Crest
QE Update
11th June 2021
Facebook icon Instagram icon LinkedIn icon
Crest
 
Limoncello
Letter from the Headmaster
The 2021 Virtual Founder’s Day countdown has begun!

In just eight days’ time, we will once again celebrate Founder’s Day online together. Please make a note right now to ‘tune in’ for our special Founder’s Day YouTube Premiere next Saturday, 19th June, at 12 noon. It is important that we celebrate our heritage, and the broadcast will therefore reflect our traditional Founder’s Day programme – but look out, too, for a number of special surprises on the day. We’ll send you details of the YouTube Premiere link in our pre-Founder’s Day email next Friday, 18th June.

And that’s not all! Boys, families, staff, our tireless FQE representatives and other friends of the School have all been hard at work preparing a varied menu of some very special events. Among them is TV host Mel Giedroyc who will be presenting The Great British QE Showstopper Sponsored Bake Off 2021 as part of our main broadcast. She is pictured, above, during her visit to the School this week, when she presented her cello – dubbed ‘Limoncello’ in honour of a favourite tipple! – to our grateful Music Department. Year 12 cellist Rafael Herberg quickly put the instrument through its paces in an impromptu performance.

Mel’s already recorded a special video message to get us all ready. You can read more about her Bake Off and our other Founder’s Day events below. Again, we’ll be sending more details in our pre-Founder’s Day email next Friday. Please do get involved and join in the Founder’s Day fun.

You can read more about Mel’s Bake Off and our other Founder’s Day events below. We will be sending further details in our special pre-Founder’s Day email next Friday. Please do get involved and join in the Founder’s Day fun.


Elizabeth I and Robert Dudley

Of course, a key aim of Founder’s Day is to raise money for the School. We had magnificent support for last year’s online Founder’s Day and duly reached our £20,000 target. We are hugely grateful for that support, which has in fact continued throughout the pandemic. It has enabled us to keep pushing forward, and we are looking forward with considerable excitement to opening our new Music School in the autumn. I therefore appeal to everyone to dig deep again and support Founder’s Day 2021 through our JustGiving page so that we can equip the new building to the highest possible standards and create a superb musical learning environment for all our boys.

Yours in anticipation of a great day,

Enright Signature
Mr Neil Enright
Headmaster

 
 
Donate through our Founder’s Day 2021 JustGiving page
 
 
Richard Burr featuring on The Bake Off 2014
 

Now listen up! Introducing The Great British QE Showstopper Sponsored Bake Off 2021, featuring Mel Giedroyc

We are delighted to announce that TV celebrity Mel Giedroyc, former BBC co-host of The Great British Bake Off, is to present and judge our online Great British QE Showstopper Sponsored Bake Off being held over the Founder’s Day weekend.

Watch Mel throw down her Bake Off challenge in her own inimitable style – with a big nod to the Earl of Leicester, the man who started it all for QE some 448 years ago: “Robert Dudley would be bursting out of his doublet and hose with excitement at this – as am I.” The Bake Off aims to raise funds to buy musical instruments for the new Music School. She is challenging participants to make a ‘Showstopper’ bake of their choice on Founder’s Day or over the Founder’s Day weekend – it can be a cake, biscuits, bread…anything you like…Send in your photos of your culinary creations to news@qebarnet.co.uk and Mel will then judge the entries and pick a winner. Extra credit will be given to bakes with a musical and/or a QE theme. The accent is firmly on having fun and getting creative, so whether you are a complete beginner or a seasoned baker, why not give it a go, remembering to get some sponsorship from friends and family, with donations going to our JustGiving page.

You’ll be able to see Mel’s further Bake Off message as part of our main Founder’s Day YouTube Premiere broadcast next week. In the meantime, you can get thinking about your showstopper by checking out the recipes of Old Elizabethan Richard Burr (1987–1994), Great British Bake Off finalist in 2014 and winner of a record five Star Baker awards.

 
 
Watch Mel’s Giedroyc issue her QE Bake Off challenge – broadcasting direct from her ‘nook’!
 
TEDx
 

Our TEDx event – ‘ideas worth spreading’ from QE boys 

Final rehearsals take place today for one of the academic highlights of Founder’s Day 2021: a specially licensed TEDx conference being recorded at QE next week. It is an opportunity for our boys to explore issues they are interested in and practise their oratorical skills – and a chance for the rest of us to see QE’s ‘free-thinking scholarship’ in action. TEDx events aim to bring TED’s overall mission to pass on ‘ideas worth spreading’ to local communities around the globe.

The conference is being produced entirely in-house at QE and will feature a number of boys speaking. It is being overseen by Crispin Bonham-Carter, Assistant Head (Pupil Involvement), with editing and production handled by a team of senior pupils. Look out for the link to QE’s TEDx event, which we will be sending out in our pre-Founder’s Day email next Friday, 18th June.

 
 
 
 
Pianoathon Challenge
 

Seven pianos for seven practice rooms! QE musicians fight it out in the House Pianoathon Challenge

The School’s pianists will be doing battle with each other next Friday in an all-day Pianoathon. Featuring both House teams and individual pianists, the competitive marathon event is raising money to ensure that each of the seven practice rooms in the new Music School can have its own piano.

All six Houses are expected to enter small teams to play music of their choice for three minutes each in the Main School Hall, with every team to include a pianist. The Houses are being challenged to fill a whole hour with non-stop music, which means each House will have to enter no fewer than 20 teams. There are awards for the winning musicians, while Houses that raise large amounts will have the opportunity to have one of the new pianos named after them.

 
 
Find out more and sponsor a House from the dedicated eQE Pianoathon page
 
 
Founder's Day Heritage
 

Learning about their Founder’s Day heritage

Today sees Year 7 involved in their very own Founder’s Day-themed event. In a normal, non-pandemic year, QE’s youngest pupils would be right at the heart of Founder’s Day, taking part both in the morning service at Chipping Barnet Parish Church and then later in other formal aspects, such as the Roll Call in front of Main Building, before enjoying the fun of the afternoon fete. This event therefore aims to give them a sense of such components of the day.

 
 
 
 
 
Founded 1573
 
Queen Elizabeth's School, Queen's Road, Barnet, Hertfordshire, EN5 4DQ
 
Tel: 020 8441 4646
enquiries@qebarnet.co.uk
Facebook icon Instagram icon LinkedIn icon
Copyright © June 2021
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -