14 minute read
Community Action
Senior Team Challenge National Final
In November Vicky Zhang, Josh Cooper, Daniel Spencer and Ivan Wang won the Regional Final of the United Kingdom Mathematics Trust Senior Team Challenge, at Fulford School.
As a result they were invited to compete in the National Final in London in February. Over 1025 teams entered the national competition and it was a significant achievement for the St. Peter's team to qualify as one of the sixty three best teams in the country, and to finish twenty third in the competition. They prepared thoroughly and worked extremely hard during the day on a range of challenging mathematical tasks. They found the first round demanding, but were very impressive in the other two rounds scoring full marks on round three and almost full marks on round two.
Senior Mathematics Challenge
This challenge encourages mathematical reasoning, precision of thought, and fluency in using mathematical techniques. In November thirty one St. Peter's 6th form students took part. 13 received Bronze Awards, 5 gained Silver and Cold Certificates were awarded to Tory Barrett, Jessi Cai, Josh Cooper, Zac Lu, Vicky Zhang, Ivan Wang, Daniel Spencer & Alex Wan.
Senior British Mathematical Olympiad and Kangaroo
Due to their high marks in the UKMT Senior Maths Challenge six students were invited to take part in higher rounds of the competition in December. Jessie Cai, Zac Lu and Tory Barrett sat the new one hour Senior Kangaroo Challenge with Jessie and Zac being awarded Certificates of Merit. Vicky Zhang, Ivan Wang and Dan Spencer were all invited to take the British Mathematical Olympiad Paper. The BMO lasts three and a half hours and contains six complex and involved mathematical problems for which full written solutions are required. Dan and Vicky performed extremely well, achieving distinctions.
Junior Team Challenge
In April Alec Moayyedi and Christian Brennan, together with Katherine Spencer and Luke Dunsmore from St. Olave's, competed in the Regional Final o: UKMT Team Challenge, at thejf Mount School. 28 teams competed. There was a group competition, a crossnumber, a head-to-head and a relay race. They worked very hard during the day on these activities and finished 8th overall. Intermediate Mathematics Challenge
This challenge is targeted at the top third of pupils in English Schools. The question papers are designed to make students think by using mathematical techniques to solve non-standard problems. In February, 133 St. Peter's students took part, with 33 pupils achieving a gold certificate, 44 a silver and 32 a bronze. Due to their excellent performance in the challenge, Alex Wan, Amy Dodds, Alex Payne, Patrick Copley, James Field, Alistair Duffey, Gemma Willink, Zoe Pindar, Max McLeish, Min Lee, Eleanor Dobson, Lee Morgan, Hannah Lawrence and Will Kimpson were invited to sit the European Kangaroo paper. The questions involved thought-provoking situations requiring the use of logic as well as mathematical understanding and pupils from over forty countries in Europe and beyond took part. Lee, Min and Alex performed very well achieving Certificates of Merit.
Intermediate British Mathematical Olympiad
Chris dePlanta de Windenburg, George Gao, Alec Moayyedi, Christian Brennan and Wendy Wan were all invited to sit the United Kingdom Mathematics Trust Intermediate Maths Olympiad following their outstanding performance on the Intermediate Maths Challenge in February and each achieved a Certificate of Merit This is a national competition and only the best mathematicians are able to cope with the very challenging questions.
DJS
Maths Inspiration is one of the largest maths enrichment programmes for teenagers in the UK. It's a chance for pupils to experience the UK's most inspiring maths speakers live, in big venues, presenting mathematics in the context of exciting, realworld situations. In March a group of L6th Further Maths students attended the Maths Inspiration Lectures at the West Yorkshire Playhouse. There were three talks:
LDambusters and the Bouncing Bomb - Hugh Hunt and Hilary Costello
The last time planes attempted to blow up a dam using a bouncing bomb was in May 1943 - until last year, that is. Hugh and Hilary were asked by Channel 4 to lead a team of engineers using maths to re-create the dambusters raid. Tracked by a film crew their challenge was to suspend a spinning bomb under a vintage aircraft, and build a 10-metre-high dam especially for the purpose of blowing it up with a bouncing bomb. In this talk, they explained how their applied maths led to a dramatic conclusion. Z.Proof, Pizza and the Electric Guitar - David Acheson
Why is proof so important? Does pizza have a place in serious mathematics? And what has all this got to do with the electric guitar? To find out, David took an off-beat look at some of the most important ideas in mathematics, with live demonstrations and computer experiments.
3.The Maths of Juggling - Dr. Colin Wright
In this acclaimed talk, mathematician Colin Wright displayed his juggling skills, while at the same time analysing what was going on. He described how he invented a mathematical notation for juggling, and showed how that information was used to invent new routines.
DJS
Community Action 2011-2012
This year the new Lord Mayor of York Young Volunteer Award was launched and it was excellent news to hear in June that seven L6 pupils had achieved the award - congratulations go to Alison Thornton, Rebecca Widdicombe, Molly Bythelljess Fairbank, Becks Jordan, Hannah Tolley and especially to Emily Scanu who received the Lord Mayor's Special award at a ceremony at the Mansion House in June.
These seven girls are particular examples of the volunteering that goes on throughout the year in St Peter's, involving over 120 pupils from all year groups. Much is achieved both off-site, working with charities, vulnerable children and adults and also onsite working within our own community and also welcoming many people into the school as our guests.
A new project launched this year was BIRD - this idea was brought into school by Andrea Canacci, a sixth form pupil here for one year from the USA on an English Speaking Union Scholarship. Andrea had run BIRD projects before in America so she organised the project along with a group of sixth form pupils with help from the Community Action team and the event took place in March. Groups of pupils from all years volunteered their services for the day and projects undertaken included decorating at a local residential home, gardening at two local primary schools and general DIY tasks at three Mencap residential homes in York. Amazingly the weather was excellent and the volunteers enjoyed a day of hard work followed by a celebration dinner in the evening where they were joined by residents of the homes. Well done to^
m
Andrea and her team, Justin Cho, Harrison Medley, Rachel Moore, Lavinia Taylor and Becks Jordan, for making the day such a success.
This year we tried a new approach to our in-house volunteering by creating a sixth form Community Action Committee. This was made up of over 20 sixth form pupils who either came along on Monday afternoons to the Monday Group or volunteered r
their time on Thursday lunchtimes to help with events such as the Macmillan Coffee Morning, the Rudolph Parcels, the Community Action Christmas Party and the Valentine's Appeal. All these events were enthusiastically supported by other pupils in the school as well and it was good to see so many sixth form pupils taking more responsibility for their organisation. The Monday Croup was also involved in a gardening project at Poppleton Road primary school with York Get Growing and this was a real success with the third form girls who took part.
We have continued our links with many charities such as the WRVS York Home Library Service, the Children's Society, SNAPPY and Contact the Elderly. We have had a large number of pupils volunteering with the Wilberforce Trust this year, including a new venture where we recorded the first audio version of the Trust's newsletter. We are sorry to lose our contact, Helen Ambrey, who has worked with all our volunteers for the past three years, finding their placements and helping them to settle in and make the most of them. We wish her well in her new job in Lancashire. The Lollipop Christmas party was once again well attended with lots of new activities this year including a bouncy castle in the Memorial Hall and early in February we also helped them with a craft event called 'Bear Bonanza'. Held in school this involved the pupils helping to make model teddy bears with the Lollipop children - quite a tricky skill to master but great fun! Our Silver Surfers group has thrived and been very well run by Bradley Smith and Rebecca Wootton - they will both be missed next year. Thanks also to Mrs Underwood who supervised the sessions until the welcome arrival of David who made his first appearance at Silver Surfers in June!
Our work with the Island charity has again been an important part of Community Action this year. The cookery sessions held in St Olave's have proved even more popular and the themed baking, from pancakes to Jubilee cupcakes have all been very successful. Julie Bainbridge also organised a Christmas party with the help of our volunteers - this is definitely becoming an annual event.
Our pupils' contribution to the daily routine of all three schools has continued with lots of volunteers helping out in CPPS, St Olave's and this year a large number in Acorn Nursery. Some have made it part of their Duke of Edinburgh award service section but most volunteer because they gain a great deal from the experience, whether they are working one-to-one in St Olave's or helping out at playtime in Clifton Prep. difficulties aided by the whole of the 3rd form. There were five different activities: Drama, Cycling, Golf, Tennis and Kurling, all supervised by trained providers and even though the weather could have been better, we didn't get wet and our pupils' enthusiasm for working with our visitors was a very uplifting experience for all those who were involved.
Thanks to all the school staff and pupils (3rd form and L6) who worked so hard to make sure that Mencap@StPeters was a great success and also to Mencap for their organisation, particularly Alison Pike, Head of Programmes, whose enthusiasm was boundless. We hope to be able to make this event a regular feature of the Community Action calendar.
For the 5th form Community Action project this year we were at three sites: Skipwith Common where we worked with Natural England to clear an area of Silver Birch saplings, Greenfields on Haxby Road where in two days the pupils managed to turn most of this raw site into an area that hopefully the local primary school will be able to manage as part of the Get Growing project next year, and finally HaggWood at Dunnington. We spent two days here waging war against rhododendrons, first leaves, then branches and finally roots which had to be hacked out of the ground. Needless to say the rhododendrons lost and a large area was cleared of this unwanted plant. We were lucky (again!) with tl weather; during a very wet June we only got soaked twice. Thanks to Rachel Earnshaw from TCV who helped us organise the project.
As ever I am very grateful to all the staff who have been part of the Community Action team this year; Libby Ullstein, an organisational genius, Ailsa Huysamen, whose artistic talents have been greatly missed since she deserted us for warmer climes at Christmas, Lorraine Underwood, and of course Sarah Mckie who has been a great support to me throughout the past four years. Another important member of the team has been Julie Bainbridge and I am delighted that she has agreed to take over the Community Action reins as I step down. The most important members of the team however are the volunteers of whom there are many in St Peter's, busy pupils who are happy to turn up and get involved with anything and everything with willingness and enthusiasm. Thank you to you all.
Monday July 2nd was a busy day in the Community Action calendar. From first discussions in September we undertook to plan a project in collaboration with Mencap to host a day of sport\ i and drama activities for over 50 children and adults with learning
>a^ r,xp?-^
, f S , " ' . , . .
The Duke of Edinburgh Gold Award Expedition, July 2012
20 apprehensive teenagers and three members of staff left York at the end of the wettest June on record in nervous anticipation of the testing days ahead. Not for nothing was one of the groups to be awarded the title of Bog Trotters, for their many and varied aquatic adventures during their expedition. We had decided on a change of venue this year and the gold assessment was to take place in the stark beauty of the North Pennines.We drove to Langdon Beck Youth Hostel in the worsening rain, to find our assessor Frank DB Hudson already there, waiting, watching, and monitoring our arrival. Frank, a former Royal Marine Commando, dressed in DPM and combat boots and sporting a pair of aviators, certainly sent a shiver of fear through all of the pupils and some of the staff! Clearly this assessment was to be no easy undertaking. Once in the hostel Frank introduced himself, discussed the plan for the days ahead and gave a brief history of the landscape we would be visiting. Henry participated in the discussion on lead mining, while Frank singled Justin out for praise - an honour and a privilege indeed.
The first day dawned cloudy, grey and cold, followed later by patches of sunshine interspersed with strong winds and vicious bursts of rain.The previous night some members of one group (we shall not name and shame) realised they had forgotten to bring their compasses, tent poles, a map case and, almost, the maps as well. Later, Riley lost a flip flop on the hill and Emery found this highly amusing. They found refuge at Thorn Green, a good campsite with showers and radiators for wet socks. Croup 2 were so tired that they were asleep by eight o'clock and didn't resurface until seven the following morning! Croup 3, after a slight false start, treated Frank to an art master class (under the expert tuition of Laura and Abbie) by the shores of Cow Green reservoir and, needless to say, he was very impressed.
Day two was wetter in the morning but cleared by lunchtime. Group 1 were tracked going off-route and were in real danger of becoming "navigationally embarrassed", before Ben helped them navigate their way back onto the correct path. Group 2 found that the stepping stones they had intended to use to cross the river were under several inches of fast flowing water and had to add a 4km detour to their route. Later, weary and footsore, Jess, Hannah and Giles had their blisters popped and taped by a solicitous Frank. Group 3 were offered beer by the lady at their campsite but regretfully had to decline. Matt Chan became a brother (again) and Jack Harrison was very proud.
Day three was sunny in the morning, as were all the groups' spirits. Georgia was so happy she laughed until she cried - did this have anything to do with the shorts that Giles was wearing? Dan cleared up everywhere after his group under the guidance of his mentor Alex. Group three's campsite had been flooded two days earlier and it took all their Yorkshire charm to persuade the owners to allow them to spend the night there. Luckily Frankie had plenty of chorizo to share and everyone was happy. Meanwhile, the Cloud Dancers suffered no navigational mishaps today.
Day four was actually sunny and dry all day - a welcome change from earlier and so very different from the weather which preceded our visit and that which was to follow. Not that bad weather was of concern to Molly and Polly whose tent was bombproof, or to Calum whose super hat defied anything the sky could throw at it, even a flying flip flop. To finish along Hadrian's Wall was a tremendous end to three fine expeditions. The groups all reached their finish points in good time and were highly commended by Frank as being among the fittest, strongest and most cohesive groups he had seen for many years.
