5 September 2014

It's the start of a new term at Bolton School, but things have not been quiet over the holidays and there has been cause for much celebration:

GCSE pupils and their parents joined teachers in the Boys' and Girls' Division Great Halls to receive their exam results.

In the Boys' Division, 28.1% of grades were at A* with eight boys achieving a set of perfect grades! The boys bucked the national trend, achieving their best results in English in three years, particularly in English Literature. Results in STEM subjects were also strong. Almost 91.4% of boys achieved a minimum of 10 A*- B grades, and 93% of grades overall were graded A*- C.

In the Girls' Division, 29% of GCSE papers were given an A* grade. Five girls achieved the impressive haul of 11 A* grades, with a further five receiving 10 A* grades. 59.4% of papers were graded A*- A, which is a great achievement or the girls, and 23% of girls secured a minimum of 11 A*- A grades!

Four pupils had an extra reason for celebration: one girl and three boys were awarded prestigious Arkwright Scholarships. This year there was a 100% success rate for Bolton School candidates! The process involved a detailed application form, two-hour aptitude test, and an in-depth interview where candidates had to talk about a project they had undertaken. Chris Battarbee, Bethany O’Donnell, Alex Seed and Niall Woodward will be awarded £600 over the course of their A Level studies through the Scholarship, as well as many opportunities to enhance their knowledge of engineering.

Bolton School's Sixth Form students have also been enjoying personal successes over the summer.

Jennifer Heyes has gained a prestigious Blue Tree Scholarship at Imperial College London! The award is given to dynamic students with an aptitude for engineering, and is worth £7,000 per annum for the full duration of her four year programme.

Paloma Shakouri has also been successful in obtaining a prestigious academic scholarship on the BSc Hons Business and Enterprise degree programme at Pearson College. Her excellent performance on the interview and assessment day led to the university choosing to award her the scholarship.

Cricketer Haseeb Hameed has proved himself in fine form for Lancashire's 2nd XI team, even impressing the first team coach, Glen Chapple!

Natasha Lomas has had a very musical summer: not only has she obtained a scholarship at the Royal Northern College of Music for her clarinet performance, she has also passed her diploma in saxophone performance and toured Europe with the Joint Jazz Band!

Sam Critchlow received a GEOSET award for his video about the lives of Marie and Pierre Curie. The award, for Streaming Media - Education, is is one of several annual awards granted by the GEOSET initiative to recognise the hard word of those who contribute to the project. GEOSET was founded by Bolton School Old Boy Sir Harry Kroto.

Although pupils only returned to School this week, the campus was buzzing with activity even before the start of term: the School was delighted to welcome back the cast and crew of Last Tango in Halifax returned to the School during August. The School was used as a filming location for certain scenes from series 3 of the television programme.

Later on this term, and continuing until March 2015, the School will also play host to the Historical Association's monthly lecture series, which will use the Girls' Division Theatre for this year's social meetings. There will be talks about every period in British history, from the middle ages to the Cold War, which will be delivered by a variety of highly qualified experts. The History Departments are particularly excited by November's lecture, which will be delivered by renowned historian Professor Sir Peter Hennessy.

The Old Girls' Association has been as busy as ever during the holidays, organising a Cooking Masterclass with local chef Mike Harrison. This will take place in the Arts Centre on Friday the 17th of October, with the proceeds split between the Phelan-McDermid Syndrome Foundation (PMSF) and the Bolton School Old Girls’ Association.

There has been further good news from Bolton School Alumni this week: KPMG announced that Old Girl Katie Clinton and Old Boy Tim Cutler have been appointed two of the four new partners at KPMG’s Manchester office! This is a fantastic achievement for both of them, and we wish them well in their future endeavours.

15 August 2014

A-Levels Results Day took place this week, and Upper Sixth pupils returned to school to celebrate another year of excellent grades.

In the Girls' Division, 15.4% of grades were at A*, 75.9% of papers were graded A*-B, and 91.1% of grades were at C or above. Almost half (48.3%) of the grades awarded were at A*-A and six in every ten girls achieved at least ABB grades. Four girls received three or more A* grades; five will go on to study at Oxford or Cambridge; and a number of students achieved excellent results while balancing their studies with extra-curricular pursuits, from playing sport for their county to making music with the Halle Youth Orchestra.

Pupils from the Boys' Division achieved top grades as well: 16.7% achieved an A* grade, and 91.1% of grades were at A*-C, which was an increase from 89.1% last year, bucking the national trend! Almost six in ten students achieved a minimum of ABB grades. A great many boys achieved excellent exam results while also pursuing a variety of personal interests. Four achieved three A* grades and two have secured Oxbridge places; the vast majority will go to their first choice university.

On receiving her A-Level results and learning that she had achieved the grades needed to attend Imperial College, London, Jennifer Heyes had an additional reason to celebrate. Her A*AA grades have secured her the prestigious Blue Tree Scholarship for the duration of her four-year course! The scholarship is awarded to bright and dynamic students who demonstrate a passion and talent for engineering.

One of the Girls' Division's younger pupils also had cause to celebrate this week: last Sunday, Sharon Daniel was victorious in Channel 4's Child Genius competition! Despite some tense moments in the final, Sharon pulled through and was crowned Child Genius of the Year 2014.

Bolton School has been updating its online archives this week: over 100 years of school magazines are now available online! Every edition of both the Boys' and Girls' Divisions' magazines can now be viewed via school's digital archive. With each one providing a review of the year, dating back to 1899 for the boys and 1893 for the girls, this is an amazing resource and a window into the school's past.

The school has also recently released a free online flip-book and PDF download of Fanny Eliza Johnson: A Thoroughly Modern Victorian Headmistress, a book about the headmistress of Bolton High School for Girls, which would later become Bolton School Girls' Division. Written by former Girls’ Division teacher Veronica Millington, the book offers great insights into the history of the Girls' Division between 1888 and 1893.

8 August 2014 - Midsummer News Round-Up

The big news this week is undoubtedly that Girls' Division pupil Sharon Daniel has made it through to the final of Channel 4's Child Genius! We found out in July that chess prodigy Sharon was in the running for the title, and now she has made it through the previous three rounds to face the other five finalists.

We will definitely be watching on Sunday at 9pm to see how she gets on!

Artwork and creative writing by girls in Year 6 and Year 9 has gone on display in Bolton's Market Place. There is a wide variety of written pieces all based on the First World War, from fictional 'letters home' to poems, and many different styles of art to look at, including propaganda posters. This fantastic display will remain in the Market Place until the end of the August Bank Holiday Weekend.

After the Joint Jazz Band's spectacular performance at the Montreux Jazz Festival, the musicians and Miss Berry travelled on to Luxembourg City. They not only took part in a special workshop at the city's conservatoire, but also were able to play in the main bandstand to a very appreciative crowd!

The Year 8 boys have also been on tour over the summer. They travelled out to Holland for a Water Polo tour with coach Mr McGinty. They played against teams from five different clubs of varying ages. Although they often found themselves facing much older and more experienced opposition, they acquitted themselves very well throughout the tour and won the majority of their matches.

Closer to home, children with a passion for sport had the chance to meet their heroes this week! Bolton School once again hosted the Andrew Flintoff Cricket Academy, and the boys taking part were lucky enough to meet professional cricketer Darren Maddy! Darren coached the boys in the nets, advising them on both their batting and bowling, and passed on his knowledge in a question and answer session.

Young netball players also took part in the International Netball Roadshow this week. The girls taking part in the sessions, which took place in Bolton School's Sports Hall, were able to meet former England Netball Captain Karen Atkinson! Karen put the girls through their paces with a series of tough training exercises, focusing on ball skills, attack, and defence. She also took questions from the girls, and gave them plenty of hints and tips for improving their skills in future.

The children at the Nursery have been busy preparing the garden for the arrival of their new greenhouse. They helped the grown-ups to fill planters with compost and put various plants into the soil before watering them in. The garden they helped to create will soon become the Nursery's dedicated gardening area.

The Bolton School in Space team, who earlier in the year sent up a high-altitude balloon into the stratosphere, received a further accolade over the summer: they have been featured on Atmospheric Optics, the leading website in this field. Two pictures of an ice halo around the sun, one taken from the balloon and one from ground level, have been featured.

We also learned recently that the majority of the Gifted and Talented children who took part in the 'Maths Club' run by Mr Howarth and Miss Reynolds have achieved Level 6 in their Maths SATs, and the rest gained marks in the 90s from the Level 3-5 paper! This is a fantastic achievement for the children involved.

Finally, staff and parents from the Nursery will be taking part in the When You Wish Upon A Star Dragon Boat Challenge in Salford on the 16th of August! They are keen to maintain their podium position this year and hope to raise £850 to help make children's Christmas wishes come true. Visit the JustGiving page to donate!

18 July 2014

The Bolton School Joint Jazz Band hung out with Paloma Faith at the prestigious Montreux Jazz Festival! In between playing their two sets on the 'Music in the Park' stage at Parc Vertex, they found time to watch some of the other acts and drink in some of the Swiss culture.

You can listen to one of the tracks from their performance at Montreux on the school's Soundcloud:


As the summer weather started to improve, the Nursery took a group of children out for the first official Forest School session. The children really enjoyed being outside in a natural environment, and were given lots of choices of things to do throughout the session.

The end of term saw the Nursery bid farewell to the 'Butterflies' who will be going on to infants' school in September. They gave the children a fitting send-off with a Wild West themed Leavers' Party! With lots of games, a bouncy castle, and even ice creams for everyone, it was a fantastic afternoon.

The Senior Schools were recently included in the Sunday Times Guide to the Best North West Schools, with both Divisions ranking highly. The Boys' Division and Girls' Division were listed as the top single-sex schools north of the M60.

There have also been some amazing individual achievements towards the end of term:

Girls' Division maths teacher Miss Reynolds recently won a grant of £7430.00 in the Let Teachers SHINE competition! She will go on to develop her idea for a maths project that will take pupils off the normal curriculum and experience maths from a different angle.

Kiran Cheema from Year 9 was awarded second prize in The Children's Bookshow national poetry competition! She wrote a poem titled 'Meant to be', which was based on a favourite piece of art.

Thea Simpson, who is in Year 7, has been selected to take part in a National Academy Water Polo Camp at Millfield School over the summer. This is a great opportunity for Thea to develop her skills in the sport that she loves.

Finally, one of the Girls' Division's Year 7 pupils will soon be on television: Sharon Daniel is set to compete in Channel 4's Child Genius television programme! Sharon is one of twenty children chosen from over 2,000 applicants to take part in the second series of this amazing intelligence competition. The first episode of Child Genius will be on Channel 4 this Sunday the 20th of July at 9pm.

11 July 2014

The last few days were packed full of events as the Summer Term drew to a close.

Over the weekend, Boys' Division pupils from Year 7 to 13 put together a Pop-Up Exhibition in the Market Place, Bolton. All of the artwork displayed was created for the exhibition and illustrated some aspect of the pupils' experience of Bolton School.

Last week, Old Boy Sir Ernest Ryder was formally installed at the new Chancellor of the University of Bolton. For the next three years, he will represent the university.

In the same week, two Bolton School alumni, a former school governor and a former headmistress of the Girls' Division were awarded honorary doctorates from the University of Bolton! They received their degrees alongside this year's graduates, and alongside famous faces such as Ryan Giggs and Martine McCutcheon.

Old Girl Aimee Parkinson returned to Bolton School on Monday to give Sixth Formers a talk on working in commercial property. This was a very informative session that allowed the pupils to ask plenty of questions.

Old Boy and Nobel Prize winner Sir Harry Kroto visited the school on the last day of term to promote chemistry to primary school pupils. Four-hundred Year 5 pupils from local primary schools attended the workshop session in the Sports Hall. They listened attentively to Sir Harry's presentation, and afterwards were able to build their own model 'buckyballs', which re-create the structure of the C60 Buckminsterfullerene molecule.

Gifted and talented pupils at a cluster of Farnworth primary schools have recently enjoyed and prospered from extra Maths lessons from two Bolton School teachers, Phil Howard of the Boys’ Division and Lauren Reynolds of the Girls’ Division. These specialist 'Maths Clubs' have raised the children's grades in their SATs and given them additional confidence in their mathematical abilities.

Girls' Division Year 7 pupil Amy Chicken has recently taken part in the Junior Manchester Run and Great Manchester Cycle to raise money for LivLive, a charity with strong links with the Girls' Division.

Year 6 pupils at the Junior Boys' School have also been hard at work. Five groups of boys became young entrepreneurs to raise money for charity, and their ideas and and business plans were very successful. Together they raised £776.15 for Cancer Research!

In sport, the Girls' Division Year 10 Tennis team achieved second place in Division 1 of the AEGON Teams Tennis tournament.

Meanwhile in the Boys' Division, the Intermediate Tennis Championship Finals were held. After preliminary knockout rounds throughout the Summer Term, the last two pupils in the Year 9 and Year 10 groups battled it out for the trophies.

Finally, Year 7 and Year 8 girls rounded off the Summer Term with a spectacular Celebration Evening. The evening of entertainment was based on the theme of 'A Tale of Two Cities' and traced the musical heritages of Liverpool and Manchester.

You can listen to a selection of music from the Celebration Evening on the school's Soundcloud page: click here.

4 July 2014

This week saw the Boys' Division SPACE programme for this academic year draw to a close. The Year 10 boys enjoyed a carousel of activities on the theme of music and dance, while the Year 7 boys played a Fairtrade Football tournament! This initiative, which was run for the first time this year, has been a huge success and has allowed the boys to develop outside of the normal curriculum and the classroom.

The 1st XI cricketers used their final SPACE session to take on the Forty Club - a nomadic cricket club which aims to encourage young people to play cricket in the best spirit. Despite their best efforts, the Bolton School boys were not able to defeat their opponents, but it was nonetheless a great afternoon of cricket and the boys could learn from the more experienced players.

Year 12 cricketer Haseeb Hameed, who is on the 1st XI team, has recently been praised for his performance during the Lancashire 2nd Team match against Warwickshire. His batting helped secure the team's victory.

On Tuesday, a group of Year 7 and Year 8 girls were given a tour of the recently re-named Macron Stadium. This 'access all areas' tour even allowed them to run out of the tunnels! The girls were awarded medals for their successful completion of the Bolton Wanderers' Community Trust football club course.

Also in sport, the Year 7 Rounders Team returned victorious having won the Town Championships!

The Sixth Form boys and girls took part in the first ever inter-divisional Young Analyst of the Year competition! Working in pairs, two of which were mixed, each team was asked to complete an undergraduate level Chemistry task which involved a practical component and a series of calculations, both of which really tested their abilities.

The Girls' and Boys' Divisions also hosted the annual Science Festival for Year 5 pupils in the local area. The pupils were given five tasks, split between the two Divisions, with each one focusing on different aspects of Biology, Chemistry and Physics. The children had a fantastic time learning about science in an entertaining environment.

We also learned this week that children who attend private school will earn £193,700 more on average in their early careers than their state educated peers. This is according to a new independent report by the Social Market Foundation (SMF) think tank, which analyses the Sutton Trust's Open Access programme.

Beech House was thrilled by a couple of special events this week. On Wednesday, the pupils were given a short assembly on dog safety, and one class received a special visit from a puppy at the end of the afternoon!

On Thursday, Beech House was overrun by 'every bear that ever there was' for a Teddy Bears' Picnic! Despite the weather, the children and their bears had a great time with 'lots of wonderful things to eat and wonderful games to play'.

The Junior Girls put on their annual Summer Concert this week. They gave two performances of 'The Song of the Earth', both of which delighted the audience of parents and grandparents. Headmistress Mrs Brierley said of the Concert: “Through song, percussion, poetry recital and dance, the girls wove their way through powerful descriptions of how human beings impact the Earth.”

You can listen to the music and songs from 'The Song of the Earth' on the School's Soundcloud page: click here.

The Junior Boys were also in fine form last week with their production of Tom Sawyer. The boys performed the play, complete with several musical numbers, on three consecutive nights to an audience of parents and grandparents. The shows were a great success!

Finally, Bolton School is delighted to announce that it will be hosting this year's North of England Girls' School Association (GSA) Girls Go Gold Conference on Thursday the 18th of September. The keynote speakers are Olympic rower Helen Glover and Jenny Meadows, the current indoor 800m European champion. The day is designed to inspire the girls attending to believe anything is possible with the right mental attitude and lots of hard work to develop their talent.

27 June 2014

Last week, Bolton School hosted the Bolton Children's Fiction Award Ceremony! This was a fantastic event, with all six nominated authors in attendance! Year 7 and 8 pupils from sixteen schools in the region arrived in the morning for talks from the authors, and stayed to enjoy the lunchtime Awards Ceremony itself. Joe Craig, who won the award himself in 2006, presented the 2014 award to this year's winner: Gillian Cross, author of After Tomorrow.

The Year 6 Junior Girls were also busy on the literary front. Following on from their study of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, they put together their own scripts and staging for a shortened version of the play, which they performed in front of parents. This forms part of the school's celebration of Shakespeare's 450th birthday.

The Girls' Division's GCSE and A-Level artists were given a great opportunity to showcase their talents and the best of their work at the University of Bolton! This was part of the Best of Bolton Schools' Art and Design Exhibition. Bolton School Year 13 pupil Jessica Broome won the Best Fine Art prize at the exhibition.

The Sixth Form linguists were busy with trips in the past week. On Monday, Year 12 boys and girls studying Spanish travelled to Aston University in Birmingham for the International Relations and Languages Sixth Form Conference. They listened attentively to two lectures, which were both fascinating and informative.

On Wednesday, three A-Level French students visited Liverpool University to meet with Dr Ian Magedera. They have been invited to assist him in his research into Representations of India in French Literature and Culture from the eighteenth century onwards, and went to the university to receive the appropriate training.

The Joint Jazz Band will in a few short weeks be setting off on a trip to Switzerland for the Montreux Jazz Festival! They will be performing two sets at the Parc Vertex venue as part of this prestigious festival, and to celebrate are holding a Pre-Tour Concert on Wednesday 2nd July.

The Boys' Division Brass Ensemble gave a special performance at Kearsley West Primary School as part of the Community Music Programme. They delighted the pupils and teachers with well-known pop tunes and themes from TV and film.

In sport, the week began with lots of fun in the sun at the Primary Schools' Sports Festival. Budding athletes from sixteen local schools were invited to Bolton School for a carousel of sporting activities designed to test their skills and to allow them to compete for the trophy.

On Thursday, the Marylebone Cricket Club visited the school. This led to two fantastic cricket matches which were watched with great interest!

Bolton School U13's cricket team enjoyed a very close T20 match against the MCC Hub team, which is based at the School. This was followed by an awards ceremony for the MCC Hub players which named two boys the U15 and U13 players of the year.

The Bolton School 1st XI team welcomed the MCC for what has become a prestigious annual fixture in the school's cricketing calendar. With opponents including opening batsman Tom Liversedge, a former captain of the school team, as well as a plethora of other established local cricketers, this was a great challenge for the 1st XI team. The MCC side ultimately proved victorious, but it was a great afternoon of cricket for all involved.

The Boys' Division celebrated the past year's achievements and successes at Prizegiving. Students collected over 100 awards and listened attentively to the words of Headmaster Phillip Britton, Chairman of Governors Mr Michael Griffiths, and Old Boy The Venerable Jonathan Boardman, Archdeacon of Italy and Malta, Chaplain of All Saints, Rome and a Canon of Malta Cathedral.

Year 12 pupils in the Boys' and Girls' Divisions were also given the opportunity to learn from another former pupil this week. Group Captain Mark Northover of the RAF returned to school to give a talk on leadership. The Girls' Division Great Hall was packed for this event, which stressed that anyone can learn the correct skills and behaviours to be a great leader.

Boys' Division pupils also remembered the sacrifice of their predecessors this week. The boys who will be attending this year's Battlefields Trip received copies of Remembered with Honour, a book compiled by Dr Eric McPherson to commemorate Old Boltonians who died in the First and Second World Wars. This book will be presented to all boys who attend the trip between 2014 and 2018 to mark the centenary of the First World War.

Finally, the Junior Boys finished collecting in the last of the sponsorship money from their annual fancy-dress Fun Run this week. They presented the cheque for £5000 to a representative of Bolton Hospice during morning assembly, as well as learning a little more about the history of hospice care, the work Bolton Hospice does, and how the money raised will help.