FROM THE TEE
The Biology Department ventured out for their annual trip to London Zoo with the entire Second Year
The Past (made up of OKs and parents) took on the Present for the inaugural John Makin Cup
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WWW.KGS.ORG.UK
MAY 2017
NEWSLETTER
KINGSTON GRAMMAR SCHOOL 1
KGS DOES ZSL
SCHOOL CAPTAINS 2017/2018 As we thank Oliver Cole, Ellie de Heer and Joe Hilty for their excellent service to KGS, we introduce our newly-appointed School Captains Attaining, adopting and wearing the mantle of leadership, in the right manner, can be quite different things and it is with this in mind that I congratulate and thank our new School Captain, George Casci, and Vice Captains, Kirsty George and Daniel Piche Hainsworth. I know that they will make excellent student leaders of the School and that the last few days may well have proved to be a whirlwind of celebration and organisation as they quickly got to grips with the enormity of their task.
They will also be able to rely on their friends, many of whom were also potential candidates for the top student roles at KGS. I am delighted to say that I am also very proud of these students in the way that they have handled the disappointment of not being selected. They have demonstrated all of the resilience and willingness to learn from any setback that we have come to expect from the very best KGS student.
All of the students who take on the responsibility of representing the School in a variety of forms, ranging from Prefectship and Ambassadors to tour guides, athletes and performers, do so with an understanding that the reputation of our School is in their hands and that, for a moment of time, they are the sole voice and persona of the School whilst performing, guiding, speaking and assisting. We couldn’t be in safer hands, entrusting that which is so hard to gain and so very easy to lose. Stephen Lehec
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WELCOME
Image from our sold out Junior Play, ‘The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe’. A full review will be in June’s Newsletter.
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KGS MAY 2017
This week has been overshadowed by the terrible events in Manchester and on Thursday, members of the school community at KGS joined with others around the UK in falling silent for a minute to remember the victims of this horrific attack. I was hugely impressed by the way in which the community in Manchester pulled together in the immediate aftermath. People offered rooms to concert goers who were unable to get home as the station was closed, taxi drivers came from as far-a-field as Liverpool to offer free rides home and those caught up in the attack together with members of the emergency services were given food and cups of tea and coffee by local businesses and people. Attacks such as these are aimed to frighten and divide communities and I was impressed by the manner in which the people of Manchester have remained defiant and examples of this can be seen by following the hashtag #WeStandTogether.
for people with different faiths and beliefs and for those without faith. Within PSHE lessons, tutorials, assemblies and in lessons these values are promoted. Terrorism seeks to restrict our liberty and our democracy and in our own way we challenge this every day at school through many small actions which add up to a cumulative effect. One such action on the immediate horizon is the holding of the School Mock Election. Canvassing has begun and on Monday candidates presented and debated their ideas at lunchtime in the Lovekyn Chapel in a peaceful and respectful manner. Events such as this enable our students to express their views (and listen to those of others) within a democratic framework and on June 8th students will have the opportunity (as in previous years) to participate in the School Mock Election and to learn about what it is to live within a democratic country. • Mr A Beard Assistant Head
At KGS, like other schools around the UK, we have a responsibility to promote fundamental British values. These include democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty and mutual respect and tolerance
PHOTO BY MR C EDWARDS
@KGSHEADMASTER
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A FOND FAREWELL Leavers’ Day for the Upper Sixth began well as Tom Gooding drew up outside the School in his father’s Caterham kit car - dressed as a lion! The rest of the cohort were also attired in ‘jungle’ theme for the day and there were some very colourful and imaginative costumes. After a final tutor period, the Upper Sixth gathered in the QEII courtyard for a continental breakfast and yearbook signings, before heading into the Theatre for the Leavers’ Revue. After awarding numerous prizes for such auspicious achievements as shooting the final goal in Cage Football (Troy O’Dowd), most cheerful students (Elliot Hudson and Katinka Ronberg) and best fancy dress costume (Bethany Williams), many were reduced to tears of nostalgia by Joe Hilty’s carefully crafted video. We were then treated to some fantastic performances from our outgoing musicians. First up was Rohan Winder with a drum solo, followed by Miles Compton’s band (including Joe Malbon, Noor Bajwa and Remi Duneau) who played a lively version of Helter Skelter. Next were Joe Underwood, Theo Cons, Lucy
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Roberts and Ollie Cole, who serenaded us in their usual versatile and eccentric style. Then we had Sophie Gallagher, accompanied by Miranda Worth, who sang a stunning version of Amy Winehouse’s ‘Valerie’, and finally Noor Bajwa, accompanied by Joe Malbon, who gave us a beautiful rendition of ‘Fly Me to the Moon’. The Revue then came to a close with an impressive (almost) world-beating performance by Joe Hilty in the Head Master’s ‘Ferrero Rocher Challenge’ – nine in one minute! With part one over, 121 Super Furry Animals piled onto coaches and headed off to Ditton Field. • Ms B McDonald Director of Sixth Form
SCHOOL LIFE
THE CCF YEAR The CCF has had a very full month of training; along with the weekly parades the cadets have been busy preparing for and taking part in the Biennial Inspection, a field day at Longmoor training camp in preparation for our annual camp (this year to be held in Scotland), flying at RAF Benson and a recruitment assembly. All these events went extremely well and where thoroughly enjoyed by all those taking part. As we progress into June we look forward to opening our doors to our current Second Year with an introduction afternoon at Ditton Field on Monday 19th June. This will give all the students the opportunity to try some of the amazing activities our cadets get involved in. We hope as many of them will make the decision to join the CCF in September, taking up this unique experience which will help them to develop their powers of leadership, teamwork, resilience, appearance and bearing, to name but a few. The joining paperwork can be found on Firefly as well as the weekly bulletin. Mrs Hetherington, Head of Second Year, says: “The CCF is a brilliant opportunity and one that I would recommend everyone in my year group should consider getting involved in!” • Mr A Beggs CCF Contingent Commander
BOROUGH ATHLETICS Wednesday 17th May saw the U12-15 boys and girls competing in the Borough Athletics at Kingsmeadow The KGS students did incredibly well in such poor weather conditions, including torrential rain. There were some excellent results including: 1st positions: U12-U15: Amy Smith, Adam Sloan, Ellie Hauck, Jake Dowding, Jess Walker, Jasmin Good, Gaia Aherne, Ciara Kennedy, Andrei Vasilisin-Tack.
Well done to all of the students who competed and represented KGS: they should be proud of their efforts and results. Some students may now represent the Kingston Team for Surrey Schools Competition. • Miss S Butler PE
Some close 2nd positions: Ben Reilly, Lucas Dwyer, Henry Trovalusci, Kea Murray, Emma Sloan, Roddy Reid, Patrick Gubbay, Sophie Merriman, Callum Farr, Thomas Hall, Maia White, Giulia Duggan, Lily Abbott. The overall results for the girls’ teams were: U15 - 2nd place; U13/14 – 3rd place; U12 first place with 93 points! The overall results for the boys’ teams were: U15 – Sixth Form and both U13/14 & U12 coming fourth in their respective groups.
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PAST VS PRESENT GOLF MATCH The Past (made up of OKs and parents) took on the Present (made up of current pupils and some staff) for the inaugural John Makin Cup, a cup in honour of long-time OK John Makin who was the driving force behind the OK Golf Society for many years and who sadly passed away earlier this year. At our new home for KGS Golf, Malden GC, a hard-fought battle ensued with the Past having the
upper hand for most of the day. But a par on the 18th hole from Upper Sixth Former Andrew Wickerson, playing against his dad, won the last vital singles match for the Present which meant that the match finished in a 10-10 tie. Because the Present won the event last year, they retained the trophy and were presented with it by Alicia Makin, the widow of John.
The Present team was made up of: Sam Reid, James Hall (both Lower Sixth), Jonathan Moeller-Schwartz (Third Year), Clara Lyckeus (Fifth Year), Andrew Wickerson, Matt Pugh (both Upper Sixth), Luca Fielden (Second Year), Oliver Dawson (First Year), Mr Daly and Mr Davies. •
Coming to our Theatre on 10th June
Book your seats www.michaelfrayntheatre.com 6
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SOUTHERN SCHOOLS INVITATIONAL Sam Reid and Jonathan MoellerSchwartz were in action again, this time representing KGS in the second annual Southern Schools Invitational at Reigate Heath GC. This 9-hole Stableford event took place across a very tight and challenging course on a cold and windy day but sensible, conservative golf brought victory for KGS in the team scratch event by two shots, beating the likes of Whitgift and Reed’s, and making Kingston Grammar School the overall Southern Schools Invitational Champions. The boys became the recipient of an antique golf club trophy, albeit for only a few minutes as the trophy is not allowed to leave the golf club. Sam narrowly lost out on winning the boys’ individual scratch, losing out on countback. This is the first scratch team event that KGS has won in three years. •
COIN COBRA RECOUNT “HURRY UP! THERE IS JUST 1 MINUTE TO GO! OLIVER, WHAT ARE YOU DOING STARTING A NEW LINE?!” Mr Turner bellowed orders as the Coin Cobra 2017 drew to a close
Mr M Rodgers Master in charge of Golf; Head of Biology I’d never known a Thursday lunch time to be so exhilarating! The tension had been mounting for some time and the coins weren’t the only things sprawled out across the floor… people too! Mr Turner’s competitive edge was something that I had never witnessed before. He was so desperate for Walworth to win, so much so, he said if we didn’t, “heads would be rolling!” My form, “the mighty tigers”, Walworth had a head start upon everyone else. One of the first things that Walworth did as a form, when we joined KGS, was starting to ambush our family’s purses and wallets for any kind of change we could scavenge. Because we were and still are the most gifted form at KGS, we made sure to keep our tactic very discreet. The other forms finally began to collect money around January. By this point, they were at least £100 behind the mighty tigers.
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Thursday arrived and so did the Coin Cobra. Last minute efforts were being made by everyone; running around Sixth Form asking for money and even worse begging teachers for loose
change! Best friends had turned into arch enemies, just like they do at any house event, but luckily it only lasts for the afternoon! Every member of First Year gathered in the empty hall; all that lay in front of them were enormous sacks of money! “GO!” called Mr Beard and the forms raced to their positions. The sound of crashing money bombarded the hall. I had never been surrounded by so many coins in my life! I love occasions such as this; the competitiveness urged me on to perform at the highest of my capabilities. The snakes grew longer until they were too long to continue. With just minutes remaining, things started to get feisty! Forms were kicking each other’s money piles and accidently falling on to the opposing snakes. With things finally coming to a close, teams began to forget about the look of the snakes and more the amount of coins on the floor when time was up. The noise grew louder… that was it! Everyone was ordered to stand up and leave their snakes. Mr Beard marched up and down,
TRIPS inspecting every inch of detail. Form tutors were doing their best to persuade the judge to choose their form but Mr Beard was having none of it. The first of the two prizes was awarded to Taverner for the straightest snake. Taverner erupted and jumped up and down, chanting. Meanwhile, all of the other forms stood in utter despair. However, nobody could lose hope yet! Mr Beard continued to look at the snakes, again manipulating them. He raised his arm to point at the winning form… who was it going to be? His arm pointed directly at Walworth! CHAMPIONS! The whole form was elated and, just like Taverner, we jumped up and down.
MY SCHOOL & OTHER ANIMALS On Tuesday 16th May the Biology Department took the entire Second Year to London Zoo
It was extremely controversial, though. Queen’s thought they had been hard done by! However, it is the judge’s decision that counts and Walworth rightfully earned that decision. After the money had been counted, everyone was even more pleased as a grand total of £726 had been raised! Well done to everyone who was involved. • Oliver Davis 1W
For the first time since we have been running this trip, we arrived before the zoo opened! We were presented with a warm and sunny day, putting a smile on everyone’s faces, as the pupils embarked on a day investigating the effect of climate change on the survival and conservation of different animal species. Phones were used to record footage of the animals feeding and at play and will be used by the pupils to present a short documentary film about their chosen animals in lessons later this term. The pupils attended an educational talk about the challenges that climate change is presenting to animal species around the globe. They learned about the issues faced by tigers in Bangladesh, lemurs in Madagascar and about the plight of sea turtles. The “highlight” of the talk (although not for everyone) was undoubtedly meeting and touching Charlie the hissing cockroach!
The pupils enjoyed the penguin and tiger feeding shows and the meerkats were their usual playful selves. The gorillas also drew a lot of attention in the way that they appear so human; it’s sometimes hard to tell who is watching whom. One group had a close encounter with a 5-foot-long snake that looked as though it had escaped from the reptile house! It turned out to be one of the population of grass snakes that live in the undergrowth by the Regent’s Canal, which runs through the zoo grounds, out sunning itself in the warm weather. The pupils represented the School wonderfully, as usual, and everyone left the zoo having had a fun, exciting and educational day out. We are looking forward to hearing and seeing the presentations from the pupils in their Biology lessons. • Mr M Rodgers Head of Biology
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KIDS’ LIT QUIZ CHAMPIONS: CELEBRATING THE SPORT OF READING
The Kids’ Lit Quiz is an annual literature competition in which teams of four students, aged 10 to 13, work together to answer wide-ranging literary questions. The winning team from each region competes in the National Final. The winner of the National Final is then invited to the World Final held annually in July and this year it takes place in Toronto. The KGS team are hoping to make the leap from National to International Champions! We are currently preparing for this trip by hosting cake sales and sponsored reads in order to reach Canada.
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Since its inception in 1991, thousands of students have participated in the Kids’ Lit Quiz each year throughout the world. The quiz was created by Wayne Mills, an educator at the University of Auckland, who wears a purple and black hat while hosting this literary quiz. He was made a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the Queen’s New Year’s Honours in 2011 for ‘Meritorious Services to Education’, specifically children’s literature. In 2003 the quiz was brought
to the UK where up to 400 schools currently participate in the heats leading to the World Final. Wayne Mills is present at each competition and he makes up all the questions. One of his favourite parts in the competition is the ‘peeling the onion’ questions where he describes a book, author or poem step by step. The Kids’ Lit Quiz motivates and inspires children to read a wide range of children’s literature from the classics to the contemporary, from nursery rhymes to comics, and from folk tales to myths. It offers children rewards they may not otherwise experience in the classroom setting. At every competition there are authors present to sign books and talk to the competitors. At the National Final, the amazing Meg Rosoff was present. Meg is the author of numerous awardwinning books, including the Carnegienominated ‘Beck’ with Mal Peak. If this is interesting to you and you’d like to change to be a world champion too, then feel free to join our next team in
September 2017 or get involved now by helping the team practise every Thursday lunch time. Kids’ Lit Quiz is an ongoing campaign, so don’t stress – you can still help. Ask Mrs Cleaves or Miss Taylor in the Library for more details. If you would like to help our KGS Team reach Canada, you can get involved with the cake sales happening at school, sponsor one of our readers, sign up to www.easyfundraising.co.uk and raise money as you shop or visit our crowd funding page to donate directly. Thank you! https://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/ causes/kgslitquiz/ https://www.justgiving.com/ crowdfunding/kidslitquizuk • Eva Preskey 3RSS
KGS Friends Feast at the Field and Sturgeon Cricket Sunday 25th June from 1.00pm
BBQ! BOUNCY CASTLE! PIMM'S! CRICKET! TENNIS! ICE CREAM! The sun will shine, the barbie will be blazing and the Pimm's will pour forth. There will be tennis, maybe netball too, and the RJ Sturgeon 1st and 2nd XIs will be in action against the School. There will be a bouncy castle, and there will be ice cream. What there won’t be is a charge. The only question is, will you be there? To help us with the arrangements, please book your places here: trybooking.co.uk/BWF
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ROAD TO WIMBLEDON Once again we held the annual KGS Road to Wimbledon Under 14 tennis tournament at Ditton Field with this year’s event taking place on Saturday 6th May. Over thirty KGS students played in the event with strong representation across the First, Second and Third Year. As ever, there were several closely-fought matches both in the boys’ and girls’ competitions, with Freddie Wilson edging out Oliver Davis in a tie-break in the boys’ quarter-finals and Sofie Procter just getting the better of Maria Uria Kabashima 5-4 in the girls’ semi-finals; meanwhile, the renewal of the Max
Vokins v Thomas Skeates rivalry did not disappoint with their semi-final yet again going down to the wire. Both events this year saw new champions come through. In the girls’ competition Sofie Procter (Third Year) emerged victorious, ending Kea Murray’s (First Year) superb run to the final, winning 6-3. In the boys’ final Luca Fielden (Second Year) demonstrated fantastic shotmaking ability to defeat Max Vokins (Third Year) 6-2. In addition, Sophie Morris (Second Year) and Oliver Davis (First Year) won the girls’ and boys’ consolation events respectively.
I would like to thank everyone who competed and parents who came to support for making it such a fun and sociable event. And congratulations to our champions – we wish the best of luck to Sofie and Luca who now go through to the Surrey County Finals in June/July. • Mr S Morris Head of Tennis; Maths
YE ACHIEVER OF THE YEAR! Hettie Cloud (L6HAH) has been awarded the Young Enterprise ‘Achiever of the Year’ Award for her outstanding contributions to the KGS company, YNOT. This is a great achievement for Hettie. Every year, Young Enterprise asks for an achiever to be nominated from each Young Enterprise company. They ask for an achiever who has contributed most to the the success of the company and/or who has shown most personal growth and progress since joining the company programme. Hettie has been chosen because we feel that she has developed the most
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in the company. She has been a key member of the team and has always been willing to participate fully in the process. Well done, Hettie! • Dr K Kennedy History