This week's maiing is:
Letters:
- To all parents – Provision of Counselling
- To parents of Third Year boys – Parents' Evening
- To parents of Fifth Year boys – Applying to Oxbridge invitation from SHSK, Free Seminar and progamme
- To parents of Fifth Year boys – Letter from Middle Master
- To parents of Fifth Year boys – Preference for Sixth Form Subjects
Notices:
Sixth Form Curriculum from September 2015
As was announced to 5th year parents during the parents' evening on Monday, national changes to A Level qualifications have resulted in all schools needing to rethink their Sixth Form Curriculums. Abingdon has decided on its pattern and will be offering two-year linear A Levels and/or pre-U qualifications from September 2015. The full detail is available here.
For Lower Sixth boys and their parents: UCAS
UCAS1: Introduction to the university application process: Friday 27 February 2015, 7pm, Amey Theatre. This is an important opportunity for boys and their parents to be introduced by experts to some of the key features of university application and admissions processes.
Programme:
7pm: Katherine Pagett, Undergraduate Recruitment Officer, Birmingham University will give an overview of the application process from a university admissions perspective (Amey Theatre);
7.45-8.00pm: refreshments (Amey foyer);
8pm-8.45pm: Boys and parents choose to attend EITHER Caitriona Woolhouse, Head of Student Recruitment at Oxford University, and Dr Bernard Randall, a Director of Studies at Christ’s College, Cambridge, will identify the particular issues involved in an application to Oxford or Cambridge universities (Amey Theatre) OR Question and Answer: a panel of current Upper Sixth boys will talk about their own experiences of university applications (Ingham Room).
Parking on evening of Friday 6 February: ASPA Quiz (7.30pm for 8pm, CMR and Dining Hall) and Les Miserables (7pm)
Parents and other visitors may need to seek alternative parking off the School campus as Les Mis is sold out. As usual on a Friday evening the coach park will be filled by those using the Sports Centre.
Trip to Moldova
A few places are still available on this summer's trip to Moldova (6-16 July) where we will be working with our partner charity, Agape, to organise summer camps for Moldovan children based in Ialoveni in Moldova and Lacu Rosu in Romania. The trip is open to any boy in the fifth or sixth form. Please contact Mr Jenkins ([email protected]) as soon as possible if you would like further details.
French Exchange 2015
We are looking for host families for 3 French students who will be with us from Sunday 8 to Sunday 15 March 2015. If you can help, please email Jane Mansfield, [email protected].
Music
Next week is a busy one for our musicians with Les Misérables in full swing. However, the opening night (Wednesday) coincides with a rather special concert in the Holywell Music Room, Oxford at 7.15pm. The World Cancer Day Gala Concert includes contributions from young musicians from a number of local schools – Abingdon, Cokethorpe, Headington and MCS. Our musicians will be playing solo music by Chopin and Ravel and a Saint Saëns piano trio. Please contact [email protected] ifyou would like to reserve tickets priced at the concessionary price of £3 or (£5, at the door).
Open Public Lecture, free admission – Professor Frank Close: Half Life, the Divided Life of Bruno Pontecorvo Physicist or Spy, www.abingdon.org.uk/frankclosetalk: Wednesday 4 March, 7pm
On the eve of the publication of his new book, Professor Frank Close will reveal his discoveries about the atomic scientist Bruno Pontecovo who disappeared from Britain just as his son Gil was about to start his second year at Abingdon. What nuclear secrets did he take with him; was there an MI5 mole at the School, what role did Kim Philby play? When Frank Close last spoke at the School in October 2013 he was still searching for facts – this time he has some answers.
Frank Close, Professor of Physics at the University of Oxford, was formerly Head of the Theoretical Physics Division at Rutherford Appleton Laboratory and Head of Communications at CERN. After the talk, he will sign copies of his book, which will be on sale in the Amey Theatre foyer. Wednesday 4 March, 7 pm Amey Theatre. All welcome – including friends and members of the public. This is a ticketless event, admission free. To reserve a place and for enquiries email: [email protected]
