The Bulletin 236

FROM THE HEADMASTER

American author Fran Lebowitz once said, “Think before you speak. Read before you think.” This is a philosophy shared at the RGS where the written word is still regarded as one of the most powerful influences. There is no doubt that reading nourishes the mind, gives perspective, nurtures empathy, and provides an education in the broadest possible sense.

Literacy remains a key focus for us as a school. Nationally, schools have noticed that students’ reading and writing stamina is suffering; students often lack the focus and resilience to read complex texts and struggle to write for prolonged periods of time. We remain committed to resisting these trends. As a result, we have prioritised disciplinary literacy by asking every subject in the Lower School to set at least one academic reading task every term and by setting aside weekly Tutor time, dedicated to reading for pleasure for the younger years. As research by the Education Endowment Foundation affirms, “Literacy is key to learning across all subjects and a strong predictor of outcomes in later life.”

This year’s World Book Week also served to highlight the centrality of reading in our curriculum and was jam-packed with visiting authors, workshops, assemblies, and book discussion groups open to all year groups, with five of our academic Departments recommending books related to their subjects. The week challenged every one of us to pick up a book and re-engage with a love of literature and reading, in particular, to read genres or styles which we may not normally choose. As our Head of English, Ms Wijesinghe, commented, “I believe that teaching empathy is the most important aspect of my job as an English teacher. Empathy is the ability to place ourselves in someone else’s shoes. If we knew what it felt like to be on the receiving end of racially or sexually-motivated hatred, would we abuse others? If we knew what it felt like to struggle in poverty would we judge those less fortunate than us? If we knew what it felt like to flee our homes in war, would we bomb other countries? We cannot experience everything first-hand but we can try to understand the lives and feelings of others, and reading enables us to do so.”

In an increasingly global context to our daily lives, mistrust and prejudice are often fuelled by an inability to empathise and sympathise, often through limited horizons and through fear of the unknown. Books remain one of the most important vehicles to break down barriers and to make our students as worldly, tolerant and balanced as possible. The RGS World Book Week 2024 provided students with a diverse range of literary options. Thought-provoking, challenging and broadening, the books included everything: from the geopolitical context behind Putin's Russia and the Ukraine crisis; to the true story of a lone genius who solved the greatest scientific problem of his time; to the story of Griet, a young Dutch girl who becomes a maid in the house of the painter Johannes Vermeer;

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Reading for pleasure; learning for life.

to the story of Elizabeth Zott, who becomes a beloved cooking show host in 1960s Southern California after being fired as a chemist four years earlier; to a gripping mystery, the story of Ezra McAdam, a mixed race surgeon's apprentice in late 18th-century London, who becomes involved in investigating unexplained deaths.

The books were unashamedly challenging and engaged with ‘big ideas’ which went beyond our students’ normal spheres of engagement: books which were developmentally beneficial as well as being outside their usual reading habits. The value of this approach is encapsulated succinctly by American philosopher Mortimer J. Adler: “In the case of good books, the point is not to see how many of them you can get through, but rather how many can get through to you.” Reading for pleasure; learning for life.

INCLUSIVITY SCHOLARSHIP INTEGRITY

RESPECT COURAGE COLLABORATION

OUR VALUES

SCHOOL PRIORITIES 2022-2025

Our current RGS school development priorities are Diversity and Inclusion, Collaboration, and Student Experience. These priorities run on a three-year cycle.

DIVERSITY & INCLUSION

We have focused on student and staff voice, as well as experienced external providers, to inform our strategy which is currently centred around staff diversity; developing a more inclusive curriculum; and providing additional training and support for staff and students with the aim of making our whole community more tolerant and inclusive.

COLLABORATION

We are focusing on four areas: staff collaboration to develop and improve teaching and learning; sharing best practice between RGS and RGS Prep; co-educational opportunities and links for our students socially and academically; and linking with our international schools to provide students with cultural and academic exchange opportunities.

STUDENT EXPERIENCE

This is an area of continual development; however, our current focuses are on student appearance; the reporting process; academic tracking and reporting; co-curricular participation; literacy; pastoral support; reviewing the Sixth Form curriculum provision; and effective use of student devices and the possibilities that AI offers.

FORTHCOMING EVENTS

Tuesday 12 March

Second Form Options’ Evening takes place online.

Wednesday 13 March

Whole-school photograph: please ensure your son’s appearance is as immaculate as usual!

First (of five) performances of the joint school musical Oliver!

Monday 18 March

RGS Jazz at The Boileroom in Guildford. Book tickets here.

Wednesday 20 March

Senior Piano Concert in the Recital Room.

Friday 22 March

Lent Term ends.

LATEST NEWS

CHEMISTRY

14,915 students from 1,025 schools took part in Round 1 of the UK Chemistry Olympiad. The RGS achieved another outstanding set of results with 10 Gold, 8 Silver, and 9 Bronze Awards. Alexander Gillan’s score put him in the top 15 nationally and he has been invited to Round 2 which selects the national team to complete in the International Olympiad. Freddie Weir and Thomas Koshy were in the top 0.5% of all candidates in the country; Joel Sellers achieved Gold, a superb achievement for a Lower Sixth Form student.

MODEL UNITED NATIONS

“The issues we face will never be solved with silence.” With these words the Secretary General of Epsom College MUN encouraged all delegates to speak up and the RGS delegates certainly rose to this challenge. With over 100 students representing 23 countries, the day was packed with debate on topics including the regulation of AI, freedom of expression, antibiotic resistance, military expansion in space and non-self-governing territories. The RGS team tackled these challenging subjects with passion and persistence, demonstrating a wide-ranging knowledge of the issues. Daniel Hughes and Ayan Chowdhury were commended, Daniel Ward was Highly Commended and George Christiansen was awarded Outstanding Delegate in the most senior committee, the Security Council. For their excellent performance across the day the RGS team representing Russia was Highly Commended, effectively coming in second place out of 23 delegations.

PHYSICS

In the BAAO Astrophysics and Astronomy Olympiad, Freddie Weir was one of just five students nationally to be awarded Top Gold. In addition, Gabriel Correia was awarded Gold, Alex Davies Bronze I; William Plunkett and Arthur Gaseltine Bronze II; and Afra Jamshaid Commended. This challenge has strong links to physics, but involves mostly unfamiliar material so these achievements are all the more impressive.

SPORTS NEWS

FOOTBALL

The 1st XI continued their excellent run in the Trinity Cup with a quarter-final victory against Royal Russell, winning 4 – 1 with goals from Hayden Christian (2), Kian Moodley, and Charlie Walker

HEPTATHLON

Our junior biathletes have qualified for the British Schools Modern Biathlon Championships: in the First Form, William Browne, Lucas Goodey de Diego, and Ollie Wynn; and in the Second Form: Jack Jamieson, Cillian Lee, Jake Mills-Hicks, Oscar Newnes-Smith, and Hugo Wilson. Our First Form team secured a Silver medal at this event last year so will be hoping to return and put in a strong performance as Second Formers.

FENCING

In the British Schools' Team Championship, the RGS had a fantastic day with all three teams winning Gold or Silver medals.

The RGS Under 18 Foil team, comprising Xavier Wallin (captain), Ben Kamstra and Rishikesh Mistry, won Gold and retained the British Schools’ title. Xavier and Rishikesh have now won gold in three successive British Schools’ Team events.

The RGS Under 15 Foil team, consisting of Valentine Wallin (captain), Josh Hine, Lucas Ngai and Harry Radforth, finished as Silver medallists. Finally, the RGS Under 13 Épée team of Cyrus Choi, Monty Membery and Alex Song also emerged as Silver medallists, with Monty and Alex fencing in their first major event.

HOCKEY

In the National Cup competitions, our Under 16As beat a strong Kingston Grammar School team by 3 – 2. The Under 15As continued their fine form with a 3 – 1 victory against KES Southampton. The conditions were not ideal, torrential rain had left the pitch sodden and the heavy rain continued for most of the game; however, the RGS dug in and emerged with an excellent result away from home.

In the block against Whitgift School – with frost once again causing a number of cancellations – performance of the day went to the Under 16Bs who recorded an excellent 3 – 0 victory; the strength in depth of RGS hockey was also highlighted in a 6 – 1 win for the Under 16Ds. The fixtures against Reed’s School also saw four seasons in one day with cold temperatures, heavy downpours, as well as blue skies and sunshine. The 1st XI kicked things off with an impressive 3 – 2 victory; the rest of the fixtures were enjoyable and tightly contested with most games resulting in results with just a onegoal margin. 10 matches were played at the Under 13 and Under 12 age-groups against KES Southampton, with the Under 12As in particular impressing in a 2 – 1 win. It was fantastic to see Under 12 A to F teams in action!

SPORTS NEWS

SHOOTING

The RGS competed in the CCF 100 Smallbore Final against Wellington College and Gresham College. The RGS came second in the overall team shoot, earning four silver medals for James Nicholas, Benedict Cunningham, Shreyas Pasarkar and Ayaan Bhagat. Then in the Falling Plate Competition each team of three had sixty seconds to hit twelve clay disks off of a target, fastest wins. All their training for the Country Life Competition stood them in good stead and the RGS won three gold medals – James Nicholas, Benedict Cunningham and Ayaan Bhagat –and a trophy for their excellent fast and accurate shooting.

RUGBY SEVENS

Our Rugby Sevens players enjoyed an excellent day at the Under 16 Sevens squad tournament hosted at Bradstone Brook. The RGS team competed with tremendous heart and character all day, especially as injuries hit and the weather became increasingly bleak, wet and cold! It was the first time the RGS had won silverware at our own home tournament as the RGS stormed through, sweeping aside all opposition, to win the Plate.

SWIMMING

Zack Grover, Dylan Fuller, Frederik Duetoft and Andrew Brett represented the RGS in the Bath and Nalson Cup competition, a prestigious event for over 80 HMC Schools from all over the country, held at the Olympic Pool in Stratford. The Bath Cup is a 4 x 100m Freestyle Relay competition, first held in 1910 and the Nalson Cup is the 4 x 50m Medley Relay competition, introduced in 1951.

After qualifying ninth for the Freestyle Relay final, the team decided to withdraw and conserve energy for the heats and final of the Medley Relay, our stronger event. This decision paid off handsomely. Having qualified in third place, the final was extremely tight. Zack led off superbly on the backstroke leg, swimming a personal best time and Frederik, our breaststroke specialist, followed on with another strong leg, leaving us in fifth place at the half-way point. Andrew dived in and swam a very impressive butterfly leg, making up one place on our rivals. This left Dylan with the anchor leg and much to the delight of his teammates, he stormed through into third place: the first time an RGS team has made the podium at this event.

MEET OUR… DEVELOPMENT & ALUMNI RELATIONS OFFICE

Ms Monica Popa Development Director

Monica leads the development and alumni team in fulfilling the school’s commitment to the bursary programme and maintaining links with our OGs and supporters worldwide.

Miss Helen Dixon Marketing

Helen is responsible for communications to our OG and parent community and manages the www.rgsconnect.com platform.

Mrs Philippa Green Alumni

Philippa manages our busy programme of alumni and community events and is the editor of our annual magazine, DialOGue.

Mrs Michele Searle Fundraising

Michelle supports Monica in fundraising and is currently organising our 2024 Telephone Campaign.

Miss Lucy Shires Office Manager

Lucy looks after the OG and parents database and makes sure the team operates effectively in fulfilling our commitments to OGs and supporters.