The Week Ahead

Saturday 6th December until the End of Term!

The Master's Voice - Bigside Pavilion

Thank you to all those parents who have donated so far to the sports pavilion appeal. It's not an easy time to ask, and it's not an easy time to give.

Thank you also for being so understanding of why I am having to do this. The good news is that we have raised £300,000 this week, and we are within sight of achieving the single storey pavilion and within £300,000 of achieving the full pavilion. I care desperately about this pavilion, and that we show momentum in our development even in the face of adverse economic conditions, building a facility that has been talked about seriously for six or more years, and which meets a real need for the school. Do please have a look at the design by clicking here. If you don't like the design, blame me, as it has been very substantially remodelled to my own specification, i.e. built with wood cladding, tiered seating for nearly 200 in front, with an extensive viewing gallery on the first floor, a large glass surround club room with excellent facilities for all, and a distinctive sail flourish on top. The pavilion will be extensively used for sports activities by both girls and boys, and building it now will take advantage of cheaper building costs. If you are willing to support this in the next twenty four hours before this appeal closes, with the Governors' meeting on Saturday, please email me , copying in Ed Schneider (ejs@wellingtoncollege. org.uk), and please note there are a number of levels of major giving: gifts over £100,000, gifts from £25,000 to £99,000, and gifts of £5,000 to £25,000. Separate boards will recognise donors on all these levels. In addition, all donors will have a plaque placed on a wooden seat. These plaques will be available for everyone who has made a gift over £1,000. If you would like your name, your child's name, or the name of someone you would like to have remembered included, you can do this by making a gift now of £1,000 or more, or by increasing a gift already made to over £1,000.

The term speeds towards it conclusion. As ever it seems to have flown by! We hope that you and your families can have a restful Christmas and New Year and we look forward to welcoming back the pupils on Sunday 4th January.

Old images from some years ago but there are certainly many children on campus hoping for a repeat snow fall. Even though as you can see the Pavilion was green then, it was still called the Pink Pavillion in those days too!

Letters Home

To try and cut down on the amount of paper we send out and to try and not bombard parents with large numbers of posting, e-mails and information generally, we plan to use this section of the Week Ahead to include letters we would normally send out - either electronically or by post. If there are parents who would still rather receive everything on paper, please e-mail the College Secretary. We still anticipate sending out paper copies of reports, bills and the Master's letters. To open some of these letters you will need to log on to the intranet as the page they are saved on is only viewable to those in the Wellington community. Do contact me if you need the password - details are further up in this Week Ahead. All letters home of this sort are stored here . If for any reason you want to see a back copy of the Week Ahead they are all available on the internet.

The WCA produces a newsletter - for regular updates on WCA events this Spring, check out their latest Newsletter .

Although not a letter home the Wellingtonian gets produced regularly. The latest copy can be found here.

General Events

The Master will be writing at the end of term - you should get a copy with the end of term material and it will be added to the letters home page.

Angels are performing two fantastic concerts at Wellington this December; our Special Community concert is on Saturday 6th December in the Sports Club (tickets £7 and concessions £5 tel: 0780 1022 763) and our magnificent Gala Evening where the Angels will perform with Wellington students is on Wednesday 10th December (tickets £40 each to include a 2 course dinner tel: Wellington Reception on 01344 444000). The Angels this year are from Tiger Kloof School which has long been associated with Wellington so there is much excitement that they are able to visit us for a change! For any other information regarding Angels please ring Clare Walters on 07831 093 499; any sponsorships would be partic welcome.

The Wellington College Community Christmas Carol Service will be held at Wellington College Chapel on Sunday 7th December at 8:00 p.m. where staff, Old Wellingtonians, parents and friends of Wellington College are invited. Please let Reception know if you and members of your family and friends would like to attend. The College will host a mulled wine and mince pie reception in the Dining Hall immediately after the service, to which all members of the congregation are invited. Reception have details.

A great opportunity to hear the Wellington Jazz Orchestra on Tuesday 9th December at 6:15 p.m. in the Concert Room. Ben Greenslade-Stanton will direct the group in numbers such as the James Bond Theme, Don't Worry, Be Happy, and there will be vocal numbers from Gina Kuschke (Norah Jones' Don't Know Why) , Isabelle Wilkinson (Amy Winehouse's Valerie), also from Hattie Jones, Gudjon Bodvarsson and Dougie Chung. The concert will last approximately 1 hour 15 minutes, so please come along if you can to enjoy the atmosphere.

The Junior Carol Service for pupils in the 3rd, 4th and 5th Forms and their parents will start at 3:00 p.m. on Friday 12th December. The Senior Carol Service for pupils in the LVIth and UVIth and their parents will start at 5:00 p.m. on the same day. Apologies but there are no spaces left for parents at the Junior Service but there is plenty of space for the Senior Service. Those who have contacted Tarla will have tickets sent to Houses and students should collect the tickets from their HM. The remaining senior tickets will be put in reception and can be picked up from there on a first come first served basis. If you were unsuccessful in your quest for a ticket, do please consider attending the Community Carol Service on Sunday 7th December at 8:00 p.m. as there are always spaces available at that occasion. If you wish to do so, please see the details above. For those who never raise their eyes in Chapel the image to the right is part of the roof of the apse!

On Sunday 14th December two of our music scholars will be playing in the Recital Room at South Hill Park. The concert will start at 3:00 p.m. and will feature Trishan Vaikunthanathan (clarinet) and Anton Crayton ('cello) accompanied by Jane Beament. Their programme consists of Debussy's Premiere Rhapsodie for Clarinet and Piano, Beethoven's Trio for Clarinet, Cello and Piano Op11, and Brahms Sonata in Eb No 2 Op 120 for Clarinet and Piano and we hope many local parents will support Trishan and Anton in what we think is their first solo venture before a paying public audience. Although young, both Trishan and Anton are superb musicians, and you won't regret an hour spent in their company. Tickets can be obtained from South Hill Park Box Office Telephone: 01344 484123, or on the door.

5th Form parents should by now have received the Futurewise reports and interview comment forms in the post (though a few of those abroad will be brought home by pupils at the end of term). I would encourage you to read these and discuss them with your son or daughter, if you have not already done so. The information should be of value in helping to decide on subject choices for the 6th Form. You should receive a letter from ISCO shortly, giving details for logging onto the Futurewise website as a parent. We expect to have an ISCO representative present at the Parents' Conference at the end of January for those who would like further information. Please contact Dr Elaine Hood if there are any questions regarding Futurewise, or if she can help in deciding on subject choices.

The Wellington Players are recruiting NEW MEMBERS! We meet on Wednesday evenings 7:30 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. and would love more parents to get involved. Whether you've dabbled in acting before or are a complete novice then come along for guaranteed fun! Email Amelia Morse for more information.

New format reports for the Third, Fourth and Fifth Forms will be arriving home in the next week. We hope parents were pleased with the new simplified effort grades and the new working grades included last time as well as the new A4 format. Full reports for the Lower School this time include class positions in most subjects as well as overview comments from Tutors, HMs, the Master and the pupils themselves. Comments will be more concise than in the past to assist parents and pupils in identifying the important messages. More detailed information on changes to reports was included in the letter sent to all parents with the last interims. Full reports for the Lower and Upper Sixth Forms will follow later in the term, as both year groups have recently had Parents' Conferences.

The OW's Society Charitable Fund has very generously sponsored the printing of cards and limited prints from these two watercolour paintings by Jenny Whalley. The aim is to sell as many of each as possible to support the 150th anniversary Channel swim. We are hoping to raise £3000 with a pack of 5 cards costing £10, a limited print A3 mounted for £25 and not mounted for £15. The other good news is that the painting on the right is also available to any purchaser. If you would like to bid for it, the value of the painting is £350 unframed and £500 framed. The highest bidder takes it home. The photographs were taken last spring.

An important plea from the Second Master and the Head of the Upper Sixth about weekend parties -"The Master has written repeatedly about his concerns regarding excessive alcohol use at weekends when pupils are away from College on leave out. In recent days some parents have expressed their own concerns to me about the scale of drinking at some parties. We are facing a very busy last few weeks of term for the Upper Vith as they prepare for January modules. There are now only two teaching weeks left before the January modules. It is essential for their work and their health that they return from leave outs refreshed and ready for the week's work. Could we therefore repeat the plea that alcohol consumption at parties be controlled on a sensible basis so that the boys and girls can have fun without being able to over-indulge? It also goes without saying that the combination of youngsters, cars and alcohol is a lethal one."

For parents who have not already bought a copy of "Wellington College -The First 150 years" , published last week, it will be available for purchase and collection until Saturday 13th December at the pre-publication price of £32.50. Copies may be reserved by emailing Chris Potter and payment on collection from the OW office in Front Quad should be by cheque made payable to "Wellington College (150th Book)". The OW office is open from 9:00 a.m. till 5:00 p.m. daily. For parents coming to either of the Carol Services on Friday 12th December copies may be collected from the OW office in Front Quad between 2:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m.

All parents should have received an e-mail from me giving you a password to open a file of contact details for pupils in your son's or daughter's year group. The page with these files on is here and is in the section of the intranet entitled info@community then current parents. There seem to have been two problems related to this. The first is that older versions of Adobe - the programme that opens pdf files - had bugs in them, particularly version 6.0 my more technical experts inform me. There is now a link on the contact details page enabling you to upload the latest version of Adobe. the second problem to catch more out was the fact that the page is in part of the password protected part of the site. This means to open the page at all you need the username and generic password. The username is COLLEGE\victoria N.B. the back slash - if you are offered three boxes COLLEGE is the domain and victoria is the username. A third possibility, if both of these fail to work, is to use victoria@wellington.net.uk in the domain/username box. The general parents' password is the name of the O.W. on the plaque by the Round Square noticeboard at Queen's Court and must be entered in capitals. Hopefully your son or daughter can supply that information. I sent it to you recently too but if you haven't got it, then ask me! There is information on the intranet to help you and this can be found at http://intranet.wellingtoncollege.org.uk/login_help.htm

Sport

On Saturday 6th December there are two two big block fixtures with the hockey teams taking on Epsom and the rugby teamsTonbridge.

The last week of term sees our Rackets players at the Public School's Championshipsin London. Otherwise the week is dominated by a variety of house sport although there will be Daily Mail rugby matches. The U15 side are playing at St. Peter's Gloucester at 2:00 p.m. on Wednesday 10th December and the U18 side also play St. Peter's but at Wellington on Thursday 11th December with a 2:15 p.m. kick-off.

The sports coaches would like to thank the parents for their huge support over this term.

Rugby and Hockey fixtures and results can be found on the Wellington College Intranet and the rugby results are on the internet as are those of hockey.

Further Ahead

Next term's calendar is now available online - click here to get to it. A paper copy should come back at the end of term with the other end of term material. There will also be a few important returns in the End of Term booklet - do please ensure that these get sent back by the appropriate date.

For information the College Shop, Grubbies, will be open on Friday 2nd January from 9:00 a.m. till 3:00 p.m. and also on Sunday 4th January from 5:00 p.m. till 7:00 p.m.

"The Kids' Cookery School" will be running a cookery course at Wellington next term. The course is open to students in the 3rd and 5th form. Students will be taught the basics of baking bread, preparing an apple crumble etc and the benefits of a balanced diet, the health and safety concerns in the kitchen and the joys of eating food cooked not bought! A professional chef will be running the course and students will each cook their own meals in any given week. The course will run for a five week period and cost £20 per lesson. If you are interested in sending your daughter/ son on the course please contact Brynn Bayman.

Next term rehearsals begin with pupils, staff and Crowthorne Choral Society to work towards a performance on Sunday15th March of Purcell's Ode on St Cecilia's Day and Britten's Rejoice in the Lamb. The concert will also feature Steph Tress (O) as cello soloist in Elgar's wonderful Cello Concerto. Parents (and friends) are warmly invited to join in with this Wellington Chorus. No auditions! Rehearsals are on Mondays beginning January 12th at 8:00 p.m. in the Old Gym. Copies are provided, no sight reading skills required. It would be fantastic to welcome many parents to sing with the Chorus. Please contact Simon Williamson if you would like to join in.

From Friday 16th to Sunday 18th January, beat the January blues with a trip to Bath Spa. A chance to partake of luxury accommodation and with a choice of spa treatments at our hotel or the historic thermal baths in the town centre. Follow in the footsteps of Jane Austen; take the waters at the Pump room and discover 200 years of fashion at the adjoining fashion museum, with an optional tour of the Roman baths: a most cultured way to pamper yourself. There are limited places and for prices and details contact Denise Cook .

On Sunday 18th January, almost 150 years to the day since the first pupils joined the school on 20th January 1859, WCA is celebrating with a supper for 3rd form parents here at Wellington. A chance to meet, chat and get to know each other better in relaxed surroundings. Supper is bookable in advance at £10 per head. If you are interested please contact Lindsay Leslie Miller .

For regular updates on WCA events the Spring, check out our latest Newsletter .

Parents of 3rd Form pupils should please be aware that on Saturday 7th February we are planning to take all the 3rd form to the theatre in London. This is a closed weekend for all of the 3rd form. The trip will cost between £40 - £50. Your son or daughter will be making their choice of show at the beginning of next term. If your son or daughter is not able to attend this event, please let us know by Tuesday 6th January.

Bobsleigh! Whilst Great Britain can not claim to be the home of Bobsleigh, it was largely involved in the founding of the sport. Back in 1890 a group of Englishmen were on holiday in St Moritz. By tying two wooden sleighs together they invented a new way to travel down the icy slopes of the Swiss Alps, which quickly turned into not just a means of transport, but a great way to race.the sport of Bobsleigh was born. Now the British Bobsleigh Association are looking for the next generation of racers and have naturally turned to Wellington to help find them. During February half-term 2009 we have been invited to send pupils (and parents!) to a BBA training camp to learn the skills of the 'Tin Tray', the vintage Cresta 'Skeleton' and the Luge. The likely cost for this once in a lifetime opportunity is around £2000 per participant (to include flights, half board accommodation, training and equipment), less for spectators. We need a minimum of 18 people for this trip to run and it is also dependent on an acceptable Risk Assessment. If you are interested in you/your son/daughter taking part please contact John Gale as soon as possible. We appreciate in these worrying financial times, this might be a luxury many will not want to afford. As a consequence we are only sending it out to parents rather than the pupils so that parents can decide if they wish to mention it to their children rather than the children badgering parents to let them go.

From the Archives

Having seen some of the wealth of material in the archives used in the new Wellington History, our archivist kindly went into the depths of his domain and produced some pictures copied here. The image below to the left was taken on Speech Day, 16th June 1940. The pageant of last year was clearly not a new invention. A more sobering thought was that within four months a line of bombs fell along South Front through the middle of this picture, destroying the then Master's Lodge and killing the Master of the day, Robert Longdon. The gates on the South Front commemorate him.

The other picture on the left shows the Common Room in 1879. A cheerful lot and you can realise that perhaps happiness should have been put on the Wellington curriculum all those years ago.

I've enlarged two particular teachers - scary times!