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About St Mary’s

Headmistress’s Letter: 8 July 2005

Dear Parents,

I am sure you are all looking forward to a well earned rest over the summer. We were thrilled with the support from parents for our Prizegiving on Tuesday. The girls seemed to enjoy our lively speaker, Anna Hemmings, a world champion canoeist.

Sports Day

We had a very happy Sports Day as usual at the University Sports Ground on 24 June. Congratulations to Ellie Herbert who won the Hope Gilbert Athletics Trophy for her outstanding performances. This year two staff teams, one sixth form team, a parents’ team and a team of German students took part in a hard fought relay race. Congratulations to the German students who won this event after the winning staff team dropped their baton in a handover near to the end of the race!

PTA BBQ and Jazz Concert

It was good to see so many parents at the PTA BBQ and Jazz Concert on the evening of 25 June. The Jazz Band gave a very enjoyable repeat of the performance they had given on the Fantasyland Stage in Disneyland in Paris and the food was excellent. A big thank you to all of the parents on the PTA Committee for all the work they do to support the School and to Marian Pesaran for her very able Chairmanship of the PTA.

Parking

We have had a request from a resident in Panton Street to ask our parents not to double park illegally in Panton Street. This causes inevitable problems for all the residents there.

Goodbye to Staff

I would like to offer my thanks to the following staff using the words from my speech at Prizegiving:

This year we say adios and gratias agimus to Miguel Tatay and Maria Christina Contrino who have worked part–time in the Spanish and Classics departments. We thank them for their hard work and commitment and wish them well for the future. We say thank you to Julia Oldham for her commitment to the English department for the last two terms. Julia suffered the rare fate of being taught chemistry by me when she was young. We say goodbye to Clive Bond, our deputy catering manager, who leaves us at the end of this week. We have enjoyed his food, especially the cakes and bread (he is a Master Baker) and his calm and kindly presence in our dining room. Thank you too to Bev Stoye and Hazel Harris who stepped in help us at short notice this term.

We say goodbye to our patient and long suffering accountant Ian Chamberlain who retires after six years of service under three Bursars. His accounts were always impeccable and his gentle sense of humour and kindness were appreciated by us all on the first floor of the Elms.

We say goodbye to Jenny Mathers who has taught Mathematics and ICT here for 14 years as well as helping the Staff Committee, playing sax in the jazz band and running the dog show. Jenny is an exceptional mathematician, a kind and caring form tutor and teacher as well as a wonderful colleague. Thank you, Jenny, for your enthusiasm, immense hard work and the love that you have given to all of us at St Mary’s.

We say goodbye to Mary Schofield as she leaves her beloved history teaching behind after 18 years of service to us. She has helped part–time this year after retiring as deputy head last year. We thank her for the love of history, especially medieval history, that she has passed on to a so many young historians.

This year Joan Jeans steps down as Head of Art after 30 years of devoted service to the School. In May, we enjoyed a wonderful exhibition of work by 39 GCSE Art pupils which spoke volumes for the enthusiasm for Art that Joan has encouraged here. Joan’s gentle manner and artistic creativity has inspired generations of young artists. We are glad that she will continue part–time when the new Head of Art starts in September. We thank her sincerely for all that she has given to the school.

Thank you and best wishes

The music of Cantore has thrilled us since it began in 2001. Cantore is a choir that welcomes any singers without audition and has grown to 80, meeting after school on Friday evenings. Cantore was the brain child of Aodain Fleming, otherwise our fantastic head of year 7 and RE teacher. Miss Fleming will be stepping down as conductor at the end of this week and we offer our heartfelt thanks to her for this wonderful initiative, for her commitment over the last 4 years and for the many, many moments of inspiration that Cantore have brought us.

We offer our good wishes to YiRu Chiam on her marriage to David Hall in the summer holidays.

I would like to record my thanks to all my staff at the end of this academic year for their hard work and dedication. My thanks too to the parents for all the support you give to us all — it has been great to get to know more of you through my parents’ surgery in the mornings. This will continue next year.

We also say goodbye to those girls leaving us in the U6th, year 11 and a few in other years as well. We wish you all the best for your futures and hope that you will take away very happy memories of your time at St Mary’s.

Wishing you all a happy and restful summer holiday. We look forward to seeing your daughters on Wednesday 7 September to start the new term.
Yours sincerely,

Jayne Triffitt
Headmistress