The School was very privileged and delighted to be able to welcome the British Council Manager of the International Schools Award, Mr John Rolfe and his team of three on Tuesday 18 December.
During the three hours that they were with us, they worked their way through a heavily packed schedule of meetings, viewing work and talking to pupils involved in a range of international activities and projects.
The visit started off with a whole school assembly where stunning musical performances from Daljit, Arvind and Ranvir Bansal and the Girls’ Senior Choir immediately gave an outstanding example of student talent and the range of international musical activity celebrated in the school.
This was followed by an address by John Rolfe to the School in which he commended us for the achievement of the International Schools Award, the range and quality of our international activity, and cited us as an exemplar school that the British Council would like to work with in future marketing promotions.
Following the assembly the British Council team then met a number of students to view and discuss their work. These included: Sixth Form groups involved in Namibia and the Stella Louise project, the forthcoming China visit and their joint curriculum project work by which they were greatly impressed, Year 10 students and their previous work on the Holocaust and genocide and the Junior Boys’ Choir rendition of ‘Noel Nouvelet’. The whole team were delighted and astounded by the amount and quality of the work undertaken and very impressed with all those students they met whom they described as ‘highly articulate, very engaging and delightfully friendly’. They also paid tribute to the ‘energetic and inspirational’ team of teachers who were making it possible for the students and school to achieve the highest standards through international links and projects.
After packing in as much as possible at the Senior School, the team then visited the Junior School where discussions centred on fulfilling the Junior School’s future aim of also achieving International School Award status.
"The day was a great success and I was immensely proud to hear the British Council representatives enthusing so highly about the ‘overwhelmingly friendly ethos of the school’, the ‘excellent work it was doing on the international field’ and the clear enthusiasm and ease with which students were able to communicate.
"I am delighted to have been able to lead the Senior school towards the successful achievement of the International Schools Award and I am particularly grateful to the members of my committee for giving up voluntarily their time in attending meetings, co-ordinating events and ensuring the success of activities and projects. I am of course also very grateful to all staff who run with the ideas presented and to the students who show such insight, motivation and determination in trying to ‘make the world a better place’. I now look forward to even further exciting developments of the international dimension as we begin to extend links into Hungary and possibly India as a future objective".
Mrs A Goodwin, Deputy Head, International co-ordinator