New Headteacher
We welcome our new Headteacher this term. Mr Simon Bird was Deputy Head at King Henry VIII School in Coventry for 5 years and before that he was Assistant Head at King Edward VI Five Ways School in Birmingham.
Exam Success
At GCSE 92% of all grades were at A* to C and 97% of all students achieved 5 GCSEs including English and Maths. Over 50% of all students achieved 5 or more A* grades. At A Level we enjoyed a 98% pass rate and 50% of all grades awarded were A* to B. All of these results point to great progress year on year and an upward trend in achievement.
Academic Success
HGS continues to raise its levels of attainment and achievement with the SSAT grading “Outstanding Student Progress” for 2011 and 2010. This puts HGS in the top 10% of all schools nationally. This is a great achievement for all our Staff, Students’ and Parents’.
Summer Soiree
Wednesday 18th July 6:30pm
A quick reminder that the Summer concert is fast approaching. It will take place on the school site and will include the first performance of the new fifth verse of the school song.
Tickets are available from the school finance office and are priced at £3.00 for adults and £1.00 for children (16 and under). Show your ticket to receive a drink and some light refreshments. So come and join us to celebrate the 150th year of the school.
Non-uniform Day
Handsworth Grammar School will be having a non-uniform day
in aid of Parkinson’s Disease and Multiple Sclerosis
on
Monday 16th July, 2012
Staff and Students are asked to donate £2 to come in non-uniform
HGS School Song
Brief background to the song.
The School Song was first sung in the 1950s, with words by the then Head Teacher J. J. Walton and music composed by B. L. Page. There are four verses followed by a chorus (the original lyrics can be found below). Most of Handsworth Grammar School’s current pupils, and those who have left in the last few years, will be unfamiliar with the School Song. Equally, there will be some of you reading this who recognise the School Song and can recite a few lines or more (including some of the ‘alternative’ words that boys in the past slipped in). Whether you know the song or not, I hope you will join in the selection of a new fifth verse.
Why a new verse?
As part of the 150th Anniversary of HGS we decided to create a competition for all year 7 pupils. Their task was to create a new fifth verse that could continue, or build upon, the original 4 verses. There were more than 20 submitted and these have been narrowed down to 5. The selection of the new fifth verse rests in yours hands!
The closing date for voting will be the 1st July 2012.
Good luck choosing.
M Ward
Head of Music
Rotary Shoebox Appeal
The Rotary Shoebox Appeal in the run up to Christmas was a great success. The Rotary Shoebox Appeal was set up in 1994 to provide children of Lasi in north-east Romania with Christmas gifts. Since then, the scheme has become a national project supported not only by Rotary Clubs but by individuals, schools, companies and churches. Gifts are now sent out throughout the year to many different countries in Central and Eastern Europe to to disadvantaged families and individuals of all ages.
Many students from different year groups brought along very thoughtful and exciting gifts to put into their shoeboxes. A big thank you to all who brought in gifts for the Appeal and to those who bought raffle tickets to help raise money for the boxes to be shipped – a total of £90 was raised. Members of 10 Henry and 13 Newton drew the tickets and the first prize of a non-uniform day was won by Harkeerat and his form 13 Pascal. The runner-up was Mohammed in 13 Euclid who won a big box of chocolates. All shoeboxes have now been packed and are ready for shipment. Thank you to members of 13 Newton who assisted in the sorting and packing of the shoeboxes and, in particular, to Simrat for his consistent effort over the different stages of collection and sorting processes.
Once again, a big thank you to all who participated and an extended word of thanks to parents, staff, family members and friends who donated gifts for the Appeal.
Ms Forth and Mr Kleczkowski
Old Boys Dinner
The Bridge Trust Old Boys’ Society Annual dinner will be held in the Pennington Suite at the Hawthorns on Saturday 17 March 2012 at 7 pm. The cost is £32 per person
The speakers will be John Loarridge a former teacher and David Fulwood ex Special Branch who will be recounting stores about the exploits of the criminal fraternity and the police’s attempts to deal with them.
Year 9 Physics ‘Big Quiz’
The Year 9 Physics ‘Big Quiz’, which took place in the Great Hall of Birmingham University, an expansive room that boasts a wooden floor and the motto and crest of the University emblazoned in the roof, was an engaging and interactive event and one that I would gladly participate in again. The quiz had three multiple-choice sections where we had to choose a, b, c or d which each corresponded to an answer on the board, and we also had three written answer rounds which total up to six rounds. There were five regular rounds covering the main topic of Physics, and a specialist round concerning Nobel prize winners in Physics. At the start of the day – around 10.15 – we had a word search to complete between our groups. Although we worked quickly and effectively, we only came second and therefore did not win the spot prizes (a hotwires set for each of the members in the winning team). After we had finished the wordsearch, there was a refreshment break where we were each handed a chocolate bar and a drink. There was also a short speech from Dr. David Evans about the quiz rules. At 10.45, we completed rounds 1 to 3, with each round focusing on a different topic in Physics. After the first three rounds we had half an hour for lunch which was swiftly followed by a keynote lecture from Dr. David Evans who is one the UKs leading scientists working on the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. The lecture focused on telling us about how a man called Peter Higgs thought of the question: “What is mass?” Although most of us associate mass with weight, they are two very different things. The lecture informed us of this and told us how a hypothetical, invisible field resides over everything and when a particle passes through that field it creates a dip, the more mass the particle has got the more of a dip it has. Dr. Evans and his team are on a search for the Higgs’ Boson which would prove Peter Higgs’ theory correct, but so far their attempts have failed to discover anything and the hypothetical particle is still proving itself to be elusive. After the lecture we completed three more rounds and the prize giving ceremony finally arrived. Although we did not come in the top 3 we still did considerably well when you take into account the fact that we came 13th out of over 90 schools. So, overall, it was a very enjoyable day and I would highly recommend it to anyone who is lucky enough to be offered a place.
Zeshan, Year 9
