June news

It's been another action packed half term so far and here are some of the highlights.

Music Department News

The Junior Concert took place on Wednesday 13 June. It featured a fantastic range of quality performances from our very talented KS3 musicians. One of the performers, Edward Cutting (Year 8), described the concert as ‘…an amazing event to perform in. It was an opportunity for any student from Year 7, 8 or 9 to perform a solo on their musical instrument, or as part of a larger ensemble. Before I began to play I was very nervous, but when I got up on stage and played my first note, I felt very relaxed and enjoyed every second of it! It was great to see all of the musical talent that we have at St Peter's showcased in one evening of entertainment. I can't wait until next year!

 
Our boys’ a capella group ‘Frontline’ performed at the G15 Celebration of Success evening on Friday 22 June at Gloucester Cathedral. They performed two songs which commemorated the 100^th anniversary of the First World War: ‘It’s a Long Way to Tipperary’ and ‘Keep the Home Fires Burning’. The performance was excellent and a tribute to the work done by Mrs Perfect and the rest of the music department.

 

The Jazz Band will be performing at the Tuffley Festival on Saturday 7 July, 3pm at Tuffley Rovers FC; any support would be greatly appreciated. You can also follow the St Peter’s High School Music Department on Twitter @musicstpeters or via the school website www.stpetershighschool.org.uk/music for the latest news, photos, videos and more.

 

Year 10 Maths visit to the University of Bristol

Last week fifteen Year 10 mathematicians were entertained by two lectures from leading academics and then participated in an exciting maths team challenge with students from 12 different schools.

The lecturers were: Dr Jennifer Roger of Oxford University, who took great pleasure in de-bunking alarmist statistics quoted in the press, and Dr Katie Steckles of Manchester University, who taught them how to square root cube numbers in their heads as a party trick and delved into the hidden maths of technology. Thank you to the maths department for organising this.

The Brilliant Club update
Our twelve Year 8 students who are part of the Brilliant Club have all achieved a 2:1 or higher on their final assignment, an excellent achievement. They have worked extremely hard on this challenging extra-curricular assignment and have impressed the PhD tutor they worked with. They will be “graduating” at the University of Bristol on 4^th July and photos will follow. Thanks to Mrs Barker for her work with this group of students.

GROW / GAP Scheme

As part of the GROWS project, some of our Year 10 pupils made the most of their half term by taking part in a 4 day STEM and Cyber Experience delivered by The Gloucester Aspiration Programme (GROWS). Activities included programming a robot to carry out a challenge and a technology teardown – stripping apart common household technology to explore and discover its components and breaking into an iPad to decipher cryptic messages. All this culminated in a trip to the Cheltenham Science festival to listen to industry experts talk about careers in STEM, followed by time in the Discovery Zone getting ‘hands on’ with virtual reality, aeronautical engineering and much more!

Year 10 pupils (with others from the county) also took part in a 3 day Sports Science Experience delivered by The Gloucestershire Aspiration Programme (GAP). Human performance and nutrition was delivered at Hartpury College’s sports laboratories. Here students got their hands on and investigated their own lung function, muscular systems and exhausted themselves through the Wingate test. Biometric investigations at the University of Gloucestershire saw students compare the difference in forces produced by bare footed runners versus those wearing trainers and measure their own speed using Brower gates.

All this culminated in at trip the home of English rugby, Twickenham, where students took part in a session exploring the use of technology in today’s game, identifying different player positions by their GPS track, as well as viewing the pitch from the royal box!

 

GROWS are offering more taster experiences, this time in Crime Scene Investigation (Dead on Time), and Engineering (Engineer IT) for current Year 9 students during the summer holidays. More details can be found at grows.ac.uk or Facebook.com/growsgloucestershire.

EAL department Strawberry Tea and awards ceremony

On the 20^th June the EAL department held the Annual Strawberry Tea Party and EAL Award ceremony to celebrate the success of the students whose second language is English. The ASDAN course students made about 100 scones and cream teas in school that day as part of their course and then we invited all to join in, lower school and sixth form students alike.

For some students it marked the end of their time at St Peters before they move on to college courses next year. It gave them a chance to say thank you to their teachers and friends for all their help. Everyone enjoyed the sun soaked, warm  hearted event, marking the real successes and progress of these hard working and enthusiastic  students from all corners of the world. Thank you to the EAL staff for organising the event and for all they do with our students.

 

The Duke of Edinburgh scheme has been really successful this year.  46 students in year 9 successfully completed the expedition section of their Bronze Award. They completed a challenging two-day expedition in the Cotswolds. 36 students from years 9 to 11 have completed their Bronze Award this academic year.

Former student Alice Davies has completed her Gold Award and is looking forward to receiving it at St James’ Palace. Thanks to the staff who give up so much of their time at weekends to ensure that the scheme runs and benefits so many students.

 

Year 9 Run to Wales
On Friday 22^nd June, a group of year 9 students ran 126.6km in nine hours, the equivalent of running from Gloucester to the outskirts of Swansea. There were representatives from all eight year 9 forms and, on a hot day, they showed each lots of respect and support, were constantly upbeat and optimistic about the challenge, felt the enjoyment of coming together as a community and displayed their kindness by raising over £1500 for CAFOD. Thank you to head of year 9, Mr Hudson, for organising this challenge.

This Friday, 29th June, is the feast of Saints Peter and Paul and we will celebrate with a whole school Mass to which parents and friends are invited. In the afternoon will be our awards presentations followed by an early finish at 2.30. All buses other than the John Dix ones are able to collect students at 2.30. Students on the John Dix buses - and students whose parents wish them to remain in school until normal time - will of course be supervised. We are looking forward to another memorable day.