Sport - Rugby School

Vales
2009/10
Vales
Vales
afternoons, first with his work on First Schools (including the
organisation of First Schools’ Day) and latterly as a member of the
CCF. Add to all this his first-rate tutoring in Sheriff and you start to
get an inkling of the contribution that Jonathan has made over the
last five years.
There is no doubt that Jonathan has also gained from being at
Rugby. He has matured and developed rapidly, not least in terms of
his choice of coaching gear! It was inevitable that he would move to
become a head of department. Finding a young Chemistry teacher
with such an eye for detail and such an extensive knowledge of the
subject would be difficult enough; add to this excellent classroom
control and all-round contribution to school life and it would hard
to find someone better than Jonathan. During Jonathan’s five years
here he has married Naomi and they are soon to start a family. As
they move on to Gresham’s, Jonathan will relish running his own
department and we wish both of them every happiness for the next
stage of their lives.
TMW
Molly Tollit
Five years ago I found a letter in my pigeon hole from the wife
of the new Deputy Head at Bilton Grange. A classicist who had
taught in senior and preparatory schools, Molly Tollit was simply
wondering if anyone needed an extra hour or two of Latin in the
evening. Little did I realise then that Molly was actually an entire
Classics department rolled up in one person and she was soon
signed up for as many periods as she could cram into her already
busy life. Equally at home with Latin, Greek or Classical Civilisation,
and willing to teach any year group or ability, Molly is a godsend for
any head of department. Molly has run trips, organised resources,
put up displays, sorted out visiting speakers, masterminded pupil
presentations, hosted pupils and staff for barbeques and dinners;
in short, she has shamed us all with her efficiency, energy and
enthusiasm. Most important of all, she has been a demanding,
but kindly teacher to Oxbridge classicists, nervous beginners and
everyone else in between. She will be greatly missed, but it is good
to know that she is still around if anyone needs an extra hour or two
of Latin in the evening.
HWP
Max Pappenheim
Max Pappenheim arrived at Rugby three years ago and immediately
gained something of a cult following: there is a generation
of Rugbeian classicists who will always very fondly remember
their deponent verbs with a ‘ding-a-ling-ling’ because of Max’s
‘deponent verbs symbols’, which he chimes whenever such a verb
appears in a text. Max is, of course, an absolute genius, so much
so that the rest of the Classics Department unashamedly tell pupils
that they will ‘just pop over and ask Mr Pappenheim’ when they
are unsure of anything. Max is modest about his intellect, though,
and exceedingly patient with those less intellectually titanic than
he is; indeed, he has only ever lost his patience once, but that was
spectacular – we’ll leave it at that ….
Max does seem to be on a different planet from the rest of us a lot of
the time. He is often to be seen running down the road to school,
late, tie undone, papers flying, and it takes regular reminders to
get him to turn up to departmental meetings. On trips, perhaps
unsurprisingly, Max is always the last person to turn up to breakfast
or the first to wander off from the rest of his party. But he always
makes up for such things by expertly leading us all away from the
tourist track to visit some little-known sight or some backstreet
bar for some serious limoncello drinking or by coming up with
witticisms and what I still think is the best insult I’ve ever heard: ‘O
you Laestrygonians!’ Similarly, Max always ends up working right
up until the deadline (I’ve lost count of the number of emails I’ve
received from him at 2.30am), but what he produces is the kind
of thing that would take the rest of us weeks of slogging. He is
certainly the only person who could write a textbook for teaching
in September that we only jokingly discussed in March!
Max was keen(ish) to play a role in the sporting life of the school
and, in between taking hockey, he has found his calling in rounders,
where the girls made caps and badges for their ‘star coach’. Max
has also been a caring and attentive tutor in Griffin for two years
and, this year, in Michell. Max could always be persuaded to sing
along with Anne Naylor at every Griffin music event and he will
certainly be missed by all the Griffin musicians as a cheerful and
reliable piano accompanist. Max’s musical talents are prodigious
so it was no surprise that he was straight away snapped up by
the Music Department here to play the organ in Chapel and with
whom he has directed numerous concerts and, in 2008, the school
musical, Sweeney Todd. Max has also directed a host of dramas,
including Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia as the school play this year and
Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex in this year’s Arts Festival. To say that Max
is talented simply does not do him justice; sadly for us, he is just too
talented to stay here. Max leaves Rugby to pursue a career in the
theatre. We all wish him well for a happy future.
CLH
Charline Fournier
Charline Fournier started at Rugby two years ago as a language
assistant, having already worked elsewhere in the UK as a classroom
teacher before moving back to France for some time. It immediately
became clear that she had a great deal to offer Modern Languages
here and so was the obvious choice to fill a teaching post in the
Department when one arose this year. Charline’s teaching of
French and Spanish has been exemplary. She is very hard-working,
spending long hours preparing innovative work for her classes, and
has proved to be an excellent colleague, always willing to join in
and to adapt to any situation. Charline has also been very generous