Clitheroe 422324 (Editorial), 422323 (Advertising), Burnley 422331 (Classified), www.clitheroetoday.co.i Change of venue for ladies’ birthday bash


CELEBRATING its sixth birthday at one of the coun­ try's premier football stadiums


is Ribble Valley Ladies' Lun­ cheon Club. Since its inception, the club has raised a massive £250,000


for research into childhood can­ cers. I t has been no mean feat and


masses of work has been carried out behind the scenes to ensure that every single event has been well attended and raised excep­ tional amounts of money for the luncheon club's charity. This year has seen a change of


venue and the birthday meeting on June 4th is to take place at the new venue, Ewood Park, the


home of Blackburn Rovers Football Club. Catering will be Langho's


Northcote Manor Hotel which has agreed to "adopt" Ribble Valley Ladies' Luncheon Club and has already offered major support. The hotel cannot take the ever increasing number of lun­


cheon club members, so the decision has been taken to hold the luncheons at Ewood Park, where Northcote has been organising the banqueting and catering facilities for the past two years. The Langho hotel will be the venue for some of the club's smaller events during the year.


June's meeting starts at noon


and the speaker will be Dawn Gibbins MBE, one of the coun­ try's top businesswomen. Founder, chairman, and


majority shareholder in Flower- crete Group pic-acknowledged as world leaders in specialist flooring technology, with offices and manufacturing centres in 15


High IQ? Take the test to find out if you might be Mensa material


by Nick Foley


HE has been convicted of trying to cheat his way to the top prize in the TV show “Who Wants To Be A Mil­


lionaire?” and branded “nice but dim.” But disgraced Army major Charles


Ingram — the man who had to ask the audi­ ence to discover that Gail is Audrey’s daughter in “Coronation Street”, then phone a friend to find out that the River Foyle is in Northern Ireland - has an answer for his critics. “I am not thick,” he protested last week. “I


am a member of Mensa, for goodness sake.” Mensa, of course, is the society for bright


sparks and brain boxes that has been proving (and disproving) people’s claims of intellectu­ al superiority since 1946. A unique and highly prestigious club, what


you know - rather than who you know - dic­ tates whether you can join its illustrious mem­ bership list.


Mensa status. Carol Vorderman, the brainy Countdown presenter who has a huge IQ (Intelligence Quotient) of 169, is a member. So too are Mary Archer, Sir Jimmy Savile


Ingram is in good company in boasting


and th a t motor-mouth TV critic Gary Bushell. But how do you go about joining Mensa’s


26,500 UK members? The good news (or the bad news) is that


entry into the society is based entirely on abil­ ity.


The only requirement for joining Mensa is


that an individual’s IQ falls within the top 2% of the population - and that is it. I t does not matter how rich you are or if


you are a pub quiz genius, the only way to get in is to take the society's IQ test, as Caroline


(costing £9.95) which is marked to give them an idea of whether they have a chance of pass­ ing the supervised IQ test.” Applicants who do well on the self-adminis­


Garbett, Mensa’s Communications Manager, explains. "People can opt to take a test at home


trated test are then invited to sit a two-hour IQ test under exam conditions (again costing £9.95) which will determine whether they can join the society’s clever clogs. “The test is broken down into two parts -


at least three years. Caroline, a Mensa member herself, insists


join the Mensa geniuses and anyone who fails to meet the grade is asked not to reapply for


one which tests verbal skills and the other spa­ tial awareness.” A result of at least 98% is then needed to


that most people who take the test are not trying to show off but admits some are trying to prove a point. “We’ve people who didn’t fit into the edu­


puzzle challenge nights to trips down to the pub. TV critic and Mensa member Gary Bushell


says he took the tests purely out of curiosity after seeing an advert in a newspaper. “I t was just a personal achievement. I was­


n’t doing it to prove a point, although I think it surprised Kelvin McKenzie (former editor at the Sun).” But Gary, who joined Mensa in 1989, sus­


normally associate with but they were harm­ less enough,” the journalist says of his fellow Mensans.


But Gary insists the society is not a quirky


cational system or who are without formal qualifications and they do it to prove a level of competence and it also looks good on their CV” For TV presenter Carol Smillie the chance


to prove she was more than just a pretty face proved too much of a temptation and she recently confessed to cheating on a Mensa test. The ex-model, who once sat the tests as


part of a television experiment to prove game show hostesses had both brains and beauty, admitted she got a friend - a Mensa member - to fill in the difficult parts of the form which she did at home several years ago. She said: “Ever since th a t day I have


always be known as someone with a Mensa IQ and I think I ’m quite glad I cheated.” Others are motivated to join Mensa


because of its thriving social scene. Members, who pay an annual fee of £40, regularly organise events which range from lectures and


club for eccentrics, eggheads and egotists and says members come from all walks of life, cul­ tural and economic backgrounds. “We’re quite normal you knowl People seem to think of us as something mysterious but we’re just a society who enjoy doing the same things as everyone else.”


is also reflected in its range of ages. “Our youngest member is five and the old­


The rich diversity of Mensa’s membership


est is over 100 — she didn’t even take the test until she was in her 90s,” says Caroline. But how accurate are the Mensa tests at


measuring our intelligence? Dr Colin Cooper, a senior lecturer in psy­


chology a t Queen’s University, Belfast, believes these tests do reflect how clever we are.


“What we know from nearly 100 years of


research is that it is possible to measure gener­ al intelligence and that an individual’s IQ is fairly easy to measure,” he says. Dr Cooper, who devised the questions for


the BBC’s “Test the Nation” IQ study, says it is extremely unlikely that any gifted geniuses would do badly on IQ tests.


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pects there is a degree of some sort of snob­ bery among many of the people who join Mensa; a bit of old-fashioned one upmanship. “They weren’t the type of people I would


show up in different types of tests. He says intelligence is largely inherited but


nevor had any interest in joining Monsa, lie...confessed to warns that an individual’s IQ only reveals one cheating in a Mensa aspect of a person’s make-up - your personal- test ity, sociability and temperament will only RIGHT: Carol Vor-


But the intelligence expert, who says he has LEFT:Carol Smil- .sk'P®I$Pad“FoJ1 derman...IQ of 1G9


some less than intellectually gifted parents have clever children. “Your genes are randomly selected - only


in boosting and stimulating IQ as a child grows up, says the doctor. But whatever your views are on IQ tests, it


half are identical to your sibling’s genes. You can have unintelligent parents and still get their smart genes.” Environmental factors also play a key role


is getting increasingly difficult to avoid them. I t is now common practice for companies to ask prospective employees to sit a set of spa­ tial awareness and logical thinking tests to judge their suitability for a job. And most secondary schools are now using


so-called cognitive assessment tests which fol­ low a similar format to IQ tests to sort chil­ dren into sets and streams. But Bushell offers a ray of hope to those are


never going to make the Mensa grade. “Intelligence and common sense are two


entirely different things. The ability to do algebra doesn’t mean you’re going to be good at everyday tasks,” he says.


H IF you think you might be Mensa material then why not take the society’s Mini-test? (courtesy of www.mensa.org.uk)


1. Rearrange the letters of DUE CROP to give a word with a similar meaning. What is it?


2. Add together three of the following numbers each time to reach a total of CO. (Numbers can be used more than once.) How many different combinations are there? 2 3 5 10 15 20 25 50


3. Replace the blanks in the following sentence with two five-letter words. The same five let­ ters must be used for both words. What are the words? The BLANK told his class that he had been BLANK fishing during the holiday.


4. What number is missing from the following sequence? 4 9 16 25 ? 49 64 81


5. Assume you are using a basic calculator and press the numbers in order, replacing each question mark with a mathematical sign. Plus, minus, multiply and divide can each be used once only. What is the highest number you can possibly score? 6 ? 2 ? 2 ? 4 ? 2 =


Answers: 1: Produce. 2: Four. (20,20,20) (25,20,15) (25,25,10) (50,5,5) 3: Tutor and trout. 4:36. They are all square numbers. 5:18 using divide, plus, multiply and minus


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