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Year 7 boys literally got to grips with artefacts from the past on a trip to the British Museum.

The museum has a number of Hands On desks, where at certain times visitors are invited to hold historical objects and listen while experts describe and discuss their origin and significance.

The boys particularly enjoyed these elements of the visit, which was a great success, reported History teacher Stephen Edwards. “All the boys had a fantastic day and learnt a lot. The amazing range of historical objects and artefacts in the museum really brings History to life and gives the pupils a wonderful insight into how different civilisations lived in the past."

QE’s History Department uses the annual trip to enhance classroom topics on the Romans, Greeks and Egyptians.

During this year’s visit, the group of 45 pupils saw Egyptian mummies, the Rosetta Stone and the Hoa Hakananai’a, or Easter Island Head. The Hands On desks include: the Roman Britain Gallery; the Living & Dying Gallery and the Money Gallery.

QE’s Junior String Quartet have given a special performance at the opening ceremony of an extension to a local care home, by special invitation of its trustees.

Year 9 violinists Simon Purdy, Daniel Cheung and Jason Yau, together with Akhil Shah on cello, performed for residents and guests at the official opening of eight new cottages at The Thomas Watson Cottage Homes Care Home in High Barnet. The chairman of the charity, Mrs Jenny Harrold, said: “We wanted to invite the quartet from Queen Elizabeth’s School as quite a few of our residents attend their Christmas concert each year and thoroughly enjoy it. We thought it would add to the sense of occasion.”

Mrs Harrold and fellow trustees Mrs Sarah Campling and Mrs Sarah Housden are descendants of Thomas Watson and his daughters Annie and Florence, who set aside the land and paid for the building of the original 11 bungalows and hall in 1914. The new cottages are to be known as Jubilee Cottages in recognition of the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee.

A plaque was unveiled by Mrs Harrold in the presence of 120 guests. Mrs Campling and Mrs Housden then officially pronounced the cottages open by untying the ribbons attached to the two brick plinths erected outside of the two sets of cottages. The trustees were accompanied by Mrs Florence Jones and Mrs Linda McCarthy, the resident who has been there longest and the newest resident respectively.

Three QE chess teams have won their age groups at the National Schools’ Chess Team Championships, while pupil Ananth Balaji has been chosen to represent England in two international competitions. The successes mark an exceptionally successful end to the year for the School’s chess players.

QE’s U12, U14 and U16 teams all won their age groups at the championships held in Somerset. The U12 team finished with a score of 24, beating their nearest challenger, Magdalen College School, by three points in a highly competitive contest. The U14 team also won by three points – beating the Royal Grammar School, Guildford, and retaining their title. The U16 boys took part in a joint U16 and U18 competition, amassing the highest total for an U16 team and only narrowly losing out to Royal Grammar School, Guildford, whose U18 team scored three points more than QE.

Teacher in charge of chess at QE, Geoff Roberts, said: “The boys really enjoyed the two days of competitive chess representing the School. I am delighted that the teams secured three national titles to take back to the School. There were many outstanding individual performances; special mention to George Taylor (U12), Jake Breindel (U14) and Joseph Levene (U16). The boys deserve great credit for their excellent chess and for their role in creating the strong team environment which underpinned the School’s success.”

The U12 team, who are all from Year 7, comprised Rishul Karia, George Taylor (who scored maximum points), Rufus Carruthers, Yuri Evdokomov, Ilan Elango. The U14 team was captained by Jake Breindel who was supported by fellow Year 9 pupils James Bunyan, Ashwin Ravichandran and Paavan Sawjani, and by Yousuf Chowdhury of Year 8. The U16 team was made up of Joseph Levene, Ananth Balaji, Adam Hilsenrath, Parus Shah and Harshil Joshi.

Talented Ananth plays for the U16 team, even though he is only in Year 8. The team successes came as he heard that he has been chosen to represent England at the European Youth Chess Championship in August in the Czech Republic and at the World Youth Chess Championship in November in Slovenia. “We are very proud of Ananth’s achievement and wish him every success in the forthcoming competitions,” said Mr Roberts.

Two Year 12 pupils have been awarded gold certificates in the Cambridge Chemistry Challenge Lower Sixth – or C3L6 for short. The result places Arran Patel and Nigethan Sathiyalingam in the top 7% of chemists in the country in their age group.

Mehul Jesani and Salman Khan have been awarded silver whilst Burhan Ashraf, Movin Abeywickrema, Vignesh Gopalan and Sharad Raval all achieved copper (not bronze, since copper is an element, whereas bronze is an alloy). More than 4,000 students entered the competition, with 40% of the entrants receiving no classification at all.

Head of Science at QE, Dr Malcolm Russell, said: “This is an amazing set of results – all of the boys who entered from QE received a certificate of merit. When I think about the examination, many of the questions were significantly beyond the syllabus traditionally studied at school up to this point. The test required a great deal of application and understanding.”

The competition, designed specifically for members of the Lower Sixth, took the form of a two-hour written examination and was organised by Dr Peter Wothers at the University of Cambridge Department of Chemistry. Its stated aim is to stretch and challenge students interested in chemistry, and to encourage them to think about science in the way they would at university.

Queen Elizabeth’s School has announced its best-ever A-level results, with strong grades across all subjects. For the first time, the proportion of A*, A and B grades achieved at the School rose above 98%, reaching 98.5% – up from 97.7 % in 2011.

Neil Enright, who became Headmaster in September last year, said: “I am extremely proud of our Year 13 students: their hard work and dedication has been well rewarded. To have improved significantly on last year’s very good results is a formidable achievement, particularly at a time when examination boards nationally have taken steps to end ‘grade inflation’.

“In the wake of the Olympics, there has been much talk about the value of competition: at QE, we unashamedly promote excellence throughout the School: competition is at the very heart of what we do. I believe our excellent academic results can be directly attributed to the combination of our meritocratic ethos with a balanced curriculum that plays to the strengths of boys.”

The number of A* grades held up, while the School recorded a 4% jump in the combined proportion of A* and A grades, which reached 88.5%.

Twenty-six boys among the Upper Sixth have offers from Oxford or Cambridge. These are in a wide range of subjects, from Engineering (five boys) to the famous Politics, Philosophy & Economics (PPE) course at Oxford.

All Year 13 boys have university places for 2012 or are taking a gap year. Nineteen boys have been offered places to read Medicine and 8 for Dentistry.

“One of the aspects of this year’s results that is particularly pleasing is that there are no weak links among the School’s departments,” added Mr Enright. “Our scientists and mathematicians have excelled themselves, but it is worth noting that all seven of our Art A-level students gained an A*, while 61% of English A-levels were given this top grade, and the History results were also very strong.”

The results represent many individual triumphs. Several boys are following in the footsteps of high-flying elder brothers who are already at university, such as Harry Peto, who is taking up a place at Clare College, Cambridge, to read Politics, Psychology and Sociology, while his brother, Tommy, has just completed the second year of his PPE course at Brasenose College, Oxford.”

“As part of our mission to produce young men who are confident, able and responsible, we encourage all our boys to pursue extra-curricular activities, so I am pleased to note that among our straight-A* students this year are the captain of our First XV rugby team, Drew Williams, and talented musician Janaka Sumanasekera,” Mr Enright concluded.

Top State School, The Daily Telegraph – Friday 17 August 2012

Top State School, The Times – Friday 17 August 2012

The Times – Friday 17 August 2012

Daily Mail – Friday 17 August 2012

The Barnet & Potters Bar Times – Thursday 16 August 2012

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Forty-two boys took part in the Music Department’s concert tour to Durham, combining a demanding performance schedule with the opportunity to visit some of the historic city’s famous attractions.

The party also met up with one of the School’s alumni, Emeritus Professor of Classics at Durham University, Peter J Rhodes (OE 1952-1959).

The four-day tour began with a 6.30am departure. “The early start was definitely worthwhile,” said Music teacher Rebecca Lancelot. “It enabled us to settle in to our accommodation and then enjoy lunch beneath the impressive chandeliers of St Chad’s College.”

In the afternoon the boys enjoyed the Durham Miners’ Gala. “They found it a splendid and moving occasion, with marching bands leading new banners into the cathedral at the start of the service. The boys relished the opportunity to sing one of our Founder’s Day hymns, Jerusalem, again, and hear the cathedral choir,” added Miss Lancelot.

After supper in St Chad's, the choir had the invaluable experience of an intensive rehearsal with the cathedral's Master of the Choristers and Organist, James Lancelot, who is Miss Lancelot’s father. He was appointed in 1985. Prior to this he was successively a chorister of St. Paul's Cathedral, Organ Scholar at King's College, Cambridge, and, for ten years, Sub-Organist of Winchester Cathedral. He studied with Ralph Downes, Gillian Weir and Nicholas Danby. In addition, Mr Lancelot is much in demand as a recitalist in Britain and abroad. Recent years have seen visits to countries including Holland, Poland, Germany, Denmark, the USA, Russia and Sweden. He is a past president of the Cathedral Organists’ Association and in 2002 became a Lay Canon of Durham Cathedral, also receiving an Honorary Fellowship of the Guild of Church Musicians. He received an Honorary Fellowship of the Royal School of Church Music in 2008.

On day two, the party travelled to the Beamish museum in Stanley, where the boys staged three very well attended performances – one by the choir and strings, and two by the band. The evening was spent aboard Durham's largest vessel, the Prince Bishop, which was making her first outing in seven weeks, having been out of service due to recent flooding.

“The third day proved to be a busy and challenging one for the boys, but they more than rose to the occasion,” said Miss Lancelot. In the morning, the boys were treated to a tour of the cathedral and those who were involved in just one of two performances taking place later that day also toured the historic castle. “They excelled in a riveting lunchtime concert and an enchanting evensong, both of which were extremely well received.”

The day was rounded off with a barbecue at St Chad's College, which was attended by the boy choristers of Durham Cathedral Choir, with whom the QE chamber choir had performed at evensong.

Also at the barbecue was Professor Rhodes, Durham’s Classics Department’s specialist in Greek history from 1965 to 2005 and Professor of Ancient History from 1983. Since his retirement in 2005 he has been Honorary Professor and Emeritus Professor. He is the author of a number of acknowledged academic books and a contributor to the second edition of the Cambridge Ancient History, and the third and fourth editions of the Oxford Classical Dictionary.

In the USA, he has been a Junior Fellow of the Center for Hellenic Studies, Washington DC, and a member of the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, New Jersey. In 2002 he was Langford Family Eminent Scholar at Florida State University. He is a Fellow of the British Academy, where he was vice-chairman of the Classical Antiquity Section 1999-2002 and chairman 2002-5, and is a Foreign Member of the Royal Danish Academy.

Professor Rhodes has since written to the School to say how much he enjoyed the occasion and to send his greetings back to Barnet: “Very many thanks, to you and all your colleagues – for bringing the QE musicians to Durham, to play and sing so well at lunchtime and at evensong, for enabling me to re-establish contacts with my old roots, and for the cufflinks.” The new cufflinks from the school would complement the pair given to him by his housemaster when he left QE in 1959, he said.

The final morning comprised a talk about, and tour of, Durham University with Mr James Randle and Dr Peter Swift. “We felt very privileged to be able to see inside labs in the Physics, Geography and Engineering departments, as well as a brand new lecture theatre,” said Miss Lancelot. The tour ended with a trip to St Mary's College, from where the group could admire the “stunning panoramic view of the cathedral”.

Miss Lancelot concluded that both pupils and staff had enjoyed a wonderful time in Durham. “The boys have performed to a very high standard and rightly received numerous compliments, not only for their musicianship but also for their polite manner. It has been a pleasure for us as staff to take such talented and considerate young men on tour, and we look forward to facilitating similar opportunities in future,” concluded Miss Lancelot.