Parents of Year 6 boys are invited along with their sons to attend our Open Evening on Thursday 13 October at 6pm.

Our Headteacher, Mr Halliwell, will address parents in the Sports’ Hall at the start of the evening. There will then be an opportunity to visit our departments and a chance to meet our staff and students and take part in some fun activities.

Student tour guides will be on hand to answer questions along with the Headboy, Jamie, and the student leadership team. They can see for themselves what makes St Bonaventure’s special.

St Bonaventure’s was founded in 1877 and has the excellent reputation for being a high performing yet caring school where every student is valued and has the chance to reach their potential. Whatever their strength or gift is, we will help develop that at St Bon’s and bring out the best in every student. 

We look forward to seeing you all on 13 October.

For parents who are unable to make the Open Evening there will be three Open Day sessions on 17, 18 and 19 October at 9.30am and 11.30am. They will have the opportunity to see lessons taking place and see how the busy school functions.

Years 7 to 11 had their Celebration of the New Term Mass at St Antony’s Church today, September 9,  in readiness for the start of the autumn term.

Father Bob and Father John Jesus celebrated mass and it was a fantastic way to start the term with lots of singing, prayers and an inspirational homily.

The new Year 7s behaved beautifully and Mr Halliwell  was pleased and commented how well behaved and serene everybody was.

Alumnus and former 6th Form Head Boy Ryan Makuku,  who is now in his second year at Birmingham Uni popped in today, September 8,  to say hi and show us his feature article in ‘Future Leaders Magazine.’

The Magazine highlights Ryan, 19,  from Stratford as one of the best black students in the country. It also features Ryan discussing his experience mentoring. He even  managed to fit in a down the line interview with  a reporter from our local newspaper who have been closely monitoring his progress.

Rightly so, Ryan was proud of his article and wanted to show Mr Halliwell and Mrs Smith the magazine as well as touching base with his old teachers.

He was telling us about his busy student life and his new buddying project he’s devised too for second and third year students that he will be busy overseeing when Uni starts again.

Does he ever sit still? No chance, there is so much to do, so many places to see and so much difference to make to the World. Here at St Bon’s we have faith in Ryan and don’t doubt for one second he won’t fulfill all his dreams and more.

The playground filled up early today with 210 eager, excited boys all looking very smart in their brown blazers and keen to meet their Form teachers.

The students were in for half a day and had assembly and met new chums. Friendships that will last a lifetime were made and there were lots of smiling faces.

At breaktime, Headteacher Mr Halliwell went out into the playground to chat with the boys and check that they were settling in well. He was pleased to report that everyone seemed fine.

Here are a few photos from the playground.

Anxious faces turned into smiles this morning as nervous students started streaming through the gate at school to hear how they had done in their exams.

75 percent of students gained A* – C grades and 98 percent A* – E.
There were many success stories too with students gaining places at universities such as Warwick, Kings, Imperial, Royal Holloway, Loughborough and so on. Teachers were on hand to guide the students through the clearing process too.

Director of 6th Form, Wayne Templeman, was very pleased with the results and said that all the students’ hard work had paid off.

Here are some photos from this morning, as you can see it was an emoji-tional day!

Today, July 15, we celebrate the Feast Day of our patron saint, St Bonaventure.

St. Bonaventure was born in the small town of Bagnoregio inTuscany, Italy in 1221 and received the baptismal name of John. An event that occurred when he was a boy profoundly influenced his life. He had a serious illness and not even his father, who was a physician, believed that he would survive. His mother prayed for the intercession of St. Francis of Assisi, who had been canonized a short time earlier. And John was cured.

At the age of twenty-two, John entered the Franciscan Order and was named Bonaventure. After he made his vows, he was sent to Paris to continue his studies in theology and philosophy. In Paris he became a close friend of St. Thomas Aquinas and received his Doctor of theology degree, together with St. Thomas Aquinas. Like St. Thomas Aquinas, he enjoyed the friendship of the holy King, St. Louis IX.

Known as the Seraphic Doctor because of his burning love for God and his great zeal to do God’s work, St Bonaventure is usually depicted reading and or writing. His symbol is a red Cardinal’s hat.

He taught us that “when we pray, the voice of the heart must be heard more than that proceeding from the mouth.” Wise words indeed.

To celebrate our Feast Day, all staff and students were treated to a cooked breakfast to start off the day. A special celebratory mass will take place too before pupils are dismissed for the summer holidays at 12.25pm.

Message from our Headmaster, Mr Halliwell: 

” As you know, we have been designated as a Teaching School which is a great honour for all associated with St Bonaventure’s. We have now formed our Teaching School Alliance which is the group of Schools and Universities that are committed  to work together to ensure a world class provision  for students, training teachers and established teachers. I am very lucky that brilliant schools and fantastic Headteachers are so enthusiastic about joining our Alliance. We have decided to call  ourselves ‘The Agnus Dei Teaching School Alliance’ which reflects our  Catholic identity. All the establishments in the Alliance are currently Catholic Secondary Schools and Universities. They are:

The Palmer Catholic Academy, Seven Kings

Holy Family, Walthamstow

St Thomas More, Leigh-On-Sea

The Campion School, Upminster

De La Salle, Basildon

St John Payne, Chelmsford

St John’s Special School, Chigwell

New Hall Independent School, Chelmsford

St Benedict’s Catholic College, Colchester

St Mary’s University, Twickenham

New signage has been erected at the entrance to the school on Boleyn Road and on Upton Lane and on the gold wall by reception. 

Agnus Dei translates from Latin as ‘Lamb of God’. This is a title for Jesus that appears in the Gospel of John. It appears at John 1:29, where John the Baptist sees Jesus and exclaims, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” We have adopted the lamb logo which will be used on letter heads and other stationery.

These are exciting times and I am looking forward to be able to develop and influence the next generation of exceptional school teachers, be at the heart of school improvement and support other schools.”