St
Andrew’s Prep was delighted to welcome Robin
Fletcher, Chief Executive of the BSA, to the school on Tuesday.  The school
embraced the Boarding School Orchard which Mr Fletcher launched in 2014 and
which aims to be the largest orchard, by distance with schools up and down the country planting fruit trees within their grounds.

Under sunny skies, Headmaster, Gareth Jones and Head of
Boarding, Mark Tomsett, assisted Mr Fletcher to plant a cherry tree at the
front of the school.  Many of the boarding community who had met with Mr
Fletcher earlier in the day, also took also took part in the ceremony.

The tree symbolises the tree of knowledge and demonstrates each
school’s commitment to growth and caring for the environment.

Mr Fletcher said, “This cherry tree will be here
for a long, long time and will be a rich food source for local bees and
insects.  I hope that the children gathered here today will come back to
St Andrew’s in years to come and see how the tree has grown.”

Headmaster, Gareth Jones said, “We
have really enjoyed having Robin here today and having the opportunity to show
him our site and boarding provision and to gain from his wisdom and
experience.  It’s been a very positive day and we would like to thank
him for his time.”

Local MP Caroline Ansell attended the St Andrew’s Prep assembly today to give the Prep School children a very balanced talk on the historical EU referendum taking place throughout the course of the day. Mrs Ansell offered arguments for both the Remain and Leave campaigns.

Mrs Ansell covered the main topics of concern including, cost of EU membership, the number of EU migrants coming to the UK each year, trade and investment, the EU decision making process (sovereignty), jobs and security.

Following her talk, the Year 8 children stayed behind for a question and answer session when Mrs Ansell was challenged to answer questions as diverse as “What is the number of people required to count the ballot papers”?, “What is the point of letting countries in to the EU who do not contribute to its finances”? and “How quickly would the UK feel the impact of a Leave result?”

As the debate and result are considered by many to be among the most important in our lifetime, St Andrew’s Prep felt it important to give the children an opportunity to vote in a mock-referendum organised by Assistant Head, Paul Shouksmith. The results were: Remain: 66% and Leave 34%.

Mr Shouksmith said, “Today is a monumental day for our country which will shape the lives and future of our pupils, so we wanted them to have their say. The result has followed the most recent the opinion poll suggesting that the young would vote for Remain. It’ll be interesting to see how the country votes later today.”

St Andrew’s Prep was placed sixth in the country at the National Junior Quiz Championships in General Knowledge for Prep Schools held at the Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich earlier this week.

Over five hundred teams from three hundred and twenty seven schools across the breadth of the nation competed in this, the largest inter-schoolqQuiz competition in the country.

St Andrew’s Prep pupils, Sam Coxen, Victor Delaney, Charlie Maidens and Juliette Zeilmaker won through two highly competitive, high-scoring rounds to reach the Finals. The children aged between 11 were far from flummoxed by 40 multiple choice questions worth between 20 and 100 points dpending on difficulty including, “What is the name of the last Tsar of Russia?”, “Which Shakesperian character said, “Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more.” and “Who was King at the time of the English Civil War in the 17th Century?”

London Prep School, The Hall, took the top spot but the next five schools were not far behind and St Andrew’s can take comfort in the fact that they beat Dulwich College Junior School who beat them in the semi final.

The whole of St Andrew’s Prep celebrated the Queen’s 90th birthday with a fabulous tea party on its school fields which was attended by many parents, grandparents and friends of the school and even the Queen herself, albeit, a life size cardboard cutout, joined the festivities. Pupils dressed up in red, white and blue and tucked into a deliciously British picnic. 

The fields were awash with bunting and British flags, Glenn Miller’s music filled the air and there was a lovely atmosphere as pupils picnicked with their teachers while parents and grandparents chatted over a slice of tasty cake and a cup of tea or a glass of Pimm’s.
The afternoon came to a fitting end with a rousing version of happy birthday and the National Anthem.

Headmaster, Gareth Jones said, “What a quintessentially, British way to celebrate the Queen’s 90th birthday. It was a fun packed afternoon enjoyed by all.”

St Andrew’s Prep has beaten more than 500 teams from 315 schools across England and Wales to claim a spot in the Final of the Key Stage 2 Quiz Club Championships, the largest inter-school competitions in the UK. Representing the school Sam Coxen, Victor Delaney, Charlie Maidens and Juliette Zeilmaker won the regional heat back in March and then claimed the school’s place in the finals when they finished third in a very high-scoring semi-final round.

The team will now take on prep schools including London based Dulwich College Junior School and The Hall, Birkdale Prep School in South Yorkshire, The Grange in Monmouth and Yarm Prep School in Cleveland.

The National Finals are to be held at the Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich, London on 21 June 2016 and we wish the team good luck.

The Project Zulu community choir made a welcome return to St Andrew’s Prep this week. The 24 strong group arrived from the Madadeni Township in South Africa on Monday evening with teachers from their school and Project Zulu representatives and immediately made friends with the boarders eager to welcome them to our community.

After an overnight stay in the school pavilion, the choir taught the Year 1 and 2 pupils their renowned Gum Boot Dance which the children loved. The choir, aged between 9 and 15, then performed two workshops with the St Andrew’s children from Years 3 and 5 and taught each year group a traditional folk song, with dance movements, which they sang a cappella. The children interacted beautifully and threw themselves into the challenge.

The aim of Project Zulu is to raise funds to support the educational development and community opportunities within the Madadeni Township, KwaZulu-Natal to increase lifelong learning prospects for young people.

All funds raised by the tour will go towards the building of new classrooms at Sithobelumthetho Primary School to help reduce overcrowding in their classes. The children are currently taught with over sixty pupils per class.

Many congratulations to the superheroes and superheroines who completed the St Andrew’s Prep 5km run and raised approaching £1,000 for the Kent, Surrey and Sussex Air Ambulance. This figure will be added to the £4,000 already raised for the charity so far this year.

Many congratulations to Tom (U13), Theo (U12) and Ethan (U11) who will represent St Andrew’s Prep and SE England Prep schools when they play in the Prep Schools’ Pumas teams at the Gothia World Youth Cup in Sweden this July. The Gothia Cup is the world’s largest and most international youth football tournament and attracts teams from 90 countries around the globe. The event includes an Opening Ceremony at the Ullevi Stadium, near Gothenburg, which attracts more than 52,000 spectators and international soccer participants. Initially, teams compete in group games before the winners progress to the final knockout stage.

Competing against approximately 80 boys in each age group – many of whom play in football academies at clubs such as Brighton and Crystal Palace – the St Andrew’s boys were selected for the all-important A squad/Development squad to seal their place on the plane to the land of the midnight sun.

To prepare for the amazing event, Tom, Theo and Ethan attended a residential training camp at Mill Hill school over Easter. The boys loved the experience which was run by UEFA qualified coaches who were supported by physiotherapists and they attended lectures on health and nutrition as well as mental strength.

St Andrew’s Prep pupils have turned into space biologists this term as they embark on an experiment to grow seeds which have spent several months in microgravity on the International Space Station (ISS). They were returned to earth in March and children from the pre-prep will grow the ‘space’ seeds alongside seeds which have not been into space and measure the differences between them over seven weeks. The children will not know which seed packet contains which seeds until all the results have been collected and analysed by professional biostatisticians.

The project is being run in partnership between the UK Space Agency and the RHSCampaign for School Gardening.

Speaking from the ISS, European Space Agency astronaut, Tim Peake asked schools across the country to get involved in the project saying, “”Conditions here on the International Space Station are quite different from on planet Earth, due to us being weightless here in orbit. This experiment will aim to see if microgravity can affect the growth mechanisms in seeds.” 

Head of Pre-Prep, Heather Stokes said, “The children are so excited to be experimenting with seeds that were looked after by Tim Peake. This is a real out of world experiment and should guide how we might preserve human life on other planets on future space missions.”