From NCS to the Rank Foundation An Update from the States

Newsletter
Vol. II Issue. III
10 October 2014
An Update from the States
From NCS to the Rank Foundation
by Ellie Geoghegan
by Trieu Ho
The Rank Foundation leadership award is about
ensuring that potential leaders thrive to achieve
the best that they can and it does so by
providing support in and outside of school. The
foundation is set on teaching the award holders
the principles of leadership and allowing them
to develop these skills through work experience.
It’s been just over a month and half since I got
to Colby College and already I’ve been to an
(American) football game, we lost but it was still
fun! The college experience is equal parts crazy
and brilliant, I have tons of work but the amount
of fun I’m having definitely makes up for it.
In the short time I’ve been here I’ve been
camping, had a prospective student come to
stay, and already had my first batch of
midterms.
Colby is insanely beautiful and the people are
so lovely (although I can’t begin to count the
amount of times I’ve been asked to say ‘Harry
Potter’). As I’m writing this, I’m sitting in the
student centre listening to great music and
people watching and I love it.
I have a job in the library, I’m taking four really
interesting classes: Philosophy, Art History,
Italian, and Calculus, and I’ve joined a
Broadway singing group. Fall break starts today
and I’m going to Canada on Saturday, and
honestly I really do feel like I’m living the life.
I’ve got to say I do miss home, and I definitely
miss some of our delightful British food.
Ultimately, this is the start of the best experience
of my life and I can’t wait for it to continue.
One
particular
experience
that
really
captivated me was working with Essex Boys and
Girls club to deliver the National Citizenship
Service (NCS) to young adults. This involved
camping and other typical outdoor activities
which gave me time to really see the group
bonding together. Having completed the NCS
myself the previous year, this gave me a look
from the other side of the page as I was working
as a volunteer. The Rank Foundation has
allowed me to flourish as a leader and as a
person, and I am very much thankful for having
won this award.
LAE Marketing Challenge
by Arsema Assefa
On the 8 October, while Eton and Caterham
visited their Partner Schools, Brighton and
Highgate were asked to compete against one
another, in an all-day long competition to
promote our School for future students.
Superpowers and Breaking Barriers:
A Girls Perspective
by Nadiya Hussain
The day started with an engaging talk about the
industry of advertising from Miss Lewis’ sister and
the potential careers that student could look
forward too within the industry and what to
expect. Miss Lewis herself worked for an
advertising firm and worked with prominent
brands like Apple.
Then we were asked to form groups of five and
six to brainstorm ideas, design a pitch and then
to present our finalized idea to our house judge.
As I am in Brighton, Miss Sargent was ours, and
she had the challenging job of deciding a
winner and runner up, in Brighton House.
After that, two teams were chosen, and were
put through to the final round where we went
against the winning Highgate team. Mr Bird,
Deputy Head at Brighton College and an LAE
governor attended the final as well. Tensions
were running high, and the judges were not
going to be easily impressed, and each team
seemed to have given a skilled and professional
presentation which included fantastic ideas. The
winning team was my team, and it was another
victory scored for Brighton House!
The engineering talk from Mr Cheung last
Friday gave an insight into engineering at
university level. After an introduction, a
background on Imperial College and a bit
more information about the department
(electrical engineering) in particular was
given.
Then the real fun started, learning more
about the endless opportunities that open
up to an engineer, and how making that
one’s discipline regardless of the institute it is
studied at, changes the way a person thinks,
lives, and makes decisions. It makes you
analytical, creative and a generally betterrounded person.
Then there's the knowledge that you'd have
the power to solve the world's problems,
and who wouldn't want to have that
superpower?
Being a girl, I'm pleased to say there was no
mention of engineering being a gender
specific profession, so it's fair to say barriers
are being broken. At least at LAE and
Imperial College.
Nevertheless, the day was certainly not only
about winning but an informative experience on
the industry of advertising, and today has
certainly left a huge impression on me and
many other students.
But the most important message given out
had to be that as students who take A Level
maths, engineering is just one of the many
exciting things you can go into, as maths is
everywhere. Without it, the phone in my
hand as I type this would be useless, and
you'd probably not be reading this right now
either.
by Harrison Iloh
My Trip to Eton
by Mythily Nagarajah
LAE offered the members of Caterham house
the amazing opportunity to visit our partner
school of the same name. In a day long trip
meeting our partner school buddies whilst
also experiencing a day in the life of a
Caterham student.
My trip to Eton College was not only
extremely interesting, but also a hugely
worthwhile experience. During the day of the
trip, I had come across many interesting
remarks not only about the school but of the
students too.
A Day in the Life of Caterham
Arriving late and slightly soggy from the never
ending rain, we were greeted with the grand
site of Caterham School. From there on we
met our partners, accompanying them to
one of their lessons we were given a direct
insight into the differences and even
similarities between the teaching at LAE and
Caterham.
After an eventful lesson we were then swiftly
taken for lunch (one of the highlights of the
day), where we were given the chance to
interact and socialise with the Caterham
students. This was a great opportunity to find
out from a student’s perspective how they
were finding caterham as a school and even
just to learn more about our partners as
people.
The trip came to it's inevitable end, but not
before the days exciting climax in which each
person was assigned to a certain event
ranging from wall climbing to circus skills, but
in my case I had the luck of being selected
for 'wildcats' in which we traversed a
selection of high ropes, even being
confronted with a leap of faith.
The trip was fantastic overall and was a great
chance to meet new people and experience
a different setting.
As soon as we got there we were warmly
welcomed with refreshments, and afterwards
we were paired up with a buddy. With the
buddy we had a chance to occupy two of
their lessons. Observing their lessons, I had
learnt that just like LAE, Eton also has a small
number of students in their classes, meaning
the teachers have more time for each
student. The teaching style in Eton was very
similar to LAE, as classes were very quiet and
lots of work was completed in a short time. I
also learnt two of the teachers at Eton also
worked in LAE too.
Throughout the day I came across many
similarities between LAE and Eton. Other
similarities included Eton’s use of Houses too,
and for each house they have a House
Captain. The house Captain was allowed to
wear preferred waistcoat. House Captain was
also in charge of the House competitions such
as the House quiz. The Houses were named
after the initial of the Housemaster or the
name of the House they boarded at. In total
there were up to 26 houses with around 50
students per house. I also discovered that that
the students went home every three weeks.
The school day meant that they had to do
sport every day and they also had assemblies
at 8.15 before getting dismissed for free time.
During my visit, I learnt that Henry VI founded
the school, and that the school has a statue
outside their chapel of him. The chapel of the
school is very big and very peaceful place for
students. The school has scholar program
awarding high achieving students like at LAE.
To conclude, visiting Eton was a brilliant
experience and I felt very inspired by the
school. I hope to get more opportunities like
this at LAE and look forward to welcoming my
Eton buddy when they visit LAE.
Information and PSHE
Badminton Report
Next week’s Core Value will be Excellence,
followed the week after by Resilience.
Six Badminton players travelled to
Brampton Manor Academy for the first
Badminton fixture of the year on
Wednesday 8 October.
Last week’s Head Master’s Awards were
presented to Jason Luong for always making
the most of every opportunity to develop his
knowledge, skills and interests, and to Aishah
Ahmed for exemplary prep in English
Literature,
including
degree
quality
annotations.
Upcoming Dates for your Diary
House Public Speaking Competition
Wednesday 15 October
Basketbell vs Brampton Manor School
Wednesday 15 October
LAE Open Day
Saturday 18 October
Unfortunately Brampton Manor Academy
was unable to field a girls’ team at the last
minute so a mixed team from the London
Academy of Excellence travelled to play
a combination of singles and doubles
matches to decide the fixture.
The team of Zakariya Allachi, Muhammed
Munaim, Aliyah Siddiqui, Jason Luong,
Arshdeep Gill and Albion Shamolli played
very well in their first outing.
Accolades for performance must go to
Aliyah Siddiqui and Arshdeep Gill who
won all three of their doubles matches!
Final Result: 4pts – 4pts.
INSET Day
Friday 24 October
Congratulations to the team. Badminton
training for the team will now move to
SportsDock at the University of East
London on Tuesday afternoons.
Term Ends
Thursday 23 October
Term Resumes
3 November
_____________________________________________
www.excellencelondon.ac.uk
Broadway House, 322 High Street, E15 1AJ
020 3301 1480
_____________________________________________
This is the home venue of the Black Arrows
Badminton Club who kindly coach the
London
Academy
of
Excellence
Badminton team.
@LAEstratford
2015 Entry Open Events
Saturday 18 October
9:30 - 14:30
Tuesday 25 November
16:00 - 20:00
Saturday 10 January
9:30 - 14:30
To register to attend an Open Event, visit www.excellencelondon.ac.uk