THE Spring Equinox is fast approaching, and as it does, the blossoming of flowers is a silent reminder of how fortunate the majority of us are.

We live in comfortable homes, have a plentiful supply of food only a short distance away and a safe community to live in. However, there are still many people who do not have the things that we take for granted, and who are suffering in both the UK and countries abroad.

Therefore, at Lady Lumley’s School, a grand effort is currently being made to raise money for the worthwhile cause of Comic Relief.

A range of sporting activities, live music, quizzes, gunging and baking will take place on Red Nose Day on Friday. To some of the teachers’ dismay, they will be the victims of green sticky gunge being dumped from a bucket onto their heads by small children.

The infamous red noses have been distributed by Year 12 students Harry Kenworthy and Tom Lishman, who have managed to sell nearly all the noses in only a few days.

Other money-spinning activities on Red Nose Day include A-level students participating in a mixed netball match in which the unfortunate males will be trading their shorts for a skirt in an effort to comply with comedic value. The exchange of kits also acts as an incentive for students to pay 50p to spectate.

The sixth form common room has been graced all week with the scent of fresh buns and biscuits as we’ve scraped any of our spare change in order to raise that extra bit of money. Thanks go to the A-level food technology groups who have baked so finely.

Other activities around the school include live music and a teachers versus students quiz.

Our school has opted for a rather unconventional non-uniform day – a choice of either 1980s or Where’s Wally? theme. The school will be full of 1980s Madonna look-a-likes or mullet hair-dos and Where’s Wally wizard whitebeards which will undoubtedly cause laughter from students and staff, alike.

At the end of the week, everyone not only hopes to have raised a large sum of money, but also to have been inspired to do their bit for positive change driven through entertainment.

When we sit on the sofa on Friday and see the grand total steadily rise, it will be good to know that some of the money has come from the efforts that the students and teachers at Lady Lumley’s School have made.

By Sophie Robinson

 

History lessons brought to life by battlefields trip

By Anna Ward-Gow

WHEN the Year 10 history students returned from Lady Lumley’s School’s annual battlefields trip, they brought back with them countless stories and unforgettable memories.

In the space of five days, the young historians took a leap out of the textbook and marched straight into Belgium and France in order to see and experience for themselves the relics of the First World War.

The students experienced each angle of the Great War, from standing inside water-logged trenches to witnessing and standing right beside mass graves of 24,000 soldiers who fought and died in such a brutal way. But it wasn’t just a walk in the trench, the students, in true regimental spirit, were also expected to adopt the harsh regime of the soldiers, which included learning military songs, being awoken at an early hour to the sound of military bagpipes and marching smartly up the Passchendaele road retracing the steps of the men who fought at Ypres.

By travelling throughout the whole Western Front, such names as the Somme and Menin Gate became much more than just words in a book.

The students were able to quantify first-hand the unforgiveable horrors and sacrifice of men that took place almost 100 years ago.

For some in the group, the tragedies of the First World War were brought even closer to home as graves of those who had fought with relatives were discovered at the Essex Farm Cemetery, with its memorial to the West Yorkshire Regiment. Standing by these graves was overwhelming for many.

One student said the moment had “totally changed” them.

This annual trip has certainly become invaluable to the Lady Lumley’s School history department.

The students are taught a great deal more than just facts and figures.

The empathy formed from firsthand experience of the First World War battlefields is not only useful as part of understanding history itself, but also understanding how events such as the First World War have contributed to the shaping of the modern world.

 

AN INTERVIEW with...David Gwilliam, geography teacher

Q: Why did you decide to go into the teaching profession?

A: I seem to have spent my life in education of one sort or another, from coaching climbers to environmental education, as well as the more traditional, so I never really decided, just found that I could do it.

Q: What was it about geography that encouraged you want to study it at university?

A: I could say it was wanting to know how the world works, or to solve the world’s problems, but mostly it was the fact that fieldwork is fantastic fun – even in the driving Lakeland rain. Geography is the only subject that allows you to investigate an enormous range of areas, finding links between them, and then using this knowledge to do something useful, fun or interesting.

Q: What do you enjoy most about geography at Lady Lumley’s?

A: Working with young people and adults who want to find out about the planet, in a great location and introducing others to the world around them.

Q: What hobbies do you pursue in your free time?

A: Outdoor stuff like mountaineering, travelling, riding my mountain bike, climbing and snowboarding.

Q: If you weren’t in the teaching profession, what would you be doing?

A: What I was doing before – and may be again one day – outdoor education.

Q: What are your achievements, both personal and professional?

A: Recently, and in no particular order, passing my mountain leader course after too many years, introducing expeditioning to Lady Lumley’s, running and increasing turnover of two climbing businesses, skydiving, setting up a visitor centre with the Forestry Commission, being a dad, diving in New Zealand, increasing uptake in geography and onwards to university, helping Lady Lumley’s win the CLOtC Secondary Excellence Award in 2011, passing my advanced driving test, flying solo in a glider – will that do?

Q: Where do you see yourself in 10 years’ time?

A: No idea – doing something interesting, I hope.

Q: Who inspires you?

A: Ernest Shackleton.

Q: What is your favourite television programme?

A: Most documentaries, preferably geology or QI, of course.

Q: What are your favourite albums?

A: Pink Floyd – Wish You were Here; Lou Reed – Transformer; James – Goldmother; REM – Automatic for the People and Prodigy – Music for a Jilted Generation.

Q: How would you sum up Lady Lumley’s School?

A: Young people with unrealised potential, working alongside staff who will go the extra mile.

Interview by Tom Wrench