Lent 2013 - Alleyn's School

Netball• Netball has been verysuccessful with, in addition to theU13 ISNC Cup competition, allteams – U12, U13, U14, U15,U16 and 1st VII and 2nd VII -reaching the Surrey finals.Highlights were the U12 teamreaching the semi-final before justlosing out to Caterham and theU13 team reached the final butunfortunately lost to GuildfordHigh.• Selected for County squadtraining:Surrey U16 Elite – Niamh CahillSurrey U16 – Laura Kelly and LaraRedmayneKent U16 – Honor MyersKent U14 – Holly Highfield, LucySands and Millie Parry.Swimming – Boys• The Year 7 and 8 boyscame 6th in a very strong andcompetitive gala against the Trinityschools as well as securing 5thplace in the London Schools final.• All boys from Year 7 through toYear 10 did extremely well at arecent three-way gala againstSt Dunstan’s and Emanuel Schooland deserved their 1st placefinish.•The Alleyn's boys’ team of SamWattles, Tristan Carman, NickMoore and James Gillie swamsuperbly well at the Bath Cupheld at Crystal Palace NSC toreach the Final of the AldenhamCup for the first time in manyyears. Swimming in the final heatof the 4 x 100m Freestyle Relaythe boys only had a one-race-restbefore being required to swimin their final. They came 6th(out of 8) swimming only 1.3 secslower than in their heat!Water Polo – Girls• U14 – retained their title fromlast year as ESSA NationalChampions in the finalstournament at Oundle School bywinning all three of their matches.• Both the U16 and U18 teamscompeted in the ESSA NationalCompetition finals tournament(top 4 schools in the Country)and won Bronze medals (3rd inthe country).• Six of the Year 13 girls havenow qualified and compete in 7ESSA National finals – anextraordinary achievement.Water Polo – Boys• U14 – qualified for Round 2 ofthe English Schools’ SwimmingAssociation (ESSA) NationalCompetition with 6 Schools(top 3 Schools qualify for theNational Finals on 12th May).• U15 – the team have won thefinal of the Schools’ Water PoloLeague (SWPL) out of 15 schools,to become 2013 champions.• U16 – came 5th in the ESSANational ChampionshipCompetition.• U18 – qualified for the quarterfinalcompetition in the SWPL.out of 17 competing schools• U18 – qualified for the ESSANational Bowl Finals tournamentat Warwick School and wherewe finished as champions, afterdefeating Bedford School 10-5and Oundle School 14-4.• U18 boys competed in theSWPL Cup semi-final againstKCS Wimbledon and won 7-4.They are through to the Cupfinal to be played at the start ofnext term.Under 14 girls’ water polo team (ESSA National Champions).Clubs andSocietiesDebating UpdateA Debating Team consisting of meand Rosa Thomas reached theSouth-East England RegionalFinals of the English SpeakingUnion Mace Competition arguingfor ‘The Arming of Women inSelf-Defence’ and against ‘TheProhibition of Teachers to Belongto Extreme Political Parties’.A lot of new debaters areparticipating in competitions thisterm including Nico McGill (10GE),Anushka Sharma (10MJ), HannahMaconochie (10DT) and HollyGimson (10PR) who participatedin the UCLU competition.Jack Myers 13AMYoung Amnesty GroupAmnesty International is amovement of ordinary peopleworldwide who stand up forhuman rights. We have becomeofficially affiliated with AmnestyInternational and our aim is to‘protect individuals whereverjustice, fairness, freedom and truthare denied.’ Since the groupstarted we have sent messagesof support to The Committee ofRelatives of the Detained andDisappeared in Honduras, sentmessages of hope and support toMehman Huseynov who Amnestyfeel is unfairly on trial in Azerbaijanfor hooliganism, sent messages ofsupport to the Afghan group YoungWomen for Change. This year wehave written to the Governor ofIllinois to try to persuade him toreconsider the case of JacquelineMontanez, who had beenimprisoned for life when she wasjust 15 without the possibility ofparole. We are also looking forwardto our first speakers coming in.Learn the LingoTapping into the diversity of thestudent body, a 7-week look atdifferent countries during thelunchtime club Learn the Lingo notonly introduces pupils to differentlanguages, but gives backgroundinformation on culture, climate,food, music and so on. Onlyslightly hindered by the refusal ofhis IT presentation to work, AoiNishizaki (12DH) taught pupilssome Japanese language basics,introduced J Hip Hop, explainedthat there’s-more-to-food-thansushiand played the Japanesenational anthem while distributingpopular Japanese sweets to thepacked classroom. In his talk onNigeria, Sogo Akintaro (13CC)taught the assembled groupsome chat-up lines in Yorubaas well as introducing a moreserious note with informationabout the geography, climateand politics of Nigeria whilehanding out delicious dodo andchin-chin.Further talks in the series areon Bengali, Swedish, Cantonese,Italian and Hindi.Medical SocietyDr Amanda William kindly came into talk to us about Pain. It is oftenthought of as a disadvantage butin evolutionary terms it is anadvantageous adaptation whichhelps us learn what to stay awayfrom. Some people are born with adisease called congenital analgesiawhere they cannot feel pain andthis often leads to them harming1 4 A L L E Y N ’ S S C H O O L N E W S L E T T E R L E N T T E R M 2 0 1 3