Nothampton High School
High News

Friday 28 June 2019

We were delighted be be able to welcome so many friends and family members into school yesterday evening to take in our Arts Invitational; an event featuring students of all ages to celebrate the Arts at Northampton High School.

It was fantastic to be able to showcase the amazing work of our students of all ages, ranging from the amazing observational drawings by Reception, to the spectacular A Level pieces created by our 6.2 students. Guests were left in awe at the outstanding talent on display.

Alongside the many exhibitions, it was a showcase of our students’ many talents, in the form of MFL poetry recitals, Sophia Symeou’s LAMDA performance, Jessica Greenough’s ballet recital and Lucy Ward’s EPQ Photographic Exhibition. A live performance of Radio Drama was also on offer to entertain guests, and homemade cream teas courtesy of Miss Knight and her students were available to provide refreshment alongside the drinks and canapés served by Mrs McCue and her team.

The Senior Theatre was the venue for our Piano Recital, and then Vocal Masterclass with renowned Soprano, Alison Roddy; students took to the stage to give breathtaking performances, proving to be a fitting way to close the curtain on a marvellous occasion celebrating the Arts.

We still have one more feature event next Tuesday as part of our Arts Festival – our Gym and Dance Extravaganza – and we hope to see you there, bringing the Festival to a close with what promises to be an unforgettable event.

Mr Nash
Marketing & Communications Officer

See all photos

Week Ahead

Monday 1 July
Senior School Assembly – Outward Bound

Tuesday 2 July
Gym and Dance Extravaganza

Wednesday 3 July
Erasmus Lunch
Minerva Seminar
Cricket: U13A vs Duston (H)

Thursday 4 July
House Assemblies
Bhaktivedanta Manor Trip
Tennis: U13B & U15B vs NSG (H)

Friday 5 July
Senior School Assembly – Sports Assembly
Staff Charity Danceathon
The Big Sing

Sunday 7 July
Gold DoE Assessed Expedition

Gemma enjoys success as she qualifies for National Equestrian competitions

Gemma Watts has enjoyed an amazing few days competing in Equestrian competitions, qualifying for a number of prestigious events!

Gemma has qualified two ponies, Barney IX and Minydon Mascherano, for the prestigious ‘Horse of the Year’ show in October. Barney IX enjoyed further success too, as he also qualified for the BSPS Gold Cup final at Burghley International Horse Trials, and the Royal International Horse Show 133cm Working Hunter Pony.

Alongside this, Renkum Bombadier is off to the Pony Club National Championships as the youngest and smallest combination to qualify, to jump with the Warwickshire Hunt Pony Club team in the 115cm show jumping final, and also for the show jump finals at Burghley International Horse Trials.

Well done Gemma, to you, and your fantastic ponies!

Mr Nash
Marketing & Communications Officer

Leah takes home the Gold at WUKF World Karate Championships!

Everyone at Northampton High School would like to say a huge congratulations to Leah Tanna-Shah, who recently competed at the WUKF World Karate Championships in Slovakia, picking up a gold medal in the process!

Leah, who has enjoyed great success in Karate over the past year, picked up a gold medal in Kata at the event, and said “I am so pleased with the results and looking forward to the future”.

Congratulations Leah on an amazing achievement!

Mr Nash
Marketing & Communications Officer

The Natasha Sen Prize for Modern Foreign Languages

Natasha Sen, one of our pupils, passed away in October 2006 following a serious illness. She was a talented and dedicated pupil who had opted to study French, German and Spanish at GCSE. This prize is awarded annually to a L5 pupil in memory of Natasha.

The competition encourages students to explore their language of study further in a creative fashion. All girls in L5 are invited to complete a project at the end of their L5 year on one aspect of a country where French, German or Spanish is spoken.

  • The project should be written predominantly in English; you might however decide to write a few paragraphs in your chosen language – it is up to you.
  • It should be entirely your own work and no more than 1,200 words. Please state the word count at the end.
  • You may include pictures and illustrations and please remember – quality is more important than quantity.
  • You may choose any aspect of the country. For example: a famous person, a moment in history, its geography, food, cinema, theatre, music, art, fashion.
  • These are only a few ideas. We are looking for a personal response to a topic, rather than entirely factual information; something that captures the imagination of the reader, and which has flair and originality.

The closing date for the submission of your project is Monday 9th September 2019, and the winner will be announced in assembly during the same week that we celebrate the European Day of Languages (26th September) with the prize being awarded at Awards Evening.

Mr Watson
Subject Leader Spanish

Request for parents with STEM careers

On Thursday 14 November 2019, Café Sci are holding a STEM Careers Speed Networking event in the Senior School Hall. The event is after school from 3:45 until 5:00pm, for U4 girls and above. We will have science, engineering and mathematics related speakers. The girls will be split into small groups and each group will have about 10 minutes to speak with at least five of the speakers. They will be able to ask questions and the speakers will give them a short talk about their job; how they got to it from school and they will also talk about the different opportunities within their field.

This is a fantastic opportunity to find out about STEM related careers.

As we are still in the planning stages, if any parents could contribute to this event we would be delighted to hear from you. Please contact Mr Attwood for further information at r.attwood@nhs.gdst.net.

The Café Sci team

Dear future medics

We have noticed that LOTS of you have used the GDST Rungway mentoring app to ask questions about applying to Med School. (If you haven’t yet downloaded the app, don’t miss out).

There is so much to think about. What to expect at interview? How do courses differ? How about assessment? How to balance A Levels with your application?

A year from now, the answers to all of these questions and more will become clearer. 6.2 students who have already been through the process are in a brilliant position to share their advice, to help you to avoid pitfulls, take advantage of opportunities – and to remain calm!

Led by Nikki K from Norwich High School for Girls, we will be ready and willing to answer your questions – LIVE – on our Instagram channel.

  • When: Tuesday 2 July from 13.00 – 14.30
  • How:  Just open the Instagram app and search for us. If you haven’t already, follow @gdstgirls.

Get involved! #AskGDST

Creative Arts Spotlight

The Creative Arts Spotlight has had difficulty choosing just one piece to highlight during our Arts Invitational week.

Ellie McGuinness in U5 painted this extraordinary portrait of her brother for her GCSE Art Examination. It drew lots of attention from our guests during the Invitational and rightly so.

Well done Ellie!

Mrs Beacroft
Head of Creative Arts

High School Sport

We have had a very busy and varied week in the Sports faculty.

On Tuesday, we welcomed the trialists for the GDST Select Netball and Hockey teams and it was great to see our own U5 and 6.1 students trialling for the teams. The day was a great experience and a fantastic opportunity to train at a very high standard.

On Wednesday, we attended the GDST Summer Rally at Queenswood, with our Cricket team performing well, reaching the semifinal of the plate competition, whilst our Tennis team showed great team work finishing 5th overall.

Yesterday we welcomed 300 Year 4 students from local primary schools.  Our Lower Fifth and 6.1 students supported the delivery of a range of sports. Finally, yesterday afternoon our 6.1 students enjoyed the opportunity to play some wheelchair rugby.

We are in the final preparation stages for the Gymnastics and Dance Extravaganza on Tuesday, and we hope to see many of you coming to watch. The event starts at 5.30pm; please would all girls performing be in school in their costumes ready for 5.15pm.

Mrs Hackett
Director of Sport

GDST Cricket Rally: On Wednesday 26 June, the U15 Cricket team made up of both U14 and U15 players travelled to Queenswood to compete in the GDST Cricket Rally.

Firstly, the girls played against South Hampstead, and all the girls were excellent at batting resulting in plenty of 6’s and 4’s. However, we narrowly lost by 4 runs. Next the girls faced Wimbledon and although we didn’t play as well as we could have, the girls gave it their all, just missing out on the win. In our following game against Sutton, the team played superbly, with massive improvement from the previous games, coming away with many wickets and a confident victory.

Moving on to the knockout stages of the plate section, the team was put up against Portsmouth where the girls fielded and batted amazingly to come away with a win. This meant we were through to the semifinals where we played against Shrewsbury. It was a challenging but exciting match, but unfortunately we did not pick up the win.

All the girls enjoyed their day, and we improved through each game making us a stronger team for the future. Well done to Jodie, Izzy, Suzannah, Radhika, Eve, Eloise, Lottie, Katie and Maddie.

Molly 
L5S

GDST Tennis Rally: On Wednesday 26 June, our U18 Tennis team consisting of Anraj, Charlotte, Lilli, Izzy, Ella and Eliza went to Queenswood School to compete in the annual GDST Summer Rally.

It was a very exciting day as all the girls played some really good Tennis. In our pool we had Wimbledon, who we beat 2-1, Sutton, beating them 3-0, South Hampstead, defeated by us 2-1 and Bromley, who got the upper hand, and we narrowly missed  out on a win 1-2.

As we placed highly in our pool we were entered into the cup tournament. This meant that we were in the quarter finals and had to play Putney. Although we fought hard and played some good tennis, we unfortunately lost 1-2.

Overall, the rally was great fun; we played some good tennis and learnt a lot.

Anraj
L5H

Book Review

The Poet X A Novel by Elizabeth Acevedo – recommended for U4 and above

THE POET X – THE WINNER OF THE CILIP CARNEGIE MEDAL 2019. A stunning New York Times bestseller with a powerful and unforgettable YA voice

Xiomara has always kept her words to herself. When it comes to standing her ground in her Harlem neighbourhood, she lets her fists and her fierceness do the talking.

But X has secrets – her feelings for a boy in her bio class, and the notebook full of poems that she keeps under her bed. And a slam poetry club that will pull those secrets into the spotlight.

Because in spite of a world that might not want to hear her, Xiomara refuses to stay silent.

Miss Buxton
School Librarian

Ecobricks

The Northampton High School Eco Team would like to request your help in raising awareness over the importance of plastic recycling, particularly in light of the recent David Attenborough series highlighting the problems associated with plastic pollution in marine ecosystems.

We are aiming to build a sculpture entirely out of plastic (which will itself be later recycled) as part of an awareness campaign in the Autumn Term. In order to achieve this we plan to make use of the Ecobricks technique, which utilises plastic bottles filled with plastic waste. This link is to a video explaining how to make Ecobricks.

For our sculpture we would welcome plastic bottles of a range of different sizes and therefore any appropriately filled plastic bottles will be accepted. For details on how to make them please refer to the video link above (written instructions are contained below the video).

If these could be brought into school immediately upon return in September and given to Mr Earp or placed neatly in the Breakout Learning Zone at the end of the E corridor then we would greatly appreciate it. Thanks in advance for your help with our environmental work and if you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact us via j.earp@nhs.gdst.net.

Mr Earp
Head of Humanities

Early May Bank Holiday 2020

Please kindly note that, in line with the change to the national Bank Holiday pattern in May 2020 in order to mark the 75th anniversary of VE Day, we will observe the early May Bank Holiday on Friday 8 May rather than on Monday 4 May, as originally advertised.

Monday 4 May will be a normal school day and school will be closed on Friday 8 May.  Please do not hesitate to get in touch if you have any queries about the change.

Dr Stringer 
Headmistress

County Netball Trials

Term Dates

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Northampton High School
Newport Pagnell Road, Hardingstone Northampton NN4 6UU
T: 01604 765765 nhsadmin@nhs.Gdst.Net