The Week Ahead
Sunday 11th March until Wednesday 21st March
General Events
Saturday 10th March is a closed evening for the whole of the Lower Sixth Form as a dinner has been organised for them.
Sunday 11th March sees a full School Eucharist at 8:00 p.m. at which the preacher is the Revd. Dr. Adrian Chatfield, Tutor at Wycliffe Hall, Oxford. Parents of boys in the Lynedoch are warmly invited to attend.
Also on Sunday 11th March, Leesu Kim (violin), Trishan Vaikunthanathan (clarinet), Claire Sledd (violin), William Wei (piano) and Amy Tress (violin) will be participating in the Reading Symphony Orchestra 2007 Young Musician Competition. This will take place at Bradfield College in Berkshire, starting from 12:30 p m and the winner will be announced around 5:30 p.m. Please come and support them in their quest as they represent Wellington College.
On Wednesday 14th March at 7.45 p.m. the Round Square Committee will be hosting a World Café discussion event: 'Towards A Green Wellington'. This will be an opportunity for all interested members of the Wellington community to join in a structured sequence of discussion groups whose purpose is to pool ideas for an environmentally friendly school. You can learn more about the 'World Café' format here. Places in the Café will be allocated on a 'first come first served' basis so if you have expertise, ideas, or are just plain interested please email Ant Peter, our 'Green Czar' .
Tickets are now available for the Drama Department's production of Little Shop of Horrors. The musical is a comic parody of 1950's B-Movies and features a fantastic cast and some great songs. The show is being performed on the 14th, 15th, 16th and 17th March at 7:30pm. Tickets are free of charge and are available by emailing Rob White in the Theatre Box Office. Please note that seating is reserved, so book early.
Saturday 17th March is a closed Saturday night for the Third, Fourth and Fifth Forms as we are putting on a variety of activities for them to round off this busy term.
On Sunday 18th March there is a School Service of the Word for the Third, Fourth and Fifth Forms to which all parents are warmly invited. The preacher is Captain Richard Meryon R.N. (O.W.)
Buy your tickets now for the Choral Concert on Sunday 18th March to celebrate Elgar's 150th anniversary. The concert is at 7:30 p.m. in the Sports Hall and tickets cost £10 (students / young people: £1). Wellington College singers, parents and staff join with Crowthorne Choral Society and West Forest Sinfonia to perform Elgar's stirring Coronation Ode, as well as Give unto the Lord and the poignant For the Fallen. Soloists include George Humphreys (OW) and two of our singing teachers, Andrew Yeats and Elisabeth Toye. A particular highlight of the concert will be the performance by Amy Tress (Orange) of Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto in E minor, Op.64. Please send a cheque payable to Wellington College to Ros Dunmore at the Music School, or, if more convenient, you can also obtain tickets from College Reception.
The Master would like to talk to all the UVIth Form and their parents on Wednesday 21st March at 12.30 p.m. in the Theatre. He will talk about his expectations of this year group over the Easter holidays and the run up to the AS retakes and A2 exams in May and June. We hope this fits in well with your picking up your son or daughter.
Wednesday 21st March sees the end of term and I'd like to take the opportunity to wish you and your families an enjoyable Easter. We look forward to welcoming back your sons and daughters on Sunday 15th April rested, relaxed but ready for a another very busy term.
The Second Master would like to remind parents again that they should not book flights before the end of term or before the beginning of Exeat. Likewise, flights should not be booked so that pupils arrive after the start of term or after Exeat. To do so causes disruption to both the academic progress of individual pupils and to the overall lesson planning and scheduling that the academic staff put in place to ensure the best coverage of the syllabus possible. If a parent finds that a flight might conflict with the published term date, we would ask that you contact the Second Master, Robin Dyer, in advance of finalising the travel arrangements.
We would be very pleased to hear from any parent who may be able assist in the Charity Shop, in particular for the afternoon sessions. The Charity Shop operates on Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings (10.40 - 11.10am), Monday and Friday afternoons (4.15 - 5.30pm) and Wednesday afternoons (2.30 - 5.30pm in two shifts). It is run by Parent Volunteers who have a lot of fun working together. If you want to find our more please read this letter and e-mail Sally Yarnton.
Please could any more requests for the 3rd Form French Trip come in? We have spaces for nearly all the year in a youth hostel in St Malo in Brittany from Sunday 24th June to late Thursday 28th June. Activities will include town tours, coastal walks, beach games and mountain biking. We will also visit the Normandy beaches and possibly Mont St Michel. If you need more information please contact David Edwards.
We are pleased to be able to offer parents a great new way of encouraging their children to read. Some parents will have received the Junior School reading list last holidays. All the recommended books have now been uploaded to a new book website Lovereading4schools.co.uk - a site set up by an Old Wellingtonian. Here parents and pupils will find opening extracts of the books and will be able to purchase their selection - all from one convenient place. All books are sold at a 25% discount and, on top of this, for every £100 spent in total by all Wellington parents, the College will receive a £5 book voucher to go towards the Library. Click here to go to our online book list or type in the url http://www.lovereading4schools.co.uk/viewschool/982/favourite. You will then need to register with an email address and personal password. For subsequent visits to the site, you will find the booklists are password protected - the password is "grubbies". We are sure your child will find nothing better to do at Half Term than read a book!
Sport
Sunday 11th March sees more rugby 7s with tournaments for the Colts and Yearlings as well as the National Schools' Novice Polo Tournament.
On Tuesday 13th March the basketball team make the journey to Haileybury, the lacrosse team play Cranleigh and the golf team competes in the Gerald Micklem competition until Thursday.
On Wednesday 14th March, the Senior Rugby 7's compete in the Surrey Tournament whilst on Thursday 15th March two yearlings hockey teams play Kingston Grammar School and the basketball teams play Winchester.
On the last big block fixtures of the term of Saturday 17th March, the hockey players take on Cheltenham College whilst the netball teams play Bradfield, the football team play Epsom and the cross country team competes in the Ranelagh Trophy.
Finally in a last week of term that is dominated by house competition, the rackets players compete at the Queen's Club, the rugby 7's players have various tournaments at Rosslyn Park and on Wednesday 21st March, the U14 netball players compete in the Berkshire County Netball Tournament.
This link will take you to the Wellington intranet where details of hockey sports' fixtures (team lists, pitch details, etc) can be found. For netball click here for basketball click here and for football click here. To keep overall track on how the teams are doing click here for hockey, here for football and here for girls' netball.
Further Ahead
To help you plan ahead, next term's calendar is now available on-line.
The English Department is holding an Exam Strategy Day on Sunday 15 April, the last day of the Easter holidays. The day is intended to give extra impetus to pupils' own study, by providing intensive sessions on exam strategy, focusing on: the format and question style of each exam; exam preparation; and exam technique. The programme is optional and, because it is in the holidays, we realise that some pupils will not be able to attend. However, we do encourage those who can to come. The day starts at 10:30 and finishes at 6:00. To book, please e-mail Justin Garrick, Head of English, before the last day of the Lent Term. Details of the day's programme are on the English Department website.
On Friday 20th April,we are hosting a conference entitled "Cannabis and Drug Abuse: How Schools should respond." Parents are welcome to attend this at a reduced rate of £50 and should apply to Tarla Woolhouse. More details can be found on the website.
On Wednesday 25th April, all students will be encouraged to take part in "A Day in the Life of Wellington College" photographic competition. The idea is that as many students as possible capture in time just some of their individual "Wellington Moments" on that day. We then hope to publish the best results in a number of formats. Persons interested in assisting in the publication of the images need to speak to Brynn Bayman. All students interested in this competition will need to remember to return next term with their camera, no matter what its shape or format.
From the 11th May to the 13th May the W.C.A. are running a trenches trip. We've had a great response to this and it is nearly full. An application form went out with the Master's beginning of term letter or you can e-mail Bill Price for one. Now there are only two places still available on the trip (1 couples or 2 singles). Applications will be dealt with on a first-come-first-served basis or by ballot if necessary.
Further ahead there is the Summer Ball on Friday 25th May. Tickets are going very well and most have gone but there are still a few available. Details can be found here and an booking form is here. For further details contact Reena Price or phone 01628 622355.
The Wellington College Summer Proms (formerly know as the Summer Music and Fireworks Spectacular) will take place in college on Saturday 16th June. A flyer with details of the evening will be sent to all parents at the end of term - tickets go on sale at the beginning of the summer term. Please support this as we hope to raise a large sum of money for both local and national charities. Further details available from Eddy Heddon.
On Friday 29th June, for the Upper Sixth form parents and pupils, we are planning a Graduation event that comprises of a service, a graduation ceremony, drinks with HMs,a dinner and a ball. The event is likely to start at 2:00 p.m. and will end at midnight. Further details and booking arrangements will be with you in due course.