I had the privilege of attending the Buckinghamshire Sports Club lunch at Dorney Lake when Georgia, one of our Year 10s, was presented with her UK Sport SportsAid grant.  As one of the country’s brightest young canoeing stars the cheque was presented to her by Katherine Grainger, 5 times Olympic medallist, including gold at London 2012. Katherine has recently been appointed as Chair of UK Sport and to hear her passion for the value of sport was inspirational, and to receive congratulations for Claires Court’s philosophy of putting sport, along with music and drama, as a central part of what we do was extremely affirming.

Equally affirming, if far more sombre, was to hear Sally and Camilla two our Year 12s give their Auschwitz Project assembly. They had applied for and been awarded places on the Holocaust Educational Trust ‘Lessons from Auschwitz’ Project.  This gave them opportunity to visit Auschwitz and then to return to Claires Court with the mission of enabling young people to understand the human dimensions behind the numbers that are so large that they can lack meaning. They made the point that the survivors of that genocide are becoming far fewer in number, and it is up to the young people of today to be the modern day memory that reminds us a society to never forget the path that hate and intolerance can take us down.

Looking forward on Tuesday our top scientists in Year 8 are off to the Salters Festival of Chemistry, and Year 11 artists and textilists undertake their final pieces for GCSE - good luck to them all. Friday we shall be taking our annual school photograph, so winter uniform is essential.

Exams may be the focus for this term for many but it is a privilege to work in a community that understands and is wedded to the broader objectives of education and learning.

I hope you have a marvellous Bank Holiday weekend.