Headmaster's Bulletin 7th July 2023
A packed Cripps Theatre enjoyed a blockbuster of a Summer Music Concert on Wednesday evening. A huge volume of students were involved and the quality of musicianship was quite extraordinary with an incredibly diverse range of ensembles performing over the course of the evening. It was particularly heartening to see such a rich seam of talent coming through the younger ranks to replace our brilliant Y13 musicians who are leaving this year. Many thanks to Mr Druker, his team and the Friends of NSB Music for putting on such a wonderful event.
In an earlier Bulletin, I mentioned that a Team of Y7 students had made it through to the final of the Northamptonshire County Schools Challenge, which is an annual competition for the Emergency Services, with the focus this year on deliberate fire setting. The final took place on Monday, at the Castle Theatre in Wellingborough. The boys delivered an excellent presentation in the final against predominantly much older opposition and were duly rewarded when Mr Pateman, who is a Reserve Fire Officer, arrived with Fire Engine in tow for the boys to explore! Many thanks to Mrs Morgan-Scott who helped prepare the boys so thoroughly for the event.
On Friday 30th June, 5 students; Chloe Walding, Haroon Kherry, Bryne Arthur, Savya Kotak and Daniel Tilston all attended the Global Ambassadors Conference at Northampton University's Waterside Campus and were an absolute credit to the school. The conference, looking at the issue of County Lines, was arranged by Quinton House School and attended by schools from all over the Northampton area. Speakers from various organisations, including The Hope Centre, The Youth Offending Service and the Police, were informative as well as thought provoking and the students discussed the issues maturely with the aim of creating a charter in relation to challenging this difficult issue. The organisers are hoping that this will become an annual event looking at relevant issues affecting the town and young people.
The first two school heats of the Future Chef competition took place this week for the boys that have opted to study GCSE Food Preparation & Nutrition. Mrs Roberts reports:
The students had to produce two portions of a main course dish within a budget of approximately £5. This was the first time students had been expected to produce something independently and the standard and range of dishes was impressive with Ashton Whittaker, Riad Shehi, Ayyub Barre, Jaydon Amoah and Leighton McWilliams producing particularly notable dishes. Hopefully all the students involved have been inspired to get cooking over the summer break to further their skills in the kitchen! There is one more round to go with the two winners to be revealed in the last week of term.
Many congratulations to Y11 student, Oliver Murphy who recently competed in the International Mathematical Olympiad Challenge which is a global competition - https://www.international-maths-olympiad.com/
Having successfully got through to the final round, competing against the top mathematicians of his age, he received his results last week and has achieved a place in the top 5% in the world, which earns him the highest accolade of ‘Champion’, an improvement on ‘Elitist’ which he achieved last year for being in the top 10%. This is an incredible achievement and we are delighted that Oliver will be taking his prodigious mathematical ability into A Level Maths and Further Maths next year.
Tomorrow we take our Junior and Inter teams to the National Track and Field Schools Cup Final in Chelmsford. This is an athletics competition for the top twelve schools in the country and to qualify you have to win both the county and regional rounds. Due to the tough qualification conditions, it is rare for a school to have two teams in these finals and therefore Mr Taplin and the PE staff are understandably very excited by the prospect! On the athletics theme, I am also delighted to announce that Y12 student Alice Bennett has been selected to represent England at the Commonwealth Youth Games in Trinidad and Tobago. Alice will travel over in August for the duration of the Games and compete in the 800m.
Finally, many congratulations to the Y9 and 10 Softball Team who have won the County Championships and to the Y8/9 hockey team who reached the final of their County competition.
Richard Bernard
Headmaster