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Sixth-formers at Queen Elizabeth’s School are benefiting from a £100,000 investment in the Heard Building – QE’s Sixth Form centre.

The old Heard Private Study Area has been replaced by the Heard Learning Centre, which opened at the start of this term. The Learning Centre has been designed to provide students with the optimum facilities for independent learning. These include: seating for 115 students at a time, a PC suite, facilities for laptop connection and larger working spaces for students completing design or art projects, as well as individual spaces.

The Heard Building also now features a Sixth Form Common Room and a refurbished Prefect Common Room. Lockers are available to all students for the first time.

Head of Sixth Form, David Ryan, said: “The refurbished Heard building provides excellent facilities for our students as they pursue the grades that will allow them access to the leading universities, both nationally and internationally. We are certainly grateful for the investment, which was made through the assistance of the Friends of Queen Elizabeth’s and the generous covenants offered by parents. Over 100 students from the School have secured places at Oxbridge colleges since 2007 and many more have taken up places at leading Russell Group universities; now we have a facility that will allow us to emulate these fine successes.”

The Learning Centre is supervised by staff at all times and is open from 8am to 2pm each day.

Several Old Elizabethans have achieved notable academic success at Cambridge University, the School has learned.

Ares Kokkinos (2001-08) has been awarded a First for Part IIA of his Economics Tripos by Trinity College, Cambridge. His academic and leadership qualities were recognised at QE, where he was described by his Year Head, David Ryan, as “an effective and committed Lieutenant” whose “peers look up to him and benchmark their performance against his”. His extra-curricular activities while he was at QE included participation in the Duke of Edinburgh Gold Award scheme, fencing and playing the piano.

Amar Shah (1999-2006) was placed in the First Class of his examinations at St John’s College, Cambridge, in recognition of which he has been awarded a College Prize and made a Scholar of the College for this academic year. In his final report from QE, Amar, who was then a senior prefect, was described as “an outstanding mathematician who has an innate ability to deal with the most complex of abstract principles”. He played the flute in School concerts, represented QE at chess and was a peer mentor.

Amar’s fellow St John’s student, Rahul Rose (2001-08), pictured receiving his A level results in August 2008, has also won prizes from the college for his academic performance. In a report issued during Rahul’s final year at QE, Mr Ryan lauded him as “certainly one of the most articulate and able students I have had the pleasure of knowing”. He was a prefect and was also a member of a very successful European Youth Parliament debating team while at the School.

Arun Jayapaul (2001-08) was congratulated in a letter from Professor Dame Jean Thomas, Master of St Catharine’s College, Cambridge, on his “outstanding examination performance”. On the basis of his results, he was awarded a Robert Skerne (1661) Scholarship and invited to the Dr Gostlin Dinner, which takes place this month. He was also awarded a College Book Prize. Arun was a House Vice-Captain, a senior prefect and took part in several extra-curricular Economics activities, such as Shares4Schools and Target 2.0.

Two QE boys took the opportunity to celebrate the festival of Sukkot with the local Jewish community during the sixth QE exchange visit to Bielefield.

Thirty Year 9 and 10 boys spent a week living with their exchange partners’ families. During their visit the boys toured the ancient castle near the city and the Nixdorf computer museum. “Eine ausgezeichnete Erfahrung!” [an excellent experience] said Head of German, Burgunde Lukasser.

The School Chess team achieved both individual and team success at this year’s Millfield International Schools’ Chess Team Championship.

Captained by Anup Desai of Year 13, the team went through to the Major Competition where they scored 47 out of a possible 60 points, winning the competition at Millfield School in Somerset by a commanding 10-point margin.

Prior to this they had qualified for the Major Competition after finishing in eighth position following the first two qualifying rounds – narrowly missing qualification for the Championship section, which is for the top six schools.

Board Prize winners were:

• Ananth Balaji of Year 7
• Jake Breindel of Year 8
• Joseph Levene and Kieran Chan of Year 9
• Ben Collins of Year 10
• Luka Sugita and Neel Popat of Year 12

“We had a highly enjoyable two days of chess and I am delighted that the boys have brought several trophies back to Queen Elizabeth’s,” said teacher Geoff Roberts, who leads chess at QE. “It was very pleasing that the whole team were able to bring out their best chess in a national competition against high-quality opposition. The strong team ethic, which enabled the boys to perform so well in spite of the slight disappointment of the first two rounds, was due in no small part to the leadership skills of QE Chess Captain, Anup Desai.

“I am also delighted with the performances of the three Year 7 boys, representing the School for the first time; Ananth Balaji and Yousuf Chowdhury both performed strongly in the main tournament, while Louis Waloschek won the reserves tournament.”

OE Tom Aggar (1995-2002) is aiming for another gold medal at the World Championships in New Zealand at the end of October.

In an interview with the Guardian newspaper, Tom said: “I’m in a good position to defend my single sculls title. I’m in pretty good shape but you never know what to expect until the day…Training is six days a week, with two or three sessions a day, so it is very ‘full on’ at the moment.”

Tom has already been named in the GB Rowing Team for the London Paralympics in 2012, where he will be looking to repeat the adaptive rowing gold medal he won at the 2008 Beijing Paralympics.

He added: “London 2012 is quite a way off but I am confident about my chances of winning a medal…I need to keep improving my times, because there will be some serious challengers in 2012. Countries start improving come Olympics time and the field becomes bunched closer together…

“The team environment helps. When you are around the group and everyone is striving for a gold-medal winning performance it is inspiring.”

QE’s 2010 Swiss Chess Tournament was won by Year 8 pupil Jake Breindel, who scored six points by winning all six of his games. The tournament was open to boys in the School from Years 8 to 11.

“It was a memorable day, both for the quality and competitiveness of the chess played, and the enthusiasm shown by the 40 boys who took part,” said Geoff Roberts, teacher in charge of chess. A Swiss-system tournament involves players being paired to face each other for several rounds of competition, rather than following a ‘round-robin’ arrangement.

Kieran Chan from Year 9 was runner-up with five points and three boys tied for third place scoring 4.5 points each. They were Madhi Elango of Year 10, Joseph Levene of Year 9 and Reyvanth Varathan of Year 11. All four boys, together with overall winner Jake Breindel, also won prizes for the best performances in their year groups.

“A feature of this event, which the boys enjoy, is that they have only 15 minutes to play all of their moves in each game – only a fraction of the time normally allocated in tournaments,” added Mr Roberts. “This leads to a much faster pace of game and on occasion some surprising results.”