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Issue No 8, 2021
Heart-warming Efforts Prestigious Offers
Charitable fundraising has been a major focus for pupils and staff during this year of pandemic. During Lockdown, several pupils chose to raise money individually. Abi Brooke (Junior King’s) made over £1000 for Suicide Prevention Charity Papyrus UK by making hand-embroidered hearts for people to send to their loved ones. Henry O’Connor (Gulliver Academy Miami) ran a marathon for Jersey Hospice and raised £3850. In May, Tommy David (Dulwich Prep Cranbrook) and Harrison MacKinnon (Junior King’s) took part in the Kent Duathlon to raise money for Mind, having also cycled 100 km round the Kent coast with six others in July to raise £2000 for the NHS. A whole number of group activities raised money for Charities of the term: Farms for City Children, Hospice UK and Rising Sun, a Canterbury based charity countering Domestic Violence and abuse in East Kent. The year has seen many other initiatives and further charities supported too. Chair of the Charity Committee Millie Lark (Hazelwood School) said: “The past year has been very disrupted for everyone, but as a school we have continued to make raising money for charities one of our main goals, with a particular aim to support local causes so that we could help make a difference in our community.”
Edited by David Hopkins, Head of Prep School Liaison (dnh@kings-school.co.uk)
Interviews for Oxford and Cambridge Universities were held online this year, and following them, King’s pupils achieved an excellent total of 15 offers. Nine pupils received offers from Cambridge colleges to read Music (two), Engineering, Philosophy, Natural Sciences (two), Modern Languages, History of Art and English. Six received offers from Oxford colleges to study PPE, Philosophy and Theology, History, Law and Modern Languages (two). In spite of the very difficult conditions for all over the last year, with King’s Education Online needing at times to come to the fore, pupils and staff have continued to aim very high and achieve at a commendable level. The school looks forward to pupils making good this summer, not only on this excellent crop of Oxbridge offers, but also once again on an impressive number of offers to a whole range of other top-ranked universities.
Musical Success
Riccardo Boiteux, Eveline Jackaman, Arwen Withey-Harrison, Dominique Judd, Ka Starck, Joseph Denyer.
It has been an outstanding year for pupils winning prestigious places to study music beyond King’s. Three pupils have won places at The Guildhall School of Music and Drama - Arwen Withey-Harrison (Marlborough House and Saint Ronan’s), Dominique Judd (Chatsworth International School) and Violet Zhou (Godolphin School). Edward Gaut (The New Beacon) and Ka Starck (Liceo Classico Marco Polo di Venezia) will be continuing their studies, in organ and vocal performance respectively, at The Royal Academy of Music next year. Joseph Denyer (St Paul’s Cathedral School) and Eveline Jackaman (St Edmund’s) are heading to Leeds Conservatoire, whilst Riccardo Boiteux (British School of Paris) has a place to read Music at Durham University. Finally Oscar Colliar will be taking up a Music and Organ Scholarship at Trinity College, Cambridge and Medomfo Owusu (Woodbridge School) has also won a place at Cambridge to read Music at Selwyn College.
Mind’s Eye Prep 2021 The 2021 edition of Mind’s Eye Prep promises to be another exciting one. Prep school writers have once again displayed huge talent in covering a wide variety of topics. Whether it is to express concern over difficult issues such as mental health, animal welfare or the environment, to meditate on the wonders of space, or to enthuse about flash fashion or country living, the authors write with real skill and energy. Along with perennial worries such as travel, poor diet, fake news and the march of technology, a variety of new interests shown this year include vampires, staplers and the
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mysteries of friendship. Mind’s Eye Editor, Anthony Lyons commented: “Once again, our young authors have excelled themselves. Very well done to them and to their teachers. The 2022 edition won’t be too far away and we welcome contributions from even more schools. Keep on writing!” Contributing schools this year are: Broomwood Hall, Cumnor House, Fulham Prep, Holmewood House, Junior King’s, Marlborough House, Newton Prep, Old Buckenham Hall, St John’s College School, Solefield, Saint Ronan’s, Vinehall.
Biggest ever book deal Annabel Steadman who was at Northbourne Park School before she came to King’s (Marlowe House 2005-10) was in the news in September having landed what’s believed to be the world’s biggest ever book deal. The book contract, agreed with Simon & Schuster, as well as a film deal with Sony Pictures, was for Annabel’s children’s fantasy adventure series “Skandar and the Unicorn Thief ”. The three-part series follows Skandar Smith in a world where unicorns are deadly and can only be tamed by the rider who hatches them. Annabel’s first novel is expected to be released in spring 2022, 13 years on from when she won the Creative Writing Competition at King’s for “Seven and a half months”, a short story which appeared in the 2009 edition of The Cantuarian. In an interview with Kent Online, Annabel talked about seeing her work in print as a pupil: “At King’s I remember I had a short story
published in the school’s Cantuarian magazine and at the time it felt like such a massive achievement to get something in print. That was a great moment, when I thought people wanted to read what I’d written.” Everyone at King’s will be eagerly awaiting the first book of the series!
Triumph Over Adversity Flexibility has been essential for success in so many activities this year and Duke of Edinburgh award candidates have excelled in this respect. Grace Murray (Windlesham) has achieved her gold this year, along with William Child-Villiers (Westminster Cathedral Choir School) in spite of the obstacles posed by Covid. “Stay local, stay safe” saw the abandonment of expeditions planned for last autumn halfPictured: Grace Murray (Windlesham), William Child-Villiers (Westminster Cathedral Choir School), term. Grace explained the Millie Lark (Hazelwood), Sholto McCausland (Dulwich Prep London), Lily Weir (Junior King’s) response: “We were keen not to miss out and devised a plan to run our Practice and Qualifier expeditions back-to-back. We were granted dispensation to do this using the playing fields as a base and walking each day from there. We walked 25-30 km every day through the Kentish countryside, accumulating 168 km. The sports fields took on new life for us with tents and campfire”. DofE Coordinator Major Adam Vintner adds that King’s was one of the only schools in Kent to achieve Covid safe status due to these arrangements. He also describes Grace’s great determination and William’s to see their award through, including the arrangements for the residential section “routinely the hardest section requiring the participant to locate and book a course off their own back”, made harder still by lockdown restrictions. The Gold Awards achieved are a great tribute to all concerned.
Online hit
A choral work performed by 40 pupils and a few staff has become a runaway online success, attracting over 30,000 view performed individually by the singers in their own homes under the direction of Head of Singing Nicholas Todd. Greg S together as one. The performance has attracted many favourable comments on YouTube as well as a huge number of vie going online out of necessity during lockdown has resulted in King’s music reaching out to thousands more than has ev
views to date. Spem in alium by Thomas Tallis premiered in July 2020 as part of Virtually King’s Week. Each part was reg Swinford, Head of Academic Music then completed the video and audio production to pull the performance f views. It also received a very nice mention on Radio 3 by Sean Rafferty. Great things can come out of adversity and s ever been possible in the past.
A Long Walk To School Will Grosse (Sevenoaks Prep) and Charles Griffin (Marlborough House) took an unconventional and inspiring approach to their return to school in September by walking 150 km from Southwark in London to Canterbury over 4 days. They raised an excellent £2700 for Uyghur refugees in Turkey at the same time. Setting off early on 3rd September from the site of the Tabard inn nestled down a side street close to London Bridge, and the same starting point for Geoffrey Chaucer’s travellers in The Canterbury Tales, Will and Charles were very much following in the footsteps of medieval pilgrims who journeyed to Thomas Becket’s Cathedral shrine. Lullingstone Roman Villa, the River Medway and Kentish orchards were among some of the sights which the boys enjoyed along the way, powered by, as Charles describes it, “a diet of cheese, chocolate, nuts and Lucozade, occasionally stopping at pubs and cafes to fill up our water supplies.” The boys duly arrived in Canterbury at Christchurch Gate after 4 days of walking and from there via the Cathedral to school. What an inspirational way to start a school year!
Friday Recitals Friday recitals have proved an exciting online development as the Music Department has found new ways to reach an audience. Friday 5pm recitals have long been a tradition at King’s but with lockdowns preventing performance to a physical audience, Fridays@5 has been streaming live on YouTube since early in 2021. 11 young musicians have performed so far on instruments as diverse as clarinet, saxophone, organ, harp and the marimba, as well as vocally. Hundreds of YouTube views underline just how popular these recitals have become. The full list of performers is: Ed Gaut (The New Beacon), Siena Barr (Highworth), Henry Bersey (St Edmund’s Junior School), Hiu You Wong (Diocesan Girls’ School Hong Kong), Oscar Colliar, Arwen Withey-Harrison (Marlborough House/Saint Ronan’s), Ilinca Chennery (Junior King’s), Theo Amies (Heritage School), Grace Stephens-Spada (Salisbury Cathedral School), Toby Davies and Catherine Bennett (St Paul’s Cathedral School).
Global Perspectives Final With topics ranging from Civil Rights in Pakistan to the Arab Spring in Egypt, The Shell Global Perspectives Final 2021 did not disappoint. 15 representatives, one from each house, gave their 3 minute presentations, which were thoroughly well researched, to the whole year group and a panel of judges. Marked on their presentation, research and analysis the finalists were then asked two follow up questions in order to demonstrate their in-depth understanding of their topic. After careful deliberation from the judges, Eva Shen (Shanghai Pinghe School) claimed first prize with her fascinating talk on the future of 5G. Alex Robinson (Junior King’s) and Lewis Turner (Felsted Prep) came second and third respectively with engaging talks on Egyptian Hieroglyphics and on Terrorism. Amongst other topics covered were the Colonisation of New Zealand by Catherine Bennett (Saint Paul’s Cathedral School), Social Media and the Arab Spring by Kit Roberts (Saint Ronan’s), and Health Care in Chile by Daniel Seo (Dulwich College, Seoul). Rob Harrison (Head of Lower School) who introduced finals night as well as organising the competition said: “This year’s final was of an incredible quality and most entertaining. It was fantastic to see such a diverse range of well investigated presentations.”
Bat for a chance Will Gaffney (Saint Ronan’s) has had quite a year following the foundation of his cricket charity Bat For A Chance in 2020 when he was just 15. In January, Will received a glowing tribute from Sri Lankan Test legend Kumar Sangakarra after Bat For A Chance, which provides cricket equipment to underprivileged communities, announced a partnership with the Sri Lankan charity of which Sangakarra is a trustee. Then in March, Will was named one of five Young Ambassadors of the MCC Foundation, who have been chosen to support the historic Marylebone Cricket Club’s drive to make cricket a game for all. A further opportunity came shortly afterwards when as a Young MCC Ambassador, Will was given the chance to play a role in putting together the MCC Foundation’s Captain Tom 100 campaign. Will founded Bat For A Chance, having seen during a cricket tour to Sri Lanka the enormous impact that cricket can have on the lives of those less fortunate than himself. The charity has already provided kit for cricketers in Uganda, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Sri Lanka and the West Indies and supports the MCC Foundation’s projects in the UK and overseas.
Fascinating online talks The pandemic has seen new online opportunities emerge and a shining example at King’s has been a series of excellent interviews with OKS (past pupils). One of these was with Miriam Lwanga (Dover College Junior School) who in 1994-5 became King’s first female Captain of School. Miriam spoke of her positive experiences at King’s as well as of her current work for UNICEF in Uganda, where she works to communicate and move forward the Children’s Fund’s programme on development and humanitarian issues around women and children. In this powerful interview, Miriam’s very strong skills as a communicator and leader were all highly evident, as was her belief in the importance of listening carefully and sympathetically. Talks by other OKS have included Fashion Brand Founder Pippa Durell (Wellesley House) on The Changing Face of the Fashion Industry, co-founder of PetMedix Jolyon Martin (Junior King’s) on his Biotech start-up based in Cambridge, and Frances Houghton (The Dragon School) on what she has learned from her experiences as a rower at 5 Olympic Games. The full programme of talks can be viewed here.
New Science Building Four years in the planning, work to construct a new Science faculty building at King’s continues apace, with completion scheduled for Autumn 2022. The beautifully designed building will house the School’s Physics Department, with six permanent laboratories, two flexi-laboratory spaces and a state-of-the-art lecture theatre. Set in the Mint Yard, the new building will be one of the most important new structures built within the Cathedral Precincts in many years. Following the demolition of a former Day House on the site, extensive archaeological excavation and analysis was undertaken; quite apart from the discovery of a sizeable section of Roman road, numerous historical artefacts were unearthed and are currently being analysed and recorded. This building project forms part of a wholesale refurbishment and upgrade of all Science facilities at King’s, with Biology and Chemistry laboratories also being transformed within their existing building. Gavin Merryweather, Capital Projects Director comments: “It has been an exciting challenge to build on what is a UNESCO-designated World Heritage Site, but we have managed very well so far and to the satisfaction of Historic England. There is no doubt that the finished building will be one of which King’s can be very proud.”
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