Friday 8 September 2017

We were very excited to launch our very first telephone campaign this summer. Over a two-week period from 8-21 Au-gust, a team of sixth formers and recent leavers contacted Emanuel alumni and current parents by phone to update them on news and developments at the school and to seek valuable support for the Fully Funded Places Campaign. It was a fantastic opportunity to connect with Emanuel and hear about life now from our students’ perspective. The Fully Funded Places Campaign, which was launched last April, aims to raise bursary funding to increase the number of free places available at Emanuel to 20, in line with Lady Dacre’s founding bequest. When Lady Dacre founded and generously endowed Emanuel in 1594, she wrote in her will that the aim of the

foundation was ‘towards the bringing up of twenty poor children in virtue and good and good laudable arts’. Today, we are committed to continuing Lady Dacre’s original vision of a place of learn-ing where boys and girls can enjoy a first class education and one that remains accessible to children of all backgrounds. The response to the telethon was fantastic and is a marvellous testament to the generosity and cooperation of the school community. We are delighted to report that we received over £100,000 in gifts to come in over the next four years. This regular support will allow us to plan for the future and secure additional free places for many years to come. Thank you to everyone who donated and who took the time to speak to our student callers. The Headmaster warmly thanks all sup-porters and said: “Such campaigns and

projects are vital in sustaining and devel-oping Emanuel. We are delighted that so many OEs and parents recognise the tremendous value of the contributions and the enormous impact they will come to have on the lives of the beneficiaries.” Our call team contacted over 700 alumni and parents over the course of the two weeks and had a fantastic and rewarding time chatting with members of the wider Emanuel family. If we did not get through to you during the campaign and you would like to learn more about fundraising opportunities at the school, please feel free to contact me in the Development Office on 0208 875 6978 or email development@emanuel.org.uk

EMILY SYMMONS (DEVELOPMENT MANAGER)

THANK YOU

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In the early hours of 23 July, 18 bleary eyed lower sixth students and four Emanuel colleagues emerged from Chennai airport in Tamil Nadu. We had just embarked on a three week trip to our partner schools Sri Jayendra Golden Jubilee School and the Gita Krishnamurthy Vidyalaya (GKV) in the rural village of Sankar-nagar, Southern India. In the first week our students quickly adapted to the demands of teaching English in the intense heat and lessons became increasingly imaginative as they found their feet. The trip was not all about work though: a highlight was the Twenty20 cricket match where even the most apathetic cricket support-ers became overnight enthusiasts after meeting the Australian fast bowler turned commentator Brett Lee. Other notable events were the very competitive basketball matches between the Emanuel and Sri Jayendra students. In spite of our valiant efforts we were often defeated, however Aidan was very noteworthy for the number of points he scored and he is now the proud owner of a local Sankarnagar basketball kit. Furthermore each evening Thea and her team of writ-ers worked tirelessly to connect to the capricious Wi Fi, in order to blog that day’s news. A trip to Kodaikanal, a hill station in Tamil Nadu was incredibly scenic and a much needed weekend break from teaching. The students were equally as excited by the prospect of eating meat and buying gifts. As this summer was the 70th anniver-sary of India’s independence and subsequent partition, the trip to the Gandhi Museum in Madurai was particularly pertinent and a re-minder of how controversial Britain’s historic relationship with India is. Emanuels also demonstrated their show stopping capacity when they performed traditional Tamil dances and songs with Sri Jayendra students. Estelle made her solo debut performance on the vocals, whilst Sholto and Zac proved them-selves to be quite the twinkle toes. It was also an excellent opportunity

for students to don their sarees and kurtas. The letter of application for this trip starts with “this is not for the faint hearted” and the students lived up to this mantra. Their tenacity and comradery were evident as they rose to every challenge. In spite of the long hours, our team were affable and good humoured. In addition Mrs Williams-Ryan’s vast experience of leading overseas trips was tremendously valuable and Mrs Mott’s enthusiasm never wavered - even on the final day when we faced our 30th curry in the hostel. The trip was also testament to the continuous hard work that Rever-end Paul Hunt has put into main-taining and strengthening the part-nership with GKV and Sri Jayendra. The popularity of the trip derives not just from being a unique and rewarding experience, but from the integrity of the partnerships. I am looking forward to reading many great applicants for the 2018 trip.

IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO GET MORE INVOLVEDAlthough this trip is not open to parents you may still get involved in supporting GKV school. The school has been established to help first time learners in the family gain access to education and since it opened in 2014 the school has expanded to 552 students. The cost of one child’s tuition fees at GKV is five pounds per month. The money goes directly to the school, there is no middle agency or charity that takes a cut. The amount can be paid by standing order and I can email you the relevant form to you directly if you get in touch kate: moore@emanuel.org.uk. Due to the incredible support of the Emanuel community we currently cover the costs of one class at the GKV School. That is the equivalent of 40 stu-dents. We really are able to make a huge impact on these people’s lives so any contribution would help. If you would like to learn more about the school you can check the web-site at: www.gkvschool.org/ KZM

EMANUEL RETURNS TO INDIA

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After 25 years at Emanuel, Mr Keddie is still going strong. To brighten up a recent staff meeting he was presented with a cake to celebrate his 25 years of amazing service to the school. We doubt it lasted long when it was redirected to the common room after the meeting, or whether the birthday boy even got a slice! Congratulations Mr Keddie... here’s to the next 25. TRJ

We are thrilled to announce the publication of the inaugural Emanuel Science Journal (ESJ) this week. It includes articles written by students and teachers on science-related topics they find interesting. Whether you are an aspiring scientist or a curious non-scientist, we are hopeful you will find the topics equally fascinating. Our aim to engage more Ema-nuel students in the discoveries of science. We will publish the journal termly and would very much welcome your feedback and ideas for the next edition. Look out for the ESJ around the school and science department. Enjoy! JOE, EDITOR

In July the OE Facebook page ran a feature on “Cheer Up Luv” a photojournal-ism project by Eliza Hatch (OE2005-12) which was attracting attention in online magazines including Dazed Digital. Over the summer Eliza’s project which uses portraiture to catalogue women’s experiences of public sexual harassment has done astonishingly well and attracted rave reviews in the mainstream media. Last week Eliza was interviewed live on the BBC News of which a section is available to view on our Emanuel School Alumni Facebook page or via the BBC directly here: www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-41038655/the-photographer-telling-women-s-sexual-harassment-stories. Her highly original and thought pro-voking project has also been featured in the Guardian, Metro, Elle Magazine, the Daily Mail and many more publications. This is amazing for a project that started

on Instagram and now has thousands of followers and can be found at www.instagram.com/cheerupluv. Eliza has said of her project: “Cheer up Luv is the product of one too many catcalls, and sprung from a series of conversations I had earlier this year with my female friends about how common it is to experience sexual harassment in public. The amount of times I have been told to ‘cheer up’ or ‘smile’ by a stranger is countless. It is one of the most simple and seemingly harmless phrases, but is actually extremely problematic. It leaves you disarmed, and feeling guilty, embar-rassed and angry in the space of about three seconds, while you are left thinking of a comeback that's too late to say. “When bringing up this encounter with a group of friends, it sparked a huge con-versation of harassment story swapping. I noticed that the men in the room were

No wonder JuJu and Maddie are so excited! This huge pile of old syllabus science GCSE text books is currently on its way to Nigeria where they will be hugely appreciated by students at schools where many of the pupils have no books at all. Many thanks to the Berrak Temelkuran for letting us know about the books and getting them all together, Yusuf Afzal and the other kind year 9 boys who carried them downstairs, senior librarian Tony Jones who found a charity that agreed to ship them to Nigeria, and estate bursar Chris Wright who arranged for them to be driven to North London where they started their journey to Africa. Reuse is the best form of recycling and we will be continu-ing to look for ways we can reuse or repurpose items we no longer require at school. If you have any ideas please contact your tutor or Mr Hale. To celebrate this great start to our eco-friendly term and the start of our Reduce, Reuse, Recycle campaign, Mr Hale is offering a small edible prize to the pupil who comes closest to estimating how many sheets of paper have been saved by reusing these books. Answers by email to Mr Hale (john.hale@emanuel.org.uk).

“CHEER UP LUV”

completely surprised and shocked by the experiences that we were sharing, and just couldn't believe that these things happened to us so frequently. “After spending a decent amount of time convincing them, that being looked at on the tube, shouted at on the street, and beeped at by passing cars, does happen more often than they think, I decided it was time to do something about it. For it’s not just the harassment itself that’s the problem, it’s the lack of awareness surrounding it.” TRJ

REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE

25 AND NOT OUT!EMANUEL SCIENCE JOURNAL

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Our annual Freshers’ Fair was held on Wednesday 6 September. Staff set up stalls to inform the pupils about their respective clubs, and more than 200 pupils attended the event to find out more. The activities offered something for everybody and included, to mention just a few; climbing, drone, ancient Greek, Dr Who, literary, swimming, Christianity Explored, chess, disection, computer, debating, robotics, philosophy, classics and art clubs. My thanks goes to both the staff who made this such a great spectacle and to the pupils whose enthusiasm and energy was magnifi-cent to see. A comprehensive list of clubs with their corresponding times and members of staff will soon be distributed to all pupils. Alternatively, please check the school website next week. AJL

FRESHERS’ FAIR

Our lower school academic scholars are just about to start shadowing the Trinity School Book Award (TSBA), a book prize competition which includes many schools in the Trinity Schools Foundation of which Emanuel is a member. For our scholars this involves reading and discussing the seven books on the new shortlist and creating two pieces of work, the best of which we will enter in the overall Trinity competition against the other schools. Last year two of the major prizes were won by Emanuel pupils Molly and Atitiya and the standard of our entries was incred-ibly high. As a school we voted for Stuart Foster’s Bubble Boy as our favourite read. It also won the overall prize as best novel. If you look closely at the attached TSBA poster elsewhere in the newsletter you’ll see that Emanuel is hosting the next award ceremony on 2 March 2017. This means hundreds of other pupils from the Trinity Schools participating in the competition will be attending this major event in the Hampden Hall. We have high hopes that large numbers of the authors of the short-listed books will also be present for the ceremony and participate in our Q&A. If other Emanuel pupils who are not scholars would like to attend the ceremony and meet the authors involved they can only do so if they submit two pieces of work and enter the competition along with our academic scholars. Please contact me at tony.jones@emanuel.org.uk if you would like information on the books that have to be read, or any further clarification. TRJ

Auditions have been taking place this week for the forthcoming senior play, Wil-liam Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night (7 and 8 December) and this year’s school musical We Will Rock You, the musical by Ben Elton and Queen (15-17 March). The drama department have seen more than 150 singing and acting auditions this week, and there are still dance auditions, with choreographer Meg Matthews, to come. It will be another exciting year for drama at Emanuel. Look out for ticket request forms in forthcoming newsletters. RJA

INTRODUCING THE TRINITY SCHOOL BOOK AWARD

DRAMA UPDATE

ESBC REMINDERWe invite Emanuel parents to our boat club regatta and welcome evening tonight

(Friday 8 September) at the Emanuel School Boat Club. This is perfect opportunity for parents new to rowing to meet the coaches and discover the boat house. Time 6.30-8.30pm.

RUGBY

SPORT

WELL DONE GIRLS: Cath-erine and Olivia travelled to Dublin during the sum-mer holidays represent-ing England in the junior touch rugby champion-ships. Catherine's team, the U18s, came first out of seven. She was awarded most valuable player. Olivia's team, the U15s, came third out of 9 and she won the coach's player award. Well done girls. LJF

U15 | PRESEASON TOURNAMENT AT MILL HILL SCHOOL | BY WILL CRAIGIEIt was a warm September morning and a lovely day for the U15s to get stuck into their first games off the season and show their strength. Our first game was against Mill Hill, the host school. Mill Hill had a physical forward pack, and thanks to this, they dominated the possession throughout the first half. Although that didn’t stop us from running away on the score board. Despite the lack of possession we had, every time Mill Hill made an error we would instantly be on the ball, and decisively pass the down the line to our superb finishers, Charlie and Josh, who would either use their blistering pace to

RUGBY: The senior squad returned to school on Monday 21 August for pre-season. The boys worked hard over throughout the week covering a lot of ground, coming together and integrating well in such a small space of time. As a result of such a fine pre-season the senior squad put in a dominant performance against familiar friends St Dunstan's, winning 59-0 in their first outing. Emanuel is eagerly awaiting the school’s first block fixture of the season - the 1st and 2nd XV along with the U15s and U14s will travel to West Sussex tomorrow (Saturday 9 September) and the U16s and U13s will play here at Emanuel. SDG

CONGRATULATIONS GRACE: In July Grace reached the finals of the tennis Surrey Junior Trophy at the National Tennis Centre where she was runner up. She reached the the final without dropping a set.

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score or to set up the ball for the support runners, such as Elliot and Monty. The second half started as the first had ended with Emanuel once again running the ball over the white wash many a time. Al-though, unlike the first half, our forwards really came into their own in the second half, showing their immense strength and skill to turn the ball over frequently. Joe and Matt seemed to turn the ball over at every maul, whilst Rigby used his strength to dictate the outcome of every ruck. Emanuel finished their first game very strongly, with confidence high going into the next game against Judd School. From the kick off, we knew we had a game on our hands due to Judd’s pure intensity. Despite this, we showed our character and the desire to win, as we took the game to Judd. Charlie led from the front, leading the team brilliantly and

setting a great example in the contact area with real intensity. Max tackled ferociously, frequently turning the ball over. Even though it was a preseason tournament and ‘the scores didn’t matter’ that still didn’t mean that the end of the game wasn’t a thriller. In the latter stages of the match Judd began to hit back, resulting in the score becoming very tight. Emanuel’s players began to tire. It looked as if Judd were going to pull it back. Thankfully, we showed heart by finishing the game tremendously with all the strength we had left by turning the ball over on their own try line and getting the ball to Charlie Shinn, who used his pace to score once again in the corner to secure the win.