Happy Feast Day to all our staff, students and their families and our governors and those  in the wider St Bon’s community.  

This is  always a special day for us all and this year is no different although obviously different. 

We are still holding a special mass so don’t forget to join us online this year for the live-streamed celebration at 2.30pm today with alumnus Father James McKay from Custom House who always makes these occasions so wonderful.

Please join in with us all if you can, it will be comforting to know we are all together like old times this afternoon for an hour in prayer and celebration In Sanctitate et Doctrina  – In Holiness and Learning.

Our school song sums today up beautifully: “With courage strong and true, we step into the fight, we listen, care and get involved, in the world our mark to make…So let us live to change the world, let us love with  all our heart, To learn the truth, to guide our lives In Sanctitate et Doctrina.”

Have a blessed and safe day whatever you are doing.

St Bonaventure, pray for us.

Mrs Wheatley has successfully completed the charity Place2Be’s ‘Mental Health Champions – School Leader programme’.

She worked with Ms Roddy and the trainer Matthew Audley in identifying and developing the school’s strategic approaches while also reflecting on her own leadership within the frame of positive mental health for the whole school community.

Along with auditing existing mental health and emotional wellbeing activities and identifying priority areas for improvement, Mrs Wheatley developed her knowledge and understanding of child development theories and how they can be applied and understood in a school context.

The trainer said that, of all the participants on the training course, Mrs Wheatley was ‘the revelation’ and that she greatly impressed him with her insight and contributions.

Did you know that with the national Basketball Championships Final being cancelled back in March, St Bon’s has been declared the co-champs by default?

What superb news.

St Bon’s Basketball Coach, Mr Onireti, went on to explain: “I am very pleased to say that St Bon’s are once again national champions or should I say co-champions in both the national schools under 14 boys premier and under 16 premier competition “The unprecedented circumstances we find ourselves in means we are having to share the title with St Aloysius School in the under 14 boys competition and Shoeburyness High School in the under 16 boys premier competition.

“I had every confidence that we would have been crowned overall winners if those matches took place.”

Mr Onireti added: “It has has been a good year for the St Bon’s basketball program, we were able to get two teams to the national finals. This is a tremendous achievement for the school and our boys. Knowing that we are co-champions in both the under 14 and 16 competitions due to Covid19 is special. The efforts that went into getting to the final is what we will be celebrating, I am extremely proud of the teams and our coaching staff who have taken the time out of their busy schedule to help get the teams to the finals. This makes it St Bon’s 15th national title, a tremendous achievement from a school located in one of the most deprived boroughs in the UK.”

Mr McCormack was happy today to welcome back into school three groups of Year 10 boys for lessons.

Maths, Science and RE lessons ran smoothly with more students coming in on Wednesday and Friday.

Students had the chance to have a one to one conversation with a staff member and shared their lockdown experiences. They discussed how they had coped with remote learning and discussed strategies for their future learning.

The school has been specially adapted to deal with the new way of learning with social distancing measures and hand sanitisers in place to ensure the safety of students and staff.

The boys were glad to return to school and many stated that they had missed the day to day life of St Bonaventure’s.

Staff were so happy to see the boys too. It was an emotional day for everyone.

Mr McCormack explained: “Teachers were glad to have more boys coming in to join our existing key worker group that has been within us throughout lockdown in Cardinal Manning Hall. We look forward to more returning over the next few weeks as a school without pupils doesn’t feel right.”

Last week Ms Mehegan and Mr Marius held a ‘Come Dine With Me’ style cookery competition for their Year 8 students during lockdown.

They had an excellent response and 17 boys entered, sending in photos and videos of their signature dishes.

All the entries were unique and impressive with pancakes, brownies, rice dishes, KFC style chicken and curries on the menu. 

Five finalists were chosen with Mr Ward being the Head Judge and he chose Paul Manzon’s chicken katsu curry as the worthy winner.

“We’d like to thank everyone who entered and keeping everyone’s spirits up in these difficult days” added Mr Ward.

Paul’s curry looked delicious and he filmed his step by step guide to the perfect curry very professionally and methodically.

Ms Mehegan was impressed with all the yummy looking entries and reckons our lads could give Gordon Ramsey or Jamie Oliver a run for their money.

Parents have been informed that there is no school for students tomorrow, Friday March 20, 2020. This is due to staff shortages caused by self isolation.

This should give us time to prepare resources and plan how we will operate in the coming weeks.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank the staff at St Bonaventure’s; together we have been working diligently to maintain our usual provision and a sense of routine for all learners. May I also take the opportunity to thank parents and carers for your support and understanding during this unprecedented period of anxiety for us all. Most of all, I would like to thank our wonderful students who, as always, have taken the changing circumstances in their stride. We will miss them, but will remain in regular contact with them.

Thanks for your continued support during these difficult and unusual times.

St Bonaventure, pray for us.

Our Prime Minister has announced this evening that all schools will shut for MOST students on Friday, March 20, 2020.

Schools will have to remain open for children of key workers and vulnerable children from Monday, March 23.

Once more details become available Mr McCormack will work on the organisation of this but it is going to take an immense amount of organisation.

Our thoughts are with Year 11 and Year 13 students who have spent the last two years preparing for exams that will no longer take place.

As soon as more details are known we will endeavour to get them to you.

Two lucky Year 12 students have been selected for the prestigious Sutton Trust US Programme.

This is a programme that allows students from state schools the opportunity to find out what studying at an American university would be like.

This is a fully-funded programme, giving the pair the opportunity to visit the USA and world-class universities, such as Yale and Harvard, in the summer holidays.

The first part of the programme will be a residential trip to Nottingham University where they will meet the other students who have been selected on the programme from throughout the UK.

They had to go through a very rigorous process that saw hundreds of students from throughout the country applying.

We are so proud of them for making it through such a challenging and selective process.