsletters and creating an online newspaper.
• English and Literature Extension – a specialised subject for Year 12
• Writers’ Club – a creative writing group for students from Years 7-12
• Readers’ Cup intra and inter-school competitions
• Author’s Day (in conjunction with the Library) and excursions to Brisane Writers’ Festival
• Competitions such as the Queensland Literacy and the ICAS English competitions
• QDU Debating for Years 7-10
• Weekly reading lessons (Years 7-9 in the Library to encourage and extend reading. This allows students to read books of their choice for their own ability level and interest.

For our students who like additional challenges in Maths, we provide a large number of opportunities for extension:

• Entry to the UQ/QAMT Problem Solving Competition held at UQ in Term 1 every year.
• Each year we enter 2 teams in both the Year 7/8 and Year 9/10 sections of the Maths Teams Challenge, which runs at Ferny Grove State High School in Term 2 every year. This challenge sees our students compete against dozens of other teams from schools in the region.
• We enter 2 teams in the Year 7/8 Quiz run by the Queensland Association of Maths teachers in Term 3 each year.
• All Year 7 and 8 students participate in the Australian Mathematics Competition in August each year. Interested students may participate in Years 9-12.
• Students from Years 7-12 may elect to participate in ICAS in Term 3 each year.
• Students in Years 7-10 can access a huge range of extension activities relevant to current class work through the Maths page of online@hillbrook.
• Senior students may elect to study Mathematical Methods and Specialist Mathematics.
• The Cambridge textbook series we use in Years 7-10 contains a vast quantity of problem-solving, reasoning and extension material for every exercise in the book. Students can also choose to access exercises which go beyond the year-level expectation. Finally, students may choose to access investigations, problems and challenges related to each chapter.

• Music Extension for Year 12: Composition, Performance or Musicology
• Open ended assessment tasks that allow for varying levels of experience due to no ceiling
• Co-curricular program including extensive performance opportunities in large ensembles, small ensembles
• Chamber music/soloist concerts
• Instrumental Music specialist
• School Musical

• UQ Philosothon and the Ethics Olympiad
• Philosophy Camp (senior students)

• Project active, an extra-curricular activity program, compulsory for Years 7-9
• Gala days for sport – Athletics, Swimming and Cross Country Carnivals
• Intra and inter-school – Soccer, Netball, Volleyball, AFL and Touch Football
• Sport education Term 3 – leadership of season and intra and interpersonal skills
• Tiered physical assessment tasks with extension resources, such as more advanced dance steps in year 10 and advanced swimming drill in Year 9

• Each term’s course is outlined Online@Hillbrook with a term planner and learning objectives. This allows students to work independently and at their own pace. There are many resources linked to each course, including some that aim to extend accelerated learners.
• Additionally, many assessment tasks are written to allow for student choice, thereby encouraging students to challenge themselves.
• Assessment submissions that are of a high standard can be entered in external competitions such as The QLD Science Competition, run by STAQ, and the Sleek Geek Eureka Short Science Video Competition, run by the University of Sydney.
• Aspire Science – an elective subject centred around project based learning for Years 9 and 10
• For students who wish to participate, a Science Club runs at lunchtime. Yr 12 students can nominate to lead the group as part of the senior responsibility program. The club meets to discuss science, work on projects and conduct experiments.
• Students can volunteer to use and gain expertise in science skills are working on the science gardens or writing articles for the school newsletter.
• Hillbrook participates in the Stem Horizons-High Achievers program for Year 7 and Year 9, where 4 high achieving students participate in out of school extension lessons.
• Excursions are organised for students in order to pique interest in STEM subjects and to further challenge. For example, previous excursions have been to the World Science Festival, and the Year 10 cohort travels to QUT for a day long program experiencing STEM activities and exposure to future study and career prospectives.

All students have access to subscriptions that enable those with further interest in science to pursue their questions. Currently, these subscriptions include Cosmos magazine, New Scientist magazine and Twig videos.

• Students have the opportunity to study Aspire Discovering Data a data analytics elective course  in Years 9 and 10. The course is delivered using project based learning and uses digital tools to analyse data.
• Students in year 7-12 may elect to participate in ICAS  Digital Technologies in Term 3.
• There is a bi-annual Bebras competition on Computational Thinking that all students may choose to compete in.
• QUT Power of engineering day & UQ’s Women in Engineering day.
• QUT/UQ Engineering camps (school holidays) to Y11/12 students
• National Computer Science School (NCSS) Challenge is available to all students via Grok online learning. The challenge teaches programming as you progress through each section, with students competing against global participants.

• Opportunities to engage in START QUT or UQ ESP programs which allow students to pursue University subjects in semester 2 Year 11 or semester 1 Year 12. Previously studied subjects include Business, IT, Fashion and History.
• Mooting
• University competitions – Science, Maths and Engineering Challenges
• ICAS (Science, Maths and English competitions)