Dear Parents and Friends,

It has been great to see the cricket, tennis, athletics and rounders season get fully under way this week with some warm weather helping fixtures to run smoothly. Our School teams and House teams have been in action and I was particularly impressed with the performance of both Nathan Daniels and Megan Driver at the Croydon Schools Athletics event on Wednesday.

On Wednesday, we welcomed 30 pupils from local primary and prep schools to our Musical Strings Workshop led by the Music Department. Thank you to Mr Millward and his team for the excellent work with these young children during the day and for ensuring that the afternoon performance to parents was such a success. There was more outstanding music making at our Guitar and Drums Concert held at the end of School this afternoon. Congratulations to all the students involved, particularly those performing for the first time. On Thursday evening, the boarding community and small Choir gathered for our Ascension Day Eucharist Service, where extracts from Mozart's ‘Sparrow Mass’ were sung. Soloists were Bart Konechni, Ben Preston, Francesca Pringle and Thalia Selby. At Assembly this afternoon, we thanked the Senior Prefect Team and Mrs Thomas-Webb for their organisation of our assemblies through the year and we heard updates from the School Council. We were also reminded of the charity for which our mufti day today was held. Waggy Tails Club is a charity based in South Croydon who provide dog therapy and support to local children. Denise, their representative, received a cheque for £1000 as a result of our mufti day today. I was also pleased to award certificates and prices for excellent performance in maths to Kevin Ai and Tim Zhang and to award the certificates for the House Drama Competition held last week. At the end of the assembly, Carly Hedmann our senior chorister, performed ‘In his eyes’.

With a week remaining before study leave starts for Year 12 and Year 11, there is a great deal of work going on by staff and pupils to ensure everyone is as ‘exam ready’ as they can be. Revision sessions and support clinics continue and it is clear that these examination year groups are setting the tone for some serious endeavour in the weeks ahead.

A swarm of bees caused some excitement on Thursday afternoon by landing on the statue of Roger Bannister and giving him a new hair style!

This morning, I was able to wave a bus full of Junior School and Year Seven pupils as they headed for their adventure activity weekend to the Brecon Beacons. I am sure they will come back having had a wonderful experience.

This weekend the CCF are supporting events at both Buckingham Palace and in Hyde Park and the Croydon Performing Arts Festival will continue in venues across the school. With best wishes,

Headmaster’s Weekly

Newsletter

6 May 2016

Chris Hutchinson Headmaster

From the Chapel

Ascension Day Service

Ascension Day is one of the four main days in the Christian Year, along with Christmas, Easter and Pentecost. It celebrates the return of the risen Christ to heaven, to be our King and High Priest, presenting our worship, with his, to the Father. For the next ten days, until Pentecost, we do as the first apostles did, pray for the promised gift of the Holy Spirit: Come, Holy Spirit, come! It is a national holiday in many countries, but not in Britain, alas. An old English tradition is that if it is sunny on Ascension Day, it will be a warm summer. Start pouring the drinks! In our evening service the Choral Society sang from Mozart’s Sparrow Mass, so called because of the ‘chirping’ sound in the Sanctus. The preacher expressed the view that Jesus most likely disappeared atop a mountain in a cloud, to convince his apostles that he was returning to heaven, which, they believed, was above the sky. The Apollo 11 launch in 1969 is not regarded as an appropriate comparison.

In this painting by Giotto (1306, Padua}, Jesus ascends through a cloud, accompanied by angels, whilst two angels explain to the Virgin Mary and the apostles what has happened [Acts, Chapter 1] Easter in the Eastern Orthodox Church was last Sunday, five weeks after our Easter Day. Happy Easter to the Orthodox members of the School!

Answer to Chapel Quiz 73

St Edmund, or Edmund the Martyr, King of East Anglia was the first patron saint of England, in the 9th century AD. It was probably the 12th century Crusaders who first invoked the name of Sty George as an aid in battle. King Edward III made him the Patron Saint of England when he formed the Order of the Garter in St. George's name in 1350, and the cult of the Saint was further advanced by King Henry V, at the battle of Agincourt in northern France. Shakespeare made sure that nobody would forget St. George, and has King Henry V finishing his pre-battle speech with the famous phrase, ‘Cry God for Harry, England and St. George!’

Chapel Quiz 74

When is the next year when Easter Day is, unusually, the same day for Western and Eastern Christians? Prizes for pupils.

Thought for the week

Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass; it is about learning to dance in the rain. [Anon.]

Not in the Bible

As the ark sinks Noah says, ‘I knew the woodpeckers were a mistake!’

Croydon Performing Arts Festival

Royal Russell has been hosting a large part of the Croydon Performing Arts Festival over the last couple of weekends including Piano, Woodwind, Brass, Music Versatility, Speech and Drama, and South Asian Music.

Participants came from as far away as Manchester to show their skills to appreciative audiences. Needless to say it was the Rock and Pop section that created the most noise with the walls of the PAC reverberating to the beat of African drums and the beautiful rhythms and harmonies of the Panash Youth and Community Steel Bands from Upper Norwood.

Russellians participated in a number of categories and collected a variety of awards:

Ryan Appadu, Aidan Bradley (1st), Daniel Topolovic (1st), Adam Wahid, Edward Lloyd, Verity Burcombe (1st in four categories), the Royal Russell Jazz Trio and Band, Sasha Howard, Cassie Exall, Katie Durrell (1st), Anna Stone, Nikita Sood, Alex Franklin, Isabella Bruguier, Jasmine Rihal, Eleanor von Gerard (1st), Megan Wood, Nancy Burgess-Gibbs, Tehmeena Malik, Amber Lukes, Eva Thomas-Daly, David Cherry, Joy Eden, Rebecca Woodham, the Senior and Junior guitar groups who all did solo pieces too, Rohit Nair, Arnav Bhagat and the Junior recorder group.

Many were placed first and collected medals.

Of special note, Arabella Howard age 5, the youngest entrant, was awarded 1st place and the Haling Park Hotel trophy for her Speech and Drama entry. Congratulations to all.

Media Student Short-Listed for National Film-Making Prize Year 13 Media student, William Skelton, had been short-listed for a prestigious national film-making competition organised by the English and Media Centre. William has been invited to the British Film Institute on the South Bank for the awards ceremony at which his AS Music Video will be screened. You can view William’s award winning work on our website: www.1853productions.co.uk but please be warned the language and themes are inappropriate for younger year groups.

Library News - Revision Aids With the exam season upon us and all pupils facing either public or internal exams, we have placed some useful links and guides on our Firefly pages. All pupils can access these to help with revision planning and practise and we encourage you to take a look. Included are links to the online app “Gojimo”, which is proving to be a very popular tool to aid revision for A level, IGCSE and GCSE subjects. Pupils can access the Firefly login and Library Revision page Here Also in the Library we have a display on #Getting Through It – a campaign from Young Minds Vs, the mental health charity supporting young people to fight school stress, so that they find it easier to deal with school and exam pressures. The display features useful tips and techniques including what foods boost your ability to concentrate and what to do if you begin to feel overwhelmed.

Popular with students is our stationery shop which is open on Monday, Wednesday and Friday lunchtimes and stocks exam essentials at cheaper than high street prices. You can see the stock and price list Here. Please note we only take cash – change is available.

And finally, Did you know, you can now keep up to date with all the Library’s news and events via Twitter….. Follow us : @RRS_Library

Geography Eggheads The Geography department held its first Eggheads competition, where the Year 13 experts took on the budding Year 10 Geographers. The competition, which closely follows the TV series, involves the challengers taking on a panel of geography experts in head to head rounds. The victors of each round go to the final and the winners of the final round take the competition. The Year 13 team, comprising of captain Linda Ge, Robbie McGeary, Howard Ma and Michele Kazi took on the Year 10 challengers of Reshe Harrison, Hrishi Nokku, Alex Ullman and Josh Cleaton. The round on deserts went in favour of Robbie McGeary, while the rounds on Italy and Glaciers were drawn. In the Final, the Year 13 trounced the Year 10 with their superior knowledge of soils and places. Next week the Year 12 will take on Year 13.

From the Sport Department

Athletics

On Wednesday 4th May (May the Fourth be with you!) we took a limited number of students to the Croydon Schools athletics meet. Against the best U14's in the district, our athletes performed admirably. The two standout performers were Nathan Daniels, 2nd in the 300m and Megan Driver, 1st in the 1500m. Well done!

On Tuesday next week we have the Year 8 Croydon Schools Athletics championship. Team lists and details are on schoolsports. If you have been selected, well done. Please make sure you train for your event on Monday night's athletics club. If you have somehow been overlooked, please get to Monday night's athletics club so that you can challenge the incumbent!

House Sport

In House sport this week we played the Junior boys’ cricket prelim between Oxford and Cambridge. Despite some enthusiastic fielding from the Oxford lads, Cambridge will go forward to the semi-finals next week together with Keable, Madden and St Andrew’s. In the Year 10 Tuesday softball session, Ben Briggs showed that he is a prize pitcher, even introducing spin! While Alex Brothers' hitting meant his team scored a rare 'grand slam'. Both were MVP's of the week.

Tennis

Tennis club has been very well attended this week, possibly due to the excellent weather and Liz's awesome tennis ladder. Please get your matches played. There will be new sheets with promotion and demotion next week. Email her or Mr Davies if you want to join in.

The Patron’s Lunch Street Party - Saturday 2 July 2016

As one of the Queen’s Patron Organisations, we have been officially invited to celebrate the occasion of Her Majesty's 90th Birthday.

You are warmly invited to a traditional ‘street party’ event to be held on Lime Tree Quad on the afternoon of Saturday 2 July 2016, following our Royal Russell Day celebrations. The event will begin at 1.00pm and conclude at 5.00pm. This will be a ticketed event and all attendees, including children, will require tickets. There is no charge for tickets which are available to Parents, Staff, Governors and Old Russellians and their children. Tickets will be issued on a first-come first served basis, with allocated table seats or the option of using a designated picnic area. Once all the table seats have been filled, only the picnic area will be available, until all tickets have been allocated. Guests are invited to bring their own family picnic. Additional refreshments including soft drinks, Pimms, cakes and ice cream will be on sale throughout the event. Tickets for the Royal Russell Patron’s Lunch event are available to book now at www.royalrussell.co.uk/PatronsLunch. We look forward to seeing you!

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Diary Dates

Monday 9 May Music Tour Presentation 7.00pm Auditorium

Wednesday 11 May Theatre Society Trip to The Play that goes Wrong

Thursday 12 May Year 10 Careers Fair

Thursday 12 May Year 7 Study skills Session

Thursday 12 May Year 13 Hollenden Trip to Covent Garden

Sunday 15 May Pentecost Chapel Service 6.00pm All Welcome

Summer Term Key Dates

Monday 6 June Internal Exam Week Begins

Wednesday 22 June New Pupils’ Welcome Day

Saturday 2 July Royal Russell Day followed by The Patron’s Lunch Street Party

Thursday 7 July Summer Term Ends

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We welcome your feedback. Please send to Ciara Campbell, Marketing and Communications Manager

email: ccampbell@royalrussell.co.uk

Royal Russell School

Coombe Lane : Croydon : Surrey : CR0 5RF

www.royalrussell.co.uk Patron: Her Majesty The Queen