Sandringham School was strongly represented at St.Albans Tennis Club’s annual singles championships on the last Sunday in September. Students from Year 7-13 made it to finals day and needed to battle, not only against their opponents, but also the blustery conditions! 

Remarkably, all three siblings in two families were represented in the finals! The 16U and 18U boys finals were both an all-Sandringham Year 11 affair with Angus taking on George in the 16U final then facing Ivan in the 18U final. Congratulations go to Harrison (12U), Marelie (18U), Angus (16U), and Ivan (18U) who were victorious in their junior events, and Andre in Year 13 for winning the men’s final.

If you would like your son/daughter featured in the Student Spotlight, please send a short article along with any photographs to admin@sandringham.herts.sch.uk

Parents should be aware of a potentially very harmful product which appears to be deliberately aimed at young people of school age due to the nature of its packaging and presentation, and the fact that it appears to be available for sale online and in some off-licences at a cheap price.   This product may be branded as a 'stoner patch' or described as 'edible weed sweets.' There appear to be no laws against selling these products (although the packaging says to keep away from under 21s) and as such, there is no action the Police can subsequently take with shops selling these. This product can have the appearance of jellied sweets and the perception may be that they can be taken without any major repercussions.  However, we have been advised that this product contains one of marijuana’s active ingredients, THC (delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol), and that consuming these 'sweets'  can make some young people very unwell, to the extent where they may need to be hospitalised.  

We are not aware of the product having been on site but include some images of the packaging below and would encourage families to discuss the potential dangers with their children.

Find out more about existing vacancies here:

https://sandringham.herts.sch.uk/vacancies/

House Points: Austen have edged in front this week with a fantastic 949 House Points. Elgar and Fawcett are not far behind.

Tutor (Group) of the week = Mr Mauldridge (10S) Well done for your 10/10 on last week’s quiz, the only tutor group in the school to achieve this! Mr Cracknell will pay you a visit at the start of next week with the House Cup!

Year group of the week = Year 10 Well done to Mr Boak and his Y10 team for their 100% return rate on the House Quiz last week.

House of the week = Newton Well done to Newton who had the biggest leap last week of 321 points from their House Quiz input and the Y8 Inter-house Sport. 

A further write up of the Inter-House Sport is in the PE News and watch this space for more fun House events planned!

I8, in the Mathematics Block, is named after Florence Nightingale whom we believe showed Resilience not only in her pursuit of following her dreams of becoming a nurse but also through the changes she implemented in the places she worked.

Nightingale was born on the 2nd May 1820 in Florence, Italy and from an early age wanted to pursue a career in nursing. When she told her parents about these ambitions, her parents forbade her as the expectation of a young lady of a wealthy social stature in the Victorian Era (like Nightingale) was to marry a man of means.

Her father finally allowed Florence to study nursing at a Christian school for women in Germany and by 1853 she was running a women's hospital in London. In 1854 she led a team of nurses revolutionising the way hospitals were used in the Crimean War and became known as "The Lady with the Lamp" for her nightly visits to patients.

In 1883 she was awarded the Royal Red Cross by Queen Victoria in 1883. She also became the first lady to be awarded the Order of Merit in 1907 and in 1910, she was awarded the badge of honour of the Norwegian Red Cross Society

“Live life when you have it. Life is a splendid gift – there is nothing small about it. “

During lockdown, Preet Cox organised various initiatives across the district including creative competitions, trails and community window hunts. The group that she founded now has over 2000 members across the district and aims to bring the community together through creativity and inclusion.

Her latest competition is for Black History Month, with the winner receiving a prize in addition to their artwork being included in an article within the Herts Advertiser newspaper.  The competition is free and entries can include artwork, poetry, singing or playing of a musical instrument. Full details can be found on the St Albans Rainbow Trail group if you would like to get involved:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/810803489428718/ 

As Mr Gray mentioned in his headlines, you can now access all of the Sandringham Virtual videos via our website.

https://sandringham.herts.sch.uk/secondary-admissions/

You can also subscribe to our YouTube channel  www.youtube.com/SandringhamYouTube if you like. This will enable us to create and post more live, informative  and exciting content in the future. Many thanks. 

On Sunday 4th October, Jane Barnett, Assistant PD and Teacher of Visual Arts Sandringham School, completed her first Marathon for Youth Talk (a charity specialising in supporting mental health for young people.) Below is the article she has written and link to her fundraising page if this is a charity you would like to support. 

"I had hours of training behind me and felt both fortunate and excited to be able to run the 26.2 miles from St Albans to my childhood home in East Barnet on Sunday 4th October. It was a tough day on many levels and the weather was not kind to the 45,000 runners that took part across the world, pounding the pavements and parks towards the finish line! The critical point at mile 21 had me digging deep to overcome the mental challenges and niggly legs that were starting to creep in. Running what is known as ‘The Greatest Marathon in the World’ was such a privilege, and I am over the moon to have raised over £725 so far for Youth Talk, a local charity which supports young people aged between 13-25 with free counselling sessions. My motivation was to give back, especially for a charity that supports the younger generation. If you would like to donate to this I would hugely appreciate it and the link is below. Thank you!" 

Jane- Youth Talks

We are aware that several of our students in Year 9 and 10 are studying additional languages out of school as native speakers and may be interested in sitting a GCSE later in this academic year. Although the exact timeline and nature of next summer’s exams have yet to be confirmed, we would be grateful if initial expressions of interest could be emailed to mark.nicholls@sandringham.herts.sch.uk stating the student name, tutor group and the language they are studying out of school. A return by Wednesday 14th October would be appreciated. Once we have all the requests, we will work with families to see if we can accommodate the requests. Thank you.

Written by Jacob Head from the Senior Executive team

This week, we have been celebrating Black History Month. Black History Month was established in the UK in 1987 by Akyaaba Addai-Sebo to help combat racism and develop a sense of pride in Black heritage. On top of a student-led assembly, we also collaborated with the student newsletter, The SandPost, to lead the October issue with articles on three important events in Black British history. It has been great to see students develop a wider understanding of their history and current social issues. We encourage you to read The Sandpost to find out more! 

This week, Year 13 students have written and delivered the whole school assembly on the theme of Black History Month. Equality is a topic which our students feel very strongly about, and it is a theme or area which the senior committee have been very keen to promote and work on this year.

The assembly covered the background to Black History Month, why it is important to educate people about black history in the UK and highlighted some significant people in black history, with an outline about their stories. Alongside this, students wrote the October edition of their student newsletter ‘The Sandpost’, which had articles about significant stories in British black history as well as a look at mental health in young people, conflict in Syria and the progress with the Covid-19 vaccine. It is a fantastic read and we would encourage all students to take a look!

Year 12 have been applying for leadership positions on the Senior Leadership Team and the Young Enterprise have entered their first online competition - check out their launch Tiktok video on our Twitter feed @SandSixth.

This week, we have been preparing for a whole school assembly just before half term, focusing on the global climate emergency. One of the best resources and visualisations used to understand the issue can be found here: https://showyourstripes.info/

Created by Professor Ed Hawkin from the University of Reading, each stripe that you can see in the picture above and represents one year and the colour indicates the global average temperature compared to the average over that time period. There is a clear pattern showing the hottest years have all been recorded towards the end of the 20th century and post 2000. This picture has gained a lot of attention around the world, offering a very clear representation of global climate warming. There is now little dispute that climate warming is definitely happening, and that human actions are causing it. In the week of the 19th October, during the assembly focus on this, we will be asking all students and families to consider individual actions to help in the fight against continuing warming. Small actions can definitely make a difference!

Every week the Mathematics Faculty publish a puzzle for you to try. You can find the puzzle in the Sandprint or on the screens around school. For every entry you will receive 1 housepoint, if you answer correctly you will win 2 housepoints and if you are the fastest person to answer the puzzle correctly then you will win 5 housepoints! To enter, simply scan the QR code and fill out the google form.  Good luck

It has been brought to our attention again that some parents are still not adhering to the parking restrictions around Sandringham School. As Mr Gray suggested in his Headlines, please consider walking to school or if that is not possible, please can we ask that you are considerate to local residents when dropping off and collecting your children. This is in order to ensure the safety of everyone. Thank you for your co-operation in this matter. 

We received some impressive entries for the World Class schools essay writing competition. Following much discussion, the panel agreed that submissions from Keerthana Appandairaj, Helena Dawes and Livia Klag-Horne would be entered into the national competition. Freya Barker, Melissa Graham and Bea Kite also received recognition for the quality of their work. Well done to all students who entered!

We are delighted to be a creative hub for The University of Arts London. We host their Future Creatives St Albans sessions for children and young people who love art and would like more opportunity to take part in additional enrichment opportunities in school.

All levels of skill and experience are welcome – from absolute beginners who want to explore their creativity and learn the basics, to seasoned creatives who want to take their work to the next level.

There are free taster sessions and full courses which take place on a mixture of after school weekdays and Saturdays. No two courses are the same, with expert teachers delivering new content and fresh new concepts for every single class. Previous classes have covered everything from punk-inspired weaving and sketching to portrait painting and performance, and there’s plenty more unique sessions in the pipeline. 

Please visit https://www.arts.ac.uk/subjects/fine-art/short-courses/teenagers/future-creatives-st-albans-7-to-11-year-olds for more details

FRENCH: Le mot de la semaine            une aberration

SPANISH: La palabra de la semana      una anormalidad

GERMAN: Das Wort der Woche           die Abweichung

Thinking questions:

• The French and English are very similar. What might the reason for this be?
• This noun is feminine in all 3 languages. English nouns don’t have a masculine/feminine. Why could this be?
• Why is the German word capitalised?

We have been completely overwhelmed by the truly outstanding efforts of all of our artists with Drawing week 2020! Students participated through lesson times and Google meets during the week in order to develop their own personal response to this year’s theme ‘A Climate of Change’. We are currently reviewing and responding to all of the stunning pieces of artwork which have been submitted and will be collating these into a virtual exhibition which will be published in the Sandprint. As a taster of the beautiful work submitted, please see these stunning pieces by Nico C and Lauren D. I would like to thank all of our students for their outstanding participation and to all of the Visual Arts staff for their wonderful teaching to support such a creative range of outcomes.

Performing Arts Club

We have been amazed by the fantastic work from all three clubs so far and can't wait to see what you'll come up with next! There are still spaces left in the Year 9 Drama Club. We'd love to see more of our talented Year 9's take part and learn to develop their characterisation and devising skills outside of their lessons - particularly those students who have opted for module!

Trinity College Cambridge is working with World Class Schools to offer free online masterclasses for Year 11 students. This is an exciting opportunity for mathematics and linguist students who are predicted grades 7-9 and who would like to improve their skills whilst engaging with other like-minded students. They are both year-long programmes via Zoom and provide a chance to build confidence and explore opportunities for further education in the relevant subjects.

Easy As Pi  is a "Women in maths online masterclass programme"  and more details can be accessed here. Easy as Pi

Love languages  is "designed to bring language learning to life and make learning a language exciting for young people." More details can be accessed here Love Languages. 

We hope that you are able to take advantage of this fantastic service.

Free Trial Woodwind Lesson!

We are incredibly lucky to have a fantastic team of instrumental and vocal teachers that come in weekly to teach our students. This week, I would like to introduce you to Laura Bookbinder who is our woodwind expert. If your son or daughter is interested in beginning lessons on the flute, clarinet or saxophone, please click here to register your interest in a free trial lesson. They would be able to meet Laura, see the instruments and try them out to get an idea of whether this is something they would like to pursue. We are very keen to build up our numbers of students learning these instruments. Look out for information about brass instruments soon!

A is for… aberration [noun]

Definition: A departure from what is normal, usual, or expected, typically an unwelcome one.

Example: They described the outbreak of violence in the area as an aberration.

Synonyms: Anomaly, Deviation, Divergence

Antonyms: Normality, Conformity, Averageness

Etymology: ‘Aberrare’ is the Latin root word meaning to stray.

Thank you to all of the Y8 tutors for arranging the Y8s for Wednesday afternoon’s festival of House Sport. It was enjoyable to see so many Y8s participating and excited by, what felt like, a normal afternoon of sport. Well done to Austen for their triumph in the house netball and Elgar’s dramatic penalty shoot-out victory in the football. Future house sports are being planned and we’ll update you on this.

We hope everyone is keeping well. Through October and November we have lots of exiting screenings coming to The SandPit including, Frida Kahlo, Uncle Vanya, Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake and Matthew Bourne’s Cinderella. We look forward to opening our doors again safely and seeing you all again.   

 Following Government guidelines, you must wear a face covering while attending The SandPit Theatre unless you are exempt as stated in these guidelines. If you do not wear a mask you will be refused entry and your ticket will be forfeited. Our café will be during these screenings for drinks and snacks but please note we will only be accepting card payments.

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The box office is open from 11.30am – 3.30pm Monday to Friday. Alternatively, you can call us on 01727 799565 or visit www.sandpittheatre.co.uk

Matthew Bourne’s Cinderella is a thrilling and evocative love story set in London during the Second World War. The internationally acclaimed choreographer’s interpretation of the classic fairy tale has, at its heart, a true war-time romance. A chance meeting results in a magical night for Cinderella and her dashing young RAF pilot, together for just long enough to fall in love before being parted by the horrors of the Blitz. Matthew Bourne’s vivid story telling has never been more heart-stopping and touching and will take the audience into the heart of Prokofiev’s magnificent score. Tickets £13.50/£10

Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake comes to cinemas with a fresh look for the 21st century and is “as bold and beautiful as ever”. This thrilling, audacious and witty production is perhaps still best known for replacing the female corps-de-ballet with a menacing male ensemble, which shattered convention, turned tradition upside down and took the dance world by storm. Collecting over thirty international accolades including an Oliver Award and three Tony’s on Broadway, Matthew Bourne’s powerful interpretation of Tchaikovsky’s beloved tale is still original and still unmissable.  Tickets £13.50/£10

Following its critically acclaimed opening in London earlier this year, Uncle Vanya was abruptly halted as the world went into lockdown. Uncle Vanya’s exquisite ensemble overcome the considerable challenges of working in a global pandemic, returning to the Harold Pinter Theatre to film the ‘perfect’ production, which is currently nominated for four Oliver Awards. Full of tumultuous frustration and hidden passions, but brimming with hope and optimism for the future, Uncle Vanya is a must-see event for our times. Tickets £16/£13

This highly engaging film takes us on a journey through the life of one of the most prevalent female icons: Frida Kahlo. She was a prolific self-portraitist, using the canvas as a mirror through all stages of her turbulent and, at times, tragic life. Guided with interview, commentary, and Frida’s own words, EXHIBITION ON SCREEN uncovers that this, however, was not a life defined by tragedy. Tickets £7/£5