Highlights Spring 13

Issue 46 Spring 2013

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Highlights

ST A L B A N S S C H O O L

James Butler OPENS new Arts CENTRE James Butler MBE RA, one of the world’s foremost figurative sculptors, officially opened the School’s new Centre for the Visual Arts in November. The new home for the Art Department is part of the ongoing development programme, which is further enhancing the educational experience of the School’s pupils. The new accommodation at Aquis Court also houses the Classics and Economics Departments, but Art occupies an entire wing of the building, with large well-lit studios, a kiln and space for ceramics and other three dimensional work. Pupils from local schools will also be able to make use of the facilities by arrangement on Friday afternoons, in keeping with the School’s tradition of being an integral part of the local community.

To mark the opening, a major exhibition was held on the day, featuring a variety of work by Old Albanians, current pupils and staff. On display were works by students studying fine art, architects, illustrators, graphic artists and sculptors among other specialists, creating a fascinating exhibition.

Famous OAs include such names as Thomas Donaldson, co-founder of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA), Chris Wilkinson RA, who designed the Gateshead Millennium Bridge, and comic book artist and writer, Dave Gibbons.

Arkwright Scholar Lower Sixth former Robert Glew has been awarded a Scholarship by the Arkwright Scholarship Trust and will be sponsored for the next two years by Selex Galileo of Luton. The Scholarships support young people who have the potential to be industry’s future leaders in electronics and other branches of engineering. Scholars are selected following a rigorous process, which includes a two-hour aptitude exam and an interview with a panel of engineers at a top engineering university. This year’s assessment process was extremely tough with over 1100 applicants competing for just 335 Scholarships.

Coach’s Accolade

The Arts Centre has plenty of display space (above). OAs discuss the exhibition at the Arts Centre Opening in November (left).

George Harrison, the long standing and highly successful School Cross Country and Athletics coach, was awarded the accolade of Coach of the Year by England Athletics. Under his guidance, the School has become one of the foremost cross country schools in the country, with numerous national trophies and international success.

Maths Champions In the Senior Maths Challenge our mathematicians received 19 Gold Awards, 26 Silver and 9 Bronze. Gold Awards went to Emma Russell (with the School’s highest score) and Tom Latham. Both of them gain automatic qualification for the first round of the British Mathematics Olympiad. In the further rounds of the competition Matt Morris gained a merit, whilst in the British Maths Olympiad Round One, Daniel Heydecker gained a Distinction, book prize and a Bronze medal. He will also gain automatic qualification to the next round.

Language Opportunities Nine Upper Sixth linguists experienced a range of ambitious challenges at the first Modern Foreign Languages Symposium held at North London Collegiate School to develop interest in modern languages and related concerns. Each of our students was paired with a girl from NLCS and prepared radio broadcasts in their target language of French or German. The evening proved an excellent opportunity for academic and ambitious Sixth Form linguists to meet and share their skills. In October, 20 pupils set off for Usingen in Germany to take part in the German exchange. As well as experiencing life with a German family and enjoying the opportunity to practise and extend their language skills, the visit included the opportunity to attend school in Germany and a trip to Rüdesheim on the Rhine. In November First Formers celebrated the traditional German lantern festival, which commemorates Saint Martin of Tours. Each pupil created his own paper lantern, while enjoying the traditional biscuit, Lebkuchen. In December a group of lower school pupils enjoyed a long weekend in Germany, where they shopped and sampled the cultural and culinary delights of the Christmas Markets. Students enjoy refreshment at the MFL Symposium (above).

The Excitement of Writing

Alan Gibbons signs books in the library (left).

Alan Gibbons, winner of the 2000 Blue Peter Award came to talk to First and Second Form pupils about his experiences as a writer and what inspired him to start writing. His talk was humorous and entertaining and he explained how he worked as a teacher prior to someone telling him to start publishing the exciting stories he told his pupils. He spoke of the delight he had when seeing his first book in stores and left the boys fascinated by his stories as they clutched their signed Alan Gibbons novel.

Gents Return Having built up an extensive discography through a busy schedule of concerts in international venues, the Gentleman of St John’s returned to St Albans School to give a warmly appreciated concert in the library. The first half of the evening concert was devoted to polyphony and Renaissance music, while in the second half the singers let their hair down with a capella arrangements of popular modern songs. Fever proved to be particularly infectious, while I Want to Be Like You from The Jungle Book was particularly inventive, amusing and skilful. It is little wonder that the BBC Music Magazine describes the Gents as ‘an immaculately blended, responsive, interactive consort’.

Puzzle Record The 43 billion billion possible combinations of a Rubik’s cube did not deter the thirteen pupils from the First to Third form as they embarked on a journey to the O2 Arena to take part in an attempt on a World Record. This was for the most people solving the Rubik’s Cube in one place, at the same time. We are pleased to confirm that our students are now World Record Breakers, helping smash the previous record of 937 puzzling people with a new one of 1414 participants. The event was held in order to raise funds and awareness for Depaul UK, the largest youth homeless charity in the country. The pupils enjoyed their day getting into the record books and at the same time they have raised money for a very worthy charity.

Investigative Science

Students study the facilities at CERN

Upper Sixth physicists flew to Geneva to visit the largest experimental laboratory in the world: CERN. A giant underground ring houses the Large Hadron Collider, which smashes together two beams of protons travelling at 99.9999% of the speed of light to recreate the calculated conditions immediately after the Big Bang. After a talk, the group visited the initial stages of the proton and lead-ion accelerators, learning more about Particle Physics and the technology used in research. Lower Sixth biologists enjoyed a fascinating day at the Natural History Museum, where they viewed some of the 80 million specimens that are not normally on display to the public. Students undertook a taxonomy workshop and attended a lecture about midge heads from lake sediments, which provide information about what the climate was like in the past. There were two Stephen Hawking lectures. Dr Alan Eames-Jones gave an insightful talk about ‘Designing mission-critical equipment to withstand earthquakes’. He focused on the importance of the safety procedures of nuclear facilities, highlighting the recent example in Fukoshima. Students also enjoyed a fascinating talk on ‘How our brain cells talk to each other’ by Dr Gareth Evans. The lecture covered both learning and memory. Intriguing questions such as ‘Where are our memories stored?’ and ‘How can we improve our memory?’ were covered and the talk finished with a discussion of the link between learning and synaptic activity between neurons.

Staging a Revolution in School Drama The end of the Autumn Term was marked by the Drama and Music Departments’ staging of a hugely ambitious production of Les Misérables, the world famous musical, adapted from Victor Hugo’s epic nineteenth century novel. Over 1200 audience members enjoyed this spectacular show, which featured a revolving stage, a barricade, stunning lighting, a 24 piece orchestra and some superb performances from students. The staging was the culmination of the incredible determination and commitment of almost 120 people involved in the production, who had been working on the show for almost a year. The large band, expertly directed by Musical Director Mick Stout, moved adroitly through the complex score, from tender light tunes to full orchestral bombast. On the stage, Director Chris Bhantoa produced some stunning performances from his cast as they worked through this epic tale of courage, betrayal, love and revolution. With performers from the Third form through to the Upper Sixth, the production took months of dedicated work and the result was a magnificent show, with moving performances and some powerful singers. Given the scale of the production, the balance of individual talent with the energetic commitment of all of the performers to the ensemble was particularly impressive. There were a number of exceptional individual performances:Trudy Cammack shone as the long-suffering Fantine and Becca Sandler and George Rutledge played the innkeeper and his wife to great comic effect. Emily Anderson played the strong yet lovelorn Eponine: her singing was emotional and her death in the second act was both moving and shocking. Amy Hobbs’ was a delightful Cosette, matched by Stephen Baldwin’s charming Mar­ius and both performed their love scenes with some delicious duets.

The revolutionary students, led by Ben Harrison and aided by an impudent Gavroche, performed on alternate nights

by Adam Annis and William Foxton, gave very credible performances of radical fervour. Particularly outstanding in the production as a whole were Christian Bevan’s ruthless and determined Javert, intent on hunting down Rob Brooks’ valiant Valjean. Their scenes bristled with tension and emotion. This was a magnificent production which was a privilege and a joy, albeit a highly charged and emotional one, for the audience to witness.

Sport: English Schools Cup Winners Cross Country: The Intermediate Team provided the top sporting achievement of the term by retaining the English Schools Cup for the third year in succession. This is a feat achieved by no other school.

The season started with success in the The cross country King’s Trophy at Wimbledon, where our squad in training World Cup team was dominant. Robbie Lightowler won the race by a margin of over 30 seconds. Joe Redwood came in second, with Adam Thorpe 4th and Mark Pearce 5th. Good runs too from Joe Brennan and Ashok Mathur ensured a score of 39 points to win the trophy.

Both Juniors and Intermediates also ran very well over a 4 kilometre course at Queenswood, where an impressive team performance clinched a victory for the Intermediates. The next venue was at Basildon in Essex, where the team ran a 4.5 kilometre course in very wet conditions. Harrison Pyrke, Alex Cook, Ben Hemsi and James Brennan took 3rd, 4th, 5th and 6th places respectively. The team’s 18 points easily put them into the English Schools Cup final at Bolton.

The team dominated the very demanding, muddy and slippery course from the outset. All six members of the team were in the top 30 from a highly competitive field of 130 runners.

Harrison Pyrke was 3rd, Ben Hemsi 10th, Ben Clarke 15th, Tom Halling 20th, Alex Cook 26th and James Brennan

30th. They scored 49 points, which put them 50 points ahead of second placed Shrewsbury School. This was truly an outstanding achievement.

This was paralleled by St Albans’ domination of the Georgetown Prep Classic in Maryland, USA. Our runners won both the Senior and Junior Varsity team races, while Lizzie Bird was individual winner of the girls’ senior race and Dan Myers won the boys’ junior race.The first class calibre of our athletes was exemplified further by Robbie Lightowler’s performance at the 14th World Biathle Championships held in the searing heat of Dubai on 3rd November. Robbie had been selected in July to compete as a member of the GB Pentathlon team. 26 nations took part in the competition, which involved a 1000m run, followed by a 200m open water swim and a further 1000m run.

Robbie took first place, ensuring a fine international win in this team event.

Rugby: There were some real successes in the course of the season, in particular for the U14s, who, with spirited play, won the County Cup. Fittingly, the final was played against Watford Grammar at the OA Rugby Club with a final score of 25-5. The 1st XV had an impressive season, enjoying a series of fine victories: Knights Templar 26-15, Haberdashers’ 29-27, Haileybury 23-17, Bedford Modern 13-10, Verulam 20-12 and St George’s 39-5. They reached the final of the County Cup, but could not quite emulate the success of the U14s. Both the 2nd XV and 3rd XV were high scorers in many of their matches, leaving their opponents on a very low or zero score line.The U16s also enjoyed a successful tour of the south of France and celebrated some very impressive victories: against Six Fours Rugby Club 70-0, RC Martigues Port de Bouc 17-12 and RC Olioullais 37-0. John Saunders, Tom Savage, James Gallagher and Oliver Barlow have been selected for the U15 County rugby squad.

Netball: Both 1st and 2nd teams scored some notable victories during the course of the season.The1st VII beat St Albans Girls 15-7 and vanquished UCS 21-2. The 2nd VII won against Loreto 13-4 and St George’s 10-6. In October, 21 girls set off on tour to Northern Ireland. Both the 1st and 2nd teams faced their most formidable opponents, Donaghadee Netball Club in Belfast, in the first fixture. The girls played well and these first narrow defeats were offset by victory against Royal School, Armagh the following day. The 1st VII won 44-7 and the 2nds 15-14.

While in Belfast, the girls were able to enjoy a sight-seeing tour, including the famous Shankill Road and Falls Road, a visit to the Ulster History Museum and some shopping. At Portrush, on the scenic north coast, matches were played against Coleraine University, whom the 1sts beat 21-19, supported by a 2nd team win of 13-8. Visits were made to the Giants Causeway and Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge, before the final matches against Cross and Passion College, where the 1st VII celebrated a 21-19 win.

Shooting: For the third year in succession, the shooting squad has won the Hertfordshire Schools’ Trophy (Emsall). We fielded four teams and successfully outgunned Haberdashers’ to take the trophy. Earlier in September 8 students travelled to Jersey to compete against Victoria College. Our teams were narrowly beaten. Top shot in the Senior competition was Chris Oates and in the Junior, Alessandro Rossi.

Tennis: Our U16 team, Charlie Broom, Tom Boon, James Wilkinson and Tim Richards made it through to the last eight from a starting field of 600 in the Aegon Tennis Championship. The Seniors, Alex Terry, Charlie Trollope, Toby Stapleton and Darius Faiz-Madavi have qualified for the knock out stages of the Senior Students’ competition to be held in February.

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