Stirling has a very strong cultural component in the school: there is a large Music department; Drama is offered as a subject and many successful productions have taken place in the Guild Theatre or our fully-equipped school hall; the Dance Society has 130 dancers; and our debators are the Eastern Cape Champions; and our annual Fashion Show is a well-supported professional event. 2009 Miss South Africa finalist Joanne Cronje first learnt her craft on the Stirling ramp.
Cultural activities on offer include:
Chess – there are many chess players at Stirling and a large portion of the Border Chess team has often been made up of Stirling students.
Drama – Students can take Drama as a subject in Grades 8 and 9 and we have a Drama teacher who also offers extra Drama lessons. We have a long tradition of excellent major productions such as Terry Pratchett’s Wyrd Sisters, Godspell, West Side Story, Pirates of Penzance, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Footloose. The school alternates annually between major musical or demanding dramatic productions, in traditional or modern genres. There are also Senior and Junior One-Act Plays, produced, written and directed by students themselves, and a strong movement in recent years into ancillary professional dramatic crafts such as lighting and production. Students enter external Drama exams and local Drama Eisteddfodau.
The Dance Society - and the variety of dance disciplines represented - continues to grow and we have over 100 students dancing as part of the society. A Dance Extravaganza is held each year to showcase the work of our dancers and opportunities for dancing include assorted internal events as well as performances in local shows.
Music – The Stirling Music Department has six music teachers specialising in piano, vocals, woodwinds, brass and guitar/bass. There are over 80 students taking Music as a subject, and over 100 further students officially involved in Music in some way. Stirling has three bands and three choirs, with good facilities and significant support from the school. The emphasis in our Music Department is on classical music tuition and all students follow the Royal Schools’ or Trinity syllabi, but the school also has a particularly strong jazz programme, with half of the 2009 National Schools’ Jazz Band selected from Stirling High and over 60 students playing in jazz bands.
Oratory / Debating - We have an active team taking part in the debating league, speaking contests and forum discussions, and Stirling is regarded as one of the best Debating schools, not just in the Eastern Cape, but in South Africa.
Societies - The Societies period is an opportunity for students to do something quite different to the normal academic programme, and hopefully to discover a talent or learn a hobby. The Pyramid Council and Grade 11 and 12 Councils and Matric Yearbook Committee meet during this period, as do the large societies of SCA, Dance, Ubuntu and Interact, and Grade 8 and 9 Music students follow a special aural programme, with the Networking Society servicing the school’s computers. The rest of the school has the opportunity to choose a hobby-oriented society from a list that includes the Business Game, Cooking Club, Driver’s Education, Decoupage, Stained Glass Painting and Fabric Painting.
Stirling has a very strong cultural component in the school: there is a large Music department; Drama is offered as a subject and many successful productions have taken place in the Guild Theatre or our fully-equipped school hall; the Dance Society has 130 dancers; and our debators are the Eastern Cape Champions; and our annual Fashion Show is a well-supported professional event. 2009 Miss South Africa finalist Joanne Cronje first learnt her craft on the Stirling ramp.
Drama – Students can take Drama as a subject in Grades 8 and 9 and we have a Drama teacher who also offers extra Drama lessons. We have a long tradition of excellent major productions such as Terry Pratchett’s Wyrd Sisters, Godspell, West Side Story, Pirates of Penzance, A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Footloose. The school alternates annually between major musical or demanding dramatic productions, in traditional or modern genres. There are also Senior and Junior One-Act Plays, produced, written and directed by students themselves, and a strong movement in recent years into ancillary professional dramatic crafts such as lighting and production. Students enter external Drama exams and local Drama Eisteddfodau. 
The Dance Society - and the variety of dance disciplines represented - continues to grow and we have over 100 students dancing as part of the society. A Dance Extravaganza is held each year to showcase the work of our dancers and opportunities for dancing include assorted internal events as well as performances in local shows. 
Oratory / Debating - We have an active team taking part in the debating league, speaking contests and forum discussions, and Stirling is regarded as one of the best Debating schools, not just in the Eastern Cape, but in South Africa.