High News 14 December 2018

We are delighted to announce the appointment of Mr Chris Bailey as the new Head of Junior School at Northampton High.  Chris will take up his role in September 2019.

Mr Bailey is currently Co-Head at the British School (Junior School) in the Netherlands is originally from Northamptonshire.  He graduated from Leeds University with an honours degree in Music and completed his postgraduate training at Northampton University. Chris began teaching in Japan where he taught English; he then taught in Hall Meadow Primary School in Kettering, rising to the position of Deputy Head in 2011.  He has taught at the British School in The Hague since 2013.

We are very pleased to confirm that Mrs Petryszak has agreed to remain in her post as Interim Head of Junior School until the end of the summer term, to provide continuity to the girls and colleagues. She and the senior team will be liaising closely with Chris in the next two terms to ensure a smooth handover.

Dr Stringer
Headmistress

Over the course of the last year, staff, students and friends of the school alike have helped celebrate what has been a milestone birthday in the history of Northampton High School. For 140 years, we have been pioneers in girls’ education, giving pupils the best platform possible as they strive to achieve their dreams.

We have celebrated this momentous occasion by holding an array of exciting events, which included our Arts Festival week, our 1878 Reception and our Old Girls’ Association Lunch amongst many others. As our 140^thBirthday year draws to a close, we were delighted to have the chance to hold one last celebratory event with all of our friends – our 140^th Birthday Gala Concert.

Held on Friday 7 December from the beautiful All Saints’ Church in the heart of Northampton, which was historically the spiritual home of the High School, current students and staff collaborated with Orchestra of the Swan, an English professional chamber orchestra of international renown, to produce a spectacular evening of  music. Our students were afforded the wonderful experience to play alongside internationally acclaimed professionals such as David Le Page, Rebecca von Lipinski and James Dutton, to produce some truly breath taking performances that will certainly live long in the memory.

To read more about the event and to view the fantastic photos, please click here

Mr Nash
Marketing and Communications Officer

On Thursday, we were delighted to welcome Tom Percival from BBC Radio Northampton into school to talk all about our recent #Now’sTheTime Conference.

The conference, designed to empower young women to start their working lives with the tools to advance their careers, gain equal pay and to progress without a ceiling, fascinated Tom and his team, and he was keen to share the story on local radio.

We were delighted to be joined by Dr Kimberley Hill from the University of Northampton, who hosted her ‘Bystander Intervention’ workshop at the conference, and she spoke passionately alongside Mrs Cantwell and Sixth Formers Maddie, Emily, Olivia and Ellie.

On Tuesday 11 December, a group of 12 Drama Prefects visited the Age UK Care Centre in Northampton town centre.

We started off with two readings by Charlotte and Sophia. These performances were followed by an adaptation of ‘A Christmas Carol’, in one act which was directed by Jess. We really enjoyed performing for the senior citizens and would love to do it again.

The highlight of our trip was spending time talking to the members of the care home and learning about their fascinating lives. On behalf of all the Drama Prefects we can say we thoroughly enjoyed this experience and hope to visit again soon.

To view more photos from the event, please click here

Abhisri, Alexandra, Anisha, Charlotte, Florence, Jodie and Sophia 

Dance

On Monday, the Northampton High U18 Dance team travelled to Pineapple Studios in London to take part in the GDST Day of Dance.

We took part in two workshops which were run by experienced choreographers such as John Graham, who has worked with celebrities such as Beyonce. He ran the Street workshop and Alice O’Hanlon ran the Lyrical Jazz workshop. They were both amazing and the team learnt so much and improved some of their skills.

The workshops were challenging and fun, and the girls got to meet other dancers from other GDST schools. After a very hard working morning we took part in a showcase of our own dances; all the 19 schools took part and were all very talented.

We would like to thank Mrs Hackett and Miss Sinead for taking us and for choreographing an amazing dance.

Claudia

Hockey

In the last match of the season, the U13A Hockey team faced Princethorpe.

In the first half, we fought very hard and kept the score at 0-0. The second half started with a short corner but sadly we conceded a goal. The final score was 1-0 to Princethorpe. Well played to all the girls and a special mention to Simran who was player of the match. We have had an unlucky season but we now look forward to the netball season.

Isabella

Letters From Father Christmas by J.R.R. Tolkien 

Every December an envelope bearing a stamp from the North Pole would arrive for J.R.R.Tolkien’s children. Inside would be a letter in strange spidery handwriting and a beautiful coloured drawing or some sketches. The letters were from Father Christmas.

They told wonderful tales of life at the North Pole: how all the reindeer got loose and scattered presents all over the place; how the accident-prone Polar Bear climbed the North Pole and fell through the roof of Father Christmas’s house into the dining-room; how he broke the Moon into four pieces and made the Man in it fall into the back garden; how there were wars with the troublesome horde of goblins who lived in the caves beneath the house!

Sometimes the Polar Bear would scrawl a note, and sometimes Ilbereth the Elf would write in his elegant flowing script, adding yet more life and humour to the stories.

Miss Buxton
School Librarian