The news on these pages is updated on a weekly basis. If you have a good story, send us your account and pictures for possible publication to: news@kingschester.co.uk.

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Week beginning Monday 10 December

UK Senior Mathematical Challenge 2007 and Maths Inspiration Lectures
Fifty-seven sixth formers sat this year's Senior Mathematical Challenge in November, between them gaining 3 gold, 14 silver and 10 bronze certificates. Gordon Beck, Leo Scott and Tsubasa Sato deserve particular congratulations for their gold certificates. These are a considerable achievement, indicating a mark in the top 6% of those sitting the Challenge – and the Challenge is only taken by those in the top 25% nationally.

Lower and upper sixth mathematicians attended a “Maths Inspiration” conference in Manchester. The day consisted of 3 different lectures on varying aspects of mathematics and its applications to the real world. Read a report on the day's lectures by Gordon Beck.

Week beginning Monday 3 December

Gap year in Uganda
Caroline Brindle (Upper Sixth 2005-06) spent her gap year in Uganda where she taught maths at a rural secondary school and worked with a number of charitable projects. In the holidays she travelled in Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda. Read a summary of her year (in a pdf document). Caroline, who was awarded a Bulkeley Jones scholarship to help support her work abroad, arranged her placement through Project Trust (www.projecttrust.org.uk ). She is now reading English at the University of Leeds. Please contact Caroline if you would like any more information about her gap year (caz_j_@hotmail.com).

Boodles ISFA Cup quarter final
The King's 1stXI beat Bradfield School 2-1 in a closely fought match. Goals were scored by James Barber and Alex Powell. Match report.

Rensburg Sheppards U13 ISFA Cup quarter final
King's beat Millfield Prep 4-0. Roared on by their travelling band of parental supporters, King’s progressed to the last four with goals from Ben Leaman (2), Oliver Green and Jonathan Verity. George Kaye was man-of-the-match. Match report.

King's School pupils representing Cheshire Girl's hockey teams
Annabelle Church (4JH) and Katie Saunders (4SR) represented Cheshire U15, Siobhan Barnard (4SR) represented Cheshire U16 and Sarah Underhill (L6RP) represented Cheshire U17 in matches against Greater Manchester and Lancashire at UCLAN, Preston yesterday. In atrocious weather conditions that were less than conducive to playing entertaining hockey, all of the Cheshire teams braved the elements to return sterling results.

Being forced to play back to back matches drained many players in the small Cheshire squads. Cheshire U15 started well with a 2 -1 win against an extremely strong Greater Manchester side. In their second match against hosts Lancashire, some dramatic saves from Annabelle Church in goal kept their hopes alive until a well executed penalty corner saw the final score Lancashire 1 Cheshire 0.

The first of the U16 matches was full of end to end action with Greater Manchester running out winners 3 – 2. Cheshire U16 dominated their second match against Lancashire coming out 2 – 0 winners.

Successful Young Enterprise companies
King's Young Enterprise companies, Bloque and Ice, competed at the first of this year's local trade fairs at the Guildhall in Chester on Saturday 1st December. Despite slow business over the course of the 4 hours, competition amongst the ten Chester YE companies was stiff.

Both King's companies were praised in the highest terms by the judges and Bloque ended the day with two of the day's four awards. Awarding the certificate and prize for 'Best trade stand' the judges complemented Bloque's professional approach to trading on the day and the quality of their promotional material and responses to the tough questioning by the judging panel. Bloque also took the coveted award for 'Best product'. Their innovative and thoroughly researched service of offsetting annual vehicle carbon emissions drew huge plaudits from the judges - theirs was a product which was tipped as hard to beat in the whole of the Cheshire region. High praise indeed.

Ice were awarded second place in two categories, including 'Best product'. Again the judges' comments signalled that King's companies are amongst the very best in this year's competition.

Congratulations to both companies - a most impressive start amd a great credit to the initiative and effort of all involved.

Week beginning Monday 26 November

Nestlé national tennis competition
Our U19 team, consisting of James Barber, Sean Boyd, Stephen Mosford and Patrick Fletcher, were victors over Rydal School in this week's regional round. They go on to play Ellesmere College in the next round.

Week beginning Monday 19 November

U16 Girls National Hockey
Our team won the semi-final of the National North championship after drawing their match against King Edward & St Anns and winning their matches against Sheffield High School and Merchant Taylors Liverpool. They will paly in the National North finals in December. View match reports and photos on the hockey results page.

Debating in German competition
On Saturday 17 November Will Kinsey and Max Mackay took part in the first HMC North West schools debating competition in German, held at Cheadle Hulme School. The topics were 'Should homosexuals be able to marry and adopt children?' and 'Should smoking be banned in all public places?' Will and Max showed excellent debating skills and this, coupled with their very good knowledge of German, enabled them to win first prize in the contest, beating Bolton School in the first round and Cheadle Hulme School in the second round.

We hope that the competition will become an annual event and that next year King's will provide teams in French and Spanish as well as German.

Fund-raising for One Water and Children in Need
Following on from the visit of campaigner Duncan Goose earlier in the term (see report below) Economics and Business Studies students have been selling One Water bottled water. They are hoping to raise £7500 by the end of the school year to pay for our own playpump.

Last Friday various events were organised in support of Children in Need.

Week beginning Monday 12 November

Qualified to coach football at full international level
Mr Horne, the school's Director of Football, was presented with the UEFA Pro-Licence at the FAW Awards Ceremony held this week at the Millennium Stadium, Cardiff.

In the photo, from left to right
Adrian Heath (ex Everton and England), Mr Horne, Kevin Russell (ex Wrexham) and Dean Saunders (ex Liverpool and Wales, now Wales National Team Coach)

Football selection
Andrew Dyne (U6SD) has been selected to play in the Cheshire Schools' FA Under 18 A team against Lancashire School's FA.

Hockey champions
Our girls' hockey teams won both the U19 and U16 Cheshire Outdoor Hockey Tournaments. Both teams are through to the Cheshire finals in March. Read the full match reports on the hockey results page.

The girls' U14 team were finalists against Bishop Heber in the National Schools Tournament Cheshire Round. At the final whistle the score was 0-0, but unfortunately Heber came out winners on penalty flicks.

Week beginning Monday 5 November

CCF Orienteering Championships
A boys' team and a girls' team took part in the National Orienteering Championships at Warcop Training Camp in Cumbria. The overall captain of the teams was Sergeant Justin Witter (L6KS).  All our cadets performed well and the girls' team won their competition.

Week beginning Monday 29 October

Hockey and football selections
Annabelle Church (4JH), Katie Saunders (4SR), Georgia Andrews (3TK), Millie Johnson (3TK), Kate Coppack (3JM), Alice Plews (5PN), Siobhan Barnard (4SR) and Hannah Porter (3JM) have all been selected for the Cheshire girls' hockey sides. Sarah Underhill (L6RP) has been selected for the Wales under-18 squad. Sean Boyd (U6LB) and Andrew Dyne (U6SD) played in Cheshire schools' FA under-18 teams.

Chester and District Cross Country Championships
Forty King's boys and girls represented the school in the four age group competitions. The best boys' performances were from Peter Boothroyd and Cameron Thompson (Removes); Harry Ashworth and James Barnard (Shells); James Ellis and George Cope (fourth form); and Ben Cooke, Oli Greening and Guy Coward (sixth form). All of these qualify to run in the County Championships in the new year. The best girls' performances were from Sara Ashworth (Removes), who won her event; Jessie Lee (Shells); and Kate Coppack (third form).

Week beginning Monday 15 October

Rugby star in the making?
Alex Caldwell (3TK) has been accepted for the North Midlands Rugby Academy and will attend his first training session during half term at Worcester Warriors Rugby Club. This is a tremendous achievement as over 400 players were originally invited to the first trial and North Midlands have selected only 20 players from the second trial. These are players that they believe have some outstanding potential. This will provide Alex with an opportunity to play rugby at a very high level and possibly even lead to regional representational rugby.

The North Midlands region covers the six areas of Shropshire, Staffordshire, Herefordshire, Warwickshire, Birmingham and the Black Country. The purpose of the academy is take players at a Junior level that show particular skill sets and coach them to a higher level with a view to playing a representational level.

Rowing Club at Boston (USA), Head of the Charles
This is the largest two-day rowing event in the world with 7,500 rwoers competing in 55 events. The race is rowed over 3 miles of the River Charles, starting at Boston University boat house.

Model United Nations
Fourteen sixth form students attended a two-day Model UN Conference at Cheadle Hulme School. Our students were representing Poland, Argentina and Venezuela, debating various issues - from child soldiers to deforestation. Throughout the day our students proved themselves to be capable debaters. Tom Lydon and Adrian Tickridge-Day achieved "commended delegate" status from the organisers of the event.

Physics Olympics
On Saturday 13th October King's sent a team consisting of Leo Scott, Oli Greening, James Nichols and Jacob Newman (all U6th) to the annual Liverpool Physics Olympics held in the Physics department of the University. Twenty one teams from all over the North west took part.

Over the day five practical events are held with a challenging theoretical test running concurrently.

King's came first in the test to estimate the height of one of the moon's mountains from the size of the shadow cast by the sun, coming within 100metres of the correct height of 2000 metres.

They came third in another of the tests but the sweetest moment came in pushing one school into second place, that had blatantly cheated, in the theoretical Fermi quiz. It is not the first time this has happened but I think it says a lot for the calibre of the King's team when they are better than a team of five that included their teacher!

The overall winners were a team from Calday Grange from the Wirral; they were consistently good despite not winning an event. King's suffered due to one very poor event but they should feel very proud of their overall second place.

ISFA Cup Draws
Boodles ISFA U18 Cup: The 1st XI will play The Grange, Hartford, at home on Wednesday, 14 November, kick-off 2.15pm.

Rensburg-Sheppards U13 ISFA Cup: The Under 13XI will play either Hulme GS, Oldham, or QEGS, Blackburn, at home on Tuesday 6 November, kick-off 3pm subject to confirmation with our opponents. Congratulations to both teams on reaching the last 16 of each competition.

Week beginning Monday 8 October

British Heart Foundation Junior Golf Championship
The school team, consisting of James Lightfoot, Joshua Rudge and Michael Brockbank, took fourth place in the national final which was held at The Belfry. The winning team from Peacehaven Community School in Sussex scored 81 Stableford points. The King's team were only 3 points behind, with the most consistent set of scores. James, Joshua and Michael scored 38, 37, and 40 points, respectively. Joshua had an individual success, winning the Longest Drive competition. The competition as a whole was a great success. 5,517 players from 1,839 teams across the UK took part and raised a record total of £298,961 for the fight against heart disease.

Week beginning Monday 1 October

Art successes
In July last school year, the art department entered pupils' work into two very different competitions.

The first was for local schools to produce a design suitable for Chester cathedral's official Christmas card. This was won by King's pupil, Eleanor Bunting. The card will be used by the cathedral and posted all over the world this Christmas. It will be available to buy from the cathedral shop, too.

The second competition has also given us some exiting news. ‘Doodle 4 Google' is open to all UK schools and the brief is quite demanding. Entrants have to design a variation of the ‘Google' logo and this year the theme is ‘My Future'.

Ben Cuffin-Munday's design has been chosen as a regional finalist: an achievement in itself considering there were well over 68,000 entries! We await the judges' decision to see if his design gets through to the next round.

Week beginning Monday 1 October

Chess champion
Davin Menon (ShJK) took part in the Leicestershire U14 Junior Chess Championship at the weekend. There were seven rounds, each game being allocated one hour for play. Davin scored five points out of a maximum of seven, allowing him to tie for first place with two other players.

Success in the ISFA U16 trials
Following nominations by our staff several King's students took part in the trials for the ISFA North U16 team. The trials were held at the weekend and were deemed by the organisers to have been a success. The standard of the boys who were nominated was extremely high. No fewer than four students from King's - Andrew Leach, Richard Sissons, Marcus Torr and Tom Pearson-Jones - have been selected for the squad to play for the ISFA North team on 14 October.

Week beginning Monday 24 September

Chester Literature Festival (www.chesterlitfest.org.uk) - Sir Ranulph Fiennes
Sir Ranulph is to give a presentation at the school on Thursday 25th October 2007 (during half-term) at 3.00pm. Please note that tickets, priced at £6.00 (£5.00 concessions), should be ordered from Chester Racecourse (tel number 01244 304 618)  and NOT from The King's School.

Hailed by the Guinness Book of Records as 'our greatest living explorer', adventurer, traveller and author Sir Ranulph Fiennes talks about his new book Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know. The story of an extraordinary life, it includes tales of the most dangerous places on Earth, the ravages of frostbite and close shaves with death. Raising millions for charity along the way, this soldier, athlete, explorer and bestselling author also nearly replaced Sean Connery as James Bond...

Week beginning Monday 17 September

Mr Turvey and his wife at his farewell reception
Four fine musicians were invited to play in the luxurious surroundings of Carden Park Hotel at a dinner held by the governors to mark Mr. Turvey's retirement from King's. Tatsuhiro Nomaguchi, Hiroshi Amako (Violins), Michael Lumb (Viola), Miriam Bowen (Cello) performed a number of light classical pieces during the drinks reception, which was enjoyed by everyone present.

We would like to wish Mr. Turvey a long and happy retirement.

Summer sporting successes
James Lightfoot, Joshua Rudge and Michel Brockbank took second place in the regional final of the British Heart Foundation Junior Golf Championship at eaton Golf Club. In so doing they have qualified to play in the national final to be held at The Belfry Golf Club on 1 October.

The under-15 girls' tennis team won the Chester and District Tournament during the last week of the Summer term. They beat teams from Upton HS and Bishop's HS to win their age group convincingly. Team members are Kate Phillipson, Amy Bellis (captain), Kathryn Williams and Siobhan Barnard.

Duke of Edinburgh Awards
Silver awards have been achieved by Tsubasa Sato and George Kiff. Bronze awards have been achieved by Charles Barry, Aditya Kasliwal, Oliver McLoughlin, Ian Britton, David Richardson, Oliver Greening, Ben Cooke and Michael Thorp. All of these students are members of the sixth form.

Week beginning Monday 10 September

Visit from Duncan Goose
Duncan Goose, founder of the charity Global Ethics and winner in the 'Campaigner' category of Greatest Living Britons 2007, will address the whole school at assembly this Wednesday.

Duncan set up Global Ethics in 2004, with the main aim of raising funds for projects in developing countries. The first step was to launch a bottled water brand called One which donates 100% of its profits to fund the development of unique roundabout-powered PlayPump water pumping systems in Africa.

Students of Business Studies and Economics from Years 10 to 13 will have an hour long session with Duncan to explore some of the issues surrounding global ethics and enterprise. According to this entrepreneur, to turn your dream of running a business into reality you need the three Ps - passion, persuasion and patience. And he definitely has plenty of each. The 38-year-old gave up his job as the director of a marketing agency in London to launch a brand of bottled water with a difference.

Useful images/videos can be found at:
http://www.onewater.org.uk/
http://www.onewater.org.uk/popup_one_ad.html
http://www.onewater.org.uk/popup_greatest_briton.html

Chemistry research
Alex White (U6DY) was highly commended by his project leader for his summer project on "Synthesis and Catalytic Behaviour of Layered Double Hydroxides". The four-week project was undertaked at the University of Liverpool Chemistry Department during the summer holidays. He has been recommended for a British Association for the Advancement of Science Crest Gold Award.

L6 induction and leadership/teambuilding course - photos of some of the activities

If for any reason you can't find what you are looking for have a look in our alphabetical list, or contact us on the following email: info@kingschester.co.uk