13 October

The highlight of last week was the Endeavour & Invincible House Charity Day that took place on Friday and which supported the UN Refugee Agency.  Our charitable nature is extremely important to us; seeing the entire school community work together to support the specific charities that we choose each year is very special.  A number of events took place during the day to raise money and awareness for the charity.  The main event in the Big Hall at lunchtime saw staff and students re-enact an episode of the classic TV programme Blind Date and at break time staff sang through the tannoy system of the School in ‘Tannoy Karaoke’.  Good fun was had by all.  Many, many thanks to the students who organised the day, and thank you to everyone who contributed and took part in the day raising a total of £1900 for the charity.  Continuing the charity theme, on Friday we received a letter from Comic Relief giving us some very pleasing news.  Maidstone Grammar School was one of their biggest fundraising schools for Sport Relief 2014. Out of over 10,000 schools that raised money, we were in the top 1500. This is an incredible achievement; well done and thank you so much.
Last week the School, in fact our catering company Independent Catering received some excellent news.  They received a spot check inspection from Environmental Heath and I am pleased to say achieved a Level 5 Certificate, the highest level that can be awarded.  Congratulations to the entire team.  We are very proud of our catering team who feed the students incredibly well each day and who receive so many positive comments on the quality and quantity of what they serve.

Also last week MGS took part in the UK Youth Parliament election, there to give young people a voice on issues that matter to them in order to determine what is debated by the UKYP in the House of Commons. All students were invited to vote on an issue that was important to them and out of the 605 votes that were cast, MGS students voted mainly for the ‘living wage’ and also for a ‘curriculum to prepare us for life.’ If these are one of the top three nationally then these will be debated by youth representatives in the House of Commons next month.

The School saw some very impressive sport results in the week.  The 1^st and 2^nd XI Football Squads beat Bishop Justus 6 – 1 and Hayes Grammar School 7 – 1 respectively in the Kent Cup, the Year 10 and 8 boys beat Tunbridge Wells Grammar School 5 – 1 and Dover Grammar School 6 – 1 respectively in the English Schools Cup, and in rugby the U15 squad beat Dartford Grammar School in the Kent Cup 26 – 21.  These results are fantastic and all the boys and staff involved should be extremely proud of themselves.  Well done.  Continuing with sport, Finn Warner of Year 13 was selected for the Kent U18 Rugby squad and was selected as a starting player, for their first game on Sunday. His brother Kit Warner has also been selected for the Kent U 14 rugby squad.  Well done to the Warner brothers.
A busy week.