School news

stellAr exAm results lead to success in independent school league tables The Perse has ranked very highly in the independent school league tables produced by The Times and Daily Telegraph. In the overall table of A Level, Pre U and IB results for all schools and colleges, The Perse was ranked sixth nationally by the Daily Telegraph, and was the top performing school in the East, with 83% of exam entries being graded A*–A.

At I/GCSE, The Perse was the top performing co-ed school in the country in The Times league tables, and eighth overall. The Perse achieved the best I/GCSE results of any school in the East, with 94% of entries being graded A*–A or 9–7.

OP NEws wins award! OP News was named Best College Magazine at The Cambridge Building Society’s Community Magazine Awards in July. Judges praised the “excellent design and print” and said the magazine was “extremely professional in content, design and production”. Thank you to all of our Old Perseans and friends who contribute to the magazine – we couldn’t do it without you!

Perse quiz teAm crowned Junior Schools’ Challenge champions Young Perse quizzers showed off their general knowledge skills to clinch the Junior Schools’ Challenge crown in June. The Perse A team, which included captain Malachy Wallace, Shaaon Bhattacharya, Yonas Atabani (all Year 8) and Vishrut Pisupati (Year 7), was in great form in the finals, held at home in the Peter Hall Performing Arts Centre. After beating St Olave’s School (1,140–350) and The Dragon School (670–470), Perse A met George Heriot’s School in the final and saw off their Scottish opponents 880–390 to take the title.

The national finals also featured a Perse B team, drafted in at only a few days’ notice after one of the schools due to attend could not take part. The team, skippered by Andrew Girgis (Year 8) and featuring Benya Atabani (Year 8), Harry Purvis and Freddie Doel (both Year 7), put in a terrific performance to come joint third.

sWitCHed-On students win making Business Happen Award George Palozzi and Hal Bartlett (both Lower Sixth) won the Making Business Happen national final for business and enterprise, sponsored by NatWest and run by the University of South Wales. George and Hal had to present their business plan to a panel of five industry experts.

Their design, the Chispa Switch, is a universal switch that can convert an existing device or appliance into a smart device without the cost of upgrading. Professor Jonathan Deacon, of USW’s Faculty of Business and Society, said: “George and Hal are a shining example of entrepreneurial spirit. The judges were impressed with their business planning detail and clear vision to adapt old and new technology to the end user.”

summit 12 exPeditiOn to ladakh During the summer holidays, the Perse Summit 12 team of 40 students travelled to Ladakh, India, for an 18-day expedition. Students visited a number of local cultural sites before embarking on a 10-day trek. The trek included ascents of the ShangLa pass (4,940m), Matho La (4,965m), Yarlas (4,980m) and the Galap glacier (5,160m). Expedition leader Tom Slader said: “The whole experience was a cultural journey, developing a greater understanding of a different way of life for the people in Ladakh. I will always remember how rewarding it felt seeing all our young people deal so well with the challenges they faced and ultimately coming down the mountain happy and fulfilled having achieved so much.”

Perse gOlFer goes international Golfer Oliver Brunt (Year 9) was selected for the England Schools’ team in their annual international with Wales in August. The England team ran out 13–5 winners in the match at Llanern, with the 14-year-old Perse pupil being the youngest member of the side.

Selection for the international came in a season which saw him play for the England Independent Schools team in a victory against Scotland, top the Independent Schools Golf Association junior rankings following success in the ISGA Radley Putter and Junior League competitions, and clinch the Cambridgeshire Schools U18 title.

Oliver, who began playing golf seven years ago and is a member of both Gog Magog and Bishop’s Stortford Golf Clubs, aims to break into the England Golf U16 Thames Valley regional training squad. OlymPiAd suCCess for Hari Hari Prasad (Year 11) won a bronze medal at the 2018 International Linguistics Olympiad, which took place in Prague. As well as his individual success, Hari was part of the UK team which also received a bronze award, coming just 0.35 points off first place.

As part of the competition, hosted by Charles University and Czech University of Life Sciences in Prague, students had to decipher puzzles compiled in a range of languages. This year’s questions centred on the Greek stress placement system; the Hakhun syntax and auxiliary prefix/suffix hierarchy; the sound laws involved between Terêna’s first person singular and second person singular genitive case (and the effect of Portuguese loanwords on that); the varying hybrid base system of Mountain Arapesh for counting objects, and the Iroquois kinship system of Akan.

As well as learning French, German and Latin, Hari’s language skills extend to Chinese, Irish Gaelic and Sanskrit – an ability he believes helps with solving linguistics problems. Hari said: “It was especially enjoyable meeting people from all over the world and getting to know about their cultures and languages. I really hope it will be possible to get into the team next year!”

brOnze FOr lOtti at World Championships!

Lotti Knights (Year 10) claimed a brilliant bronze in sprint duathlon at the ITU Multisport World Champions in Fyn, Denmark in July. Representing Great Britain in the female U20 category following her success in a qualifying event at Bedford Autodrome in March, Lotti finished third in the discipline in a time of 1hr 11min 1sec. She completed the opening 5km run in 22.05 and followed it up with a time of 35.00 on the 20km bike leg before posting 10.12 for the final 2.5km run. Lotti has already earned her place at next year’s world championships in Spain and we can’t wait to see how she progresses!

CHristel HOuse internAtiOnAl: making a difference in Bangalore The Perse has been working with Christel House since 2011 and raises money throughout the year to provide resources to support teachers and students. In July, three teachers and four pupils travelled from The Perse to Christel House School in Bangalore to help cement the bonds between the schools. Jessica Summers and Ben Wingfield worked on a singing project, mixing English folksong and popular Carnatic music, whilst Carl Cerny worked with teachers and pupils in the English department. Perse pupils were given free rein to explore what the school offers. Nancy Wang (Year 11) and Jacqueline Chesher (Year 9) spent time with the art department, while Camillo Padulli and Neil Sardesai (both Year 10) helped out in computing and English. Neil also used his coding expertise to create a platform in which the music staff could demonstrate different recorder fingerings. The group had an enjoyable, yet humbling, experience and forged friendships that will hopefully last a lifetime.