14th December 2012

It was a reunion with a difference as representative Head Girls and School Captains of Bolton School gathered on Wednesday to lay the Foundation Stone for the new £7m Sixth Form Centre. The building, which will be ready for occupation at the start of the Autumn Term of 2013, has received substantial funding from alumni of the School and will be named after the campaign’s lead benefactor, Ian Riley, an Old Boy who was a pupil from 1974-1981.

2008 Apprentice finalist Claire Young also returned to Bolton School this week for Business Challenge Day, to help judge the preliminary round of the annual KPMG Enterprise Trophy. For the first time, the Business Challenge was joint between the Girls’ and Boys’ Divisions. In teams, pupils developed their own business ideas and delivered a ten minute Dragon’s Den style presentation to a panel of judges. The best four teams were chosen to compete for the KPMG Enterprise Trophy in the Spring Term.

And there were yet more visitors to the School this week as our pupils were joined by pupils from other local schools for a Royal Society of Chemistry Christmas Lecture entitled 'How Chemistry Works: colour, explosions and wonder'. Alan Goodwin, former Head of Sciences Teacher Education at Manchester Metropolitan University, demonstrated how chemistry makes sense of the world around us, through a series of fun and explosive chemical experiments.

While Max Griffiths, co-founder of the LivLive charity, returned to his old school to pick up a cheque for a massive £11,463.03 and to thank the pupils and staff of Bolton School for their enormous fundraising efforts earlier in the year. Just prior to the summer holiday, the whole school, which totals over 2,300 pupils, came together to raise funds for the LivLife Foundation which offers free and relevant education and vocational opportunities in Tanzania for children and adults. Further charity efforts saw year 7 pupils in the Girls’ Division donating hundreds of brand new toys and gifts to Cash for Kids and Key 103’s Mission Xmas. The girls raised the money through a sponsored silence last month and then went on a trolley dash around Toys R Us in Bolton to spend the money on toys for less fortunate children.

Girls' Division pupil Vasudha Marthi has been asked to join the National Children's Orchestra. Vasudha has been offered a full membership place for a 12 month period in the Under 13 Orchestra - a full symphony orchestra offering children their first taste of performing in a major UK concert venue. And the Junior Boys held their Christmas Carol Concert this week, filling the Great Hall with a host of festive music and song.

7th December 2012

The Year 9 Masterchef has been crowned, and the winner is Melissa Cordingley who won the judges over with her banana and walnut cake with toffee sauce. The final cook off between finalists Melissa, and fellow pupil Charlotte Winrow was a close fought battle with amazing food being produced by both girls, as each one cooked her 'signature dish'. Charlotte made a portobello mushroom and black pudding stack with cabbage and bacon, while Melissa opted for the banana and walnut cake. Down to just two girls the pressure was on as the girls had to cook their dishes in front of a live audience of pupils and staff.

Well done to several of our sixth form girls and staff who completed a ‘Santa Dash’ 5km run dressed as Santa in order to raise sponsorship money for a variety of charities. Eight and a half thousand people gathered from all over the UK to participate as Liverpool took on Las Vegas once again, for the ‘Largest Santa Gathering’ in a bid to win the World Santa Dash Challenge.

There were more Christmas festivities over at Hesketh House with their Christmas Concert this week. Dressed in winter woollies, the girls performed a number of readings, poems and musical items all about Christmas, in front of an audience of their family and friends.

Year 8 girls took part in a Crime Squad course this week as part of their enrichment at school. Girls worked in teams on a variety of activities, including decoding and defusing an explosive device, investigating a crime scene and examining forensic evidence, and solving a murder mystery using powers of deduction. The Crime Squad course was run by the company ‘Wiser Words’, who specialise in master classes and enrichment days for students.

And in sport, the Under 13 water polo team celebrated winning the prestigious 'President Trophy' tournament, triumphing over three other top class teams from all over the country - King Edward School, Birmingham, Kings School, Grantham, and Warwick School.

5th December 2012

Bolton Wanderers Football Club is to collaborate with Bolton School Boys’ Division to launch a new two-year international sports course. The programme will allow 16 year old students from around the world to move to Bolton to spend 3 days a week experiencing elite football training and 2 days a week studying A-levels in PE and Business Studies at Bolton School. Participants will live with a local host family and experience total immersion within a professional football club, while mixing with Bolton School Sixth Form boys as they join tutor groups and make full use of the school’s new state-of-the-art Sixth Form Centre, which will open in September 2013.

Children at Beech House have shown their generosity by going through their own toy collections to find things less fortunate boys and girls might enjoy this Christmas. Representatives from Bolton Lions Club were delighted at the quality and quantity of toys that had been collected at the Infant School this year. While Girls’ Division pupils have been helping to prepare shoeboxes of Christmas gifts for needy children as part of Operation Christmas Child - the world's largest children's Christmas appeal. And Movember came to an end for teachers in the Boys' Division who joined the global campaign to raise awareness about men's health. The teachers were sponsored by friends, family and pupils to grow their moustaches and hope to raise over £200.

Able and talented pupils from local primary schools enjoyed a day absorbed in the Classics at Bolton School this week. Year 6 girls and boys took part in a series of workshops in both the Girls’ Division and the Boys’ Division in which they learnt about Roman warfare, Roman and Greek theatre and their Gods and myths. Seven pupils from Years 9, 10 and 11 from the Girls’ Division achieved highly at a Model United Nations competition held at Stockport Grammar School, where they represented the countries of Pakistan and South Africa. And Year 9 pupil, Jack Virgin, is the first pupil from the School to be awarded a Silver medal in the national Junior Mathematical Olympiad (JMO) - placing him well within the top 100 pupils out of the quarter of a million participants.

The two finalists for next week’s Bolton School Girls’ Division MasterChef Live Cook Off Grand Final have been announced as Melissa Cordingly and Charlotte Winrow, after a keenly contested semi-final where contestants were charged with preparing a wedding dessert.

And Bolton School is playing a starring role in the BBC's drama Last Tango in Halifax. The Boys' Division Great Hall, several classrooms and offices as well as corridors were used to represent a quality school in the filming of the romantic comedy series which stars Sarah Lancashire as Headmistress of a school. The series can be seen on Tuesdays at 9.00pm on BBC1.