Admissions Newsletter: Academic News

SPJ/SPS Leadership Conference

In January, representatives from the SPJ and SPS prefect teams came together for the first joint leadership conference. After hearing some thoughts from Mrs Huang, Mr Snowball, SPJ’s Head Boy and SPS’s Captain of School, the 30 participants got to work. In groups they discussed everyday and grander moral dilemmas, the role of the school’s focal character traits (kindness, humility, respect, integrity and resilience) and how they might want to lead by example in these situations. They also worked together to write scenarios that their peers might discuss in future lessons and then created action plans for the two prefect teams based around how they could help further develop the character traits within the school community.

Holocaust Memorial Day

On Tuesday, January 30, St Paul’s School had the privilege of welcoming guest speaker Joan Salter MBE, who shared her childhood experience during the Holocaust. Further details about Joan’s story can be found here. Additionally, the History Society and J Soc were joined by renowned Holocaust Camp survivor and author Ben Midler who gave a talk about his experiences during WW2.

Boys’ Education Workshop with Verulam School

In January, St Paul’s School was visited by five pupils from Verulam Boys’ School.

They met with a small contingent of SPS’s Eighth Formers over lunch to discuss boys’ education, the perceptions people have of it and whether these match up to the realities. Given that both of the schools have “character” as one of three core aspects of their values and mission statement, they also spent time discussing what character means to them and their peers, and its importance in the two schools. Pupils commented on how interesting the discussion was and we look forward to similar, future events as the school continues to deepen and develop its connection with other boys’ schools in the area and around the world.

Annual Psychology Society Trip to Bethlem Museum of the Mind

Earlier in the Spring Term, Eighth Form pupils from the school’s psychology society visited the Bethlem Museum of the Mind. The pupils were introduced to the fascinating history of Bethlem Royal Hospital and how the treatment of patients has changed over the centuries. They were then invited to explore patient records from the hospital’s archives and look at the museum’s exhibitions which include artwork created by service users, ethical dilemmas around sectioning and more.

Oxford University Computing Challenge

In the first round of the Oxford University Computing Challenge, five Paulines secured invitations to the final of which only about 20 students nationally are invited for each age group finals.

In the Elite age group, Haolin and Victor (Eighth Form) qualified, and Haolin scored full marks – one of just seven in the country  to do so. In the Seniors, Fifth and Sixth Formers, Jason, Adavya, Anango all scored full marks – three of the 14 in the country to do so. Additionally, 23 Paulines achieved Distinctions.

Model United Nations Conference.

The sixth Model United Nations conference was held at SPS in the Spring Term – the first as a collaborative event with SPGS.

The conference was attended by 250 students, including delegates from 15 other schools. 20 SPS/SPGS students were responsible for organising and running the event. This involved selecting the topics, writing the briefing packs, chairing the six different committees, supervising the closing event of the conference (a General Assembly debate on a Crisis topic: the discovery of uranium deposits in western Sahara) and working hard to ensure that the event ran smoothly. Teachers from visiting schools commented that their students enjoyed the conference enormously, and the standard of preparation and debate was extremely high.

Safe Cracking

In February, five Lower Eighth pupils – Vedaant, Richard, Jack, Adam and Yohan, accompanied by Mr Swartzentruber and Mr Tretiakov, successfully entered their completed physics and engineering puzzle to the 2024 Safe Cracking competition at Dulwich College. Working down to the wire, the team managed to assemble the complete build in the final hours, learning valuable technical skills and lessons about project management, teamwork and communication, and enjoyed meeting, discussing physics and engineering, and being challenged by expert judges and peers from schools around London and beyond.

German Theatre Festival

The SPS German department was delighted to host our inaugural German Theatre Festival in the Dorfman Theatre in February.

Students from seven schools, including SPS, City of London Boys’ School, City of London Girls School, Graveney School, Woodford High School and Gordon’s School performed extracts from existing or self-devised plays in the German language. The atmosphere was terrific and all the schools brought something new to the table. It was wonderful to see the German language being celebrated in this way, particularly a time when the number of students studying German at A Level is at an all-time low nationally.

At the interval all the students, teachers and judges were able to enjoy an authentic German Abendbrot. Whilst the judges were deliberating, we were all entertained with a virtuosic performance of Wagner’s Romance by Richard (Lower Eighth). Our SPS team, comprising director Nick (Lower Eighth) and actors Sam (Sixth), Charlie (Lower Eighth) and Max (Lower Eighth) were truly exceptional, winning the award for the best interpretation of a text for performance jointly with City of London Boys.

Chemistry Race

In February, five Lower Eighth chemists took part in the Chemistry Race at Cambridge University. Students earned points by solving chemistry problems of increasing difficulty against the clock, running between their work area and the competition moderators who issued further problems only in exchange for correct answers. After two hours of solving chemistry problems six-at-a-time, the team of Stef, Kian, Lachlan, Aneesh and James finished an impressive 35th out of 99 schools, beating some top teams.

Romanian Masters of Mathematics Competition

Haolin (Upper Eighth) received a very strong silver medal from the Romanian Masters of Mathematics in Bucharest, scoring 28 points out of 42. The competition is very similar to the International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) and is held during two consecutive days in which students are given six problems (three on each day). Unofficially, the RMM is thought of as the competition with the hardest problems, harder even than the IMO.

On the first day, Haolin lost only one point, on problem 3, which was the hardest problem of the day, and scored 20 out of 21. On the second day he managed to solve the first problem completely and made little progress on the second, which gave him 8 more points, and with a total of 28 out of 42 his result was the 13th highest among those who were physically present in Bucharest, and 19th highest when online competitors are included. To be precise, there were 6 participants with 28 points, as Haolin, and those positions are therefore shared. Haolin’s result was the second highest in the UK Team and was only two points short of a gold medal.

Fourth Form Languages’ Poetry Competition

The 2024 edition of the Fourth Form Languages’ Poetry Competition took place in March. There was a very impressive audience turnout to hear this year’s participants engage in what has become a much-anticipated annual event. The standard of declamation was very high and the judges were faced with a difficult decision over whom to select for each of the languages. However, the eventual winners and their poems were: for French, Rayaan (Le Cancre); for German, Alex (Mondnacht); for Italian, Noah (Il Lonfo); for Latin, Hoa-Tinh (Aeneid 2.547ff) and for Spanish, James (La Semilla Dorada).

Three pupils invited to IMO training camp

Three pupils were invited by the UK Mathematics Trust to attend a prestigious IMO training camp at Trinity College, Cambridge over the Easter Remedy.

Adavya (Sixth Form), Haolin (Upper Eighth) and Neil (Upper Eighth) all received invitations following their outstanding performances in the British Mathematical Olympiad. Only the top 20 or so school pupils in the whole of the UK are invited, so to have three Paulines at the camp for the second year in a row is exceptional.

Learning How to Build a Start Up

Over 100 students from across SPJ and SPS took part in the ‘How to Build a Start Up’ event which saw venture capitalist and parent James Strabo introducing the concepts of investing in early stage businesses to an eager audience of pupils. We then hosted Questo Founder, Alex Govoreanu, identified by Deloitte as one of the fastest 50 growing start-ups in central Europe. After a remarkable introduction to the world of Questo at lunch break, pupils were then invited to an after-school masterclass directed by Alex to learn more about the secrets of success and how to ensure sustainable growth in the early stages of starting a business.