Old Palace 150


The Anniversary Celebrations


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ver the course of the Autumn Term, we have been preparing for


the anniversary celebrations of 2013, when the School will mark the 150th anniversary of the year in which its founder, the Society of the Holy Child Jesus, was gifted the Old Palace. The full programme of events will be published early in the New Year, and will include:


Sunday 13 January: Mass to open the anniversary year (including lunch and pupils’ performances in the Concert Hall)


Sunday 19 May: Thursday 23 May:


The Old Cornelians’ Anniversary Reunion


The Pupils’ Picnic


Sunday 17 November: Mass to close the Anniversary Celebrations


To read regular updates on the anniversary celebrations follow Old Palace 150 on Facebook (www.facebook.com/oldpalace 150).


The new Sixth Form Centre


Preparatory work on the Tower was completed towards the end of the Autumn Term, which allowed the School to progress to the main contract for the refurbishment and alteration of Chapel House to create the new Sixth Form Centre. The work will be carried out in the first six months of 2013 and will be finished by the end of June. Consequently, the Centre will be fully operational from September 2013… excitement is particularly high amongst the current Year 11!


The Anniversary Campaign


The Campaign to raise £500,000 towards the cost of the Sixth Form Centre was launched at a formal dinner on 11 September and fundraising began in earnest two weeks later. The Campaign team has focused its attention on both individual and institutional donors and we are delighted to report that, to date, the sum of £390,000 has been donated or pledged to the Campaign. Thank you to everyone who has participated in the Anniversary Campaign already, including The Friends of Mayfield, who did a fantastic job of organising the Opera Lite fundraising evening in November. If you have pledged your support but have yet to return your donation form, please do so as soon as possible so we can clearly identify the size of funding gap which remains to be bridged. And if you have yet to hear from the Campaign Team, fear not… fundraising continues until August!


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ongratulations to all the girls who performed at the latest Teatime Concert, which took place in the Courtyard on Friday 19 October.


Ten girls from across the School impressed their audience with performances on a variety of musical instruments, as well as two vocal performances.


Fran Collings sang Wolf’s Verborgenheit, and Maria Cook sang Sherman’s Feed the Birds, from the musical Mary Poppins. Grace Valentine gave a very sensitive performance of Andante alla Sicilianafrom Flute Concerto No. 6by Mercadante, while Mary-Rose Beamish impressed the audience with her rendition of Senaillé’s Allegro in D minor on the violin. There were also several accomplished piano performances, and a beautiful version of Sting’s Fields of Goldplayed by Marie-Louise Elsener on the harp.


Director of Music, Peter Collins, commented: “These informal concerts are a wonderful opportunity for girls to get used to performing in front of an audience, in a less intimidating fashion than a formal concert. They are also very good exam practice for all the girls, and it was wonderful to see a great range of pupils performing today. We are very proud of all of them.”


Ms Clarke’s poetry reading was attended by enthusiastic pupils from the School, as well as


members of the local community. During her


visit, she gave an exclusive reading of a new poem, entitled 'Daughter', which she had just written about the five-year-old Welsh schoolgirl, April Jones, who went missing from her home the previous week. Head of English at the School, Mrs Natasha Evans commented, “It was an enormous privilege to welcome Gillian Clarke to Mayfield, and our students greatly appreciated the opportunity to hear her speak about her long career as a poet, and to learn how poetry can be current, and remains relevant to our lives.”


The Agenda/Mayfield International Poetry Festival continued at Mayfield until Sunday 14th October with


literary talks, readings, workshops and art exhibitions provided by an impressive line-up of writers, artists and poets who had travelled from Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Chester and the West Country.


Musical talent entertains over a cup of tea


ational Poet


National Poet for Wales, Gillian Clarke, visited Mayfield on Tuesday 9 October, as part of the School’s inaugural International Poetry Festival, held in conjunction with the respected international poetry journal, Agenda.


POETRY


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