Year 13 student Jack Baynes was joined by students from all over England and Wales for an online celebration hosted by St Mary’s University this week.

He was joined on Zoom by his parents, Mrs Parker (his Form tutor) and Mr Lewis. Cardinal Vincent Nichols offered his congratulations to every student that entered entered the competition, including a large number of our Year 13 RS students. They had to plan, prepare and write their essays during the summer when they were working from home. He said a special thank you to all parents who have supported students during this time.

The Vice Chancellor of St Mary’s, Anthony McClaren, spoke about how challenging and difficult the topic of euthanasia was and how students took risks just in taking part.

It was made clear how impressive it was that Jack made the final shortlist and he will be receiving a £20 prize and certificate in school.

Mr Lewis said: “I am incredibly proud of Jack’s achievement. His essay showed a real passion for RS and I know that this award will give him a real boost as he continues his studies this year. Well done to all those who entered this year: Edward Ndow, Anda Lazur, Sumayya Alam, Muhammad Haque and Prince Owoeye. St Mary’s have commented on the very high standard of all entries from the school.”

Our Headteacher,  Mr McCormack, had this message for all Year 11 students who collected their much anticipated GCSE results from school today.

“I am so proud of the achievements of all the boys this year. They have been a wonderful cohort who have faced up to the challenges of this unique year with a sense of purpose and dignity. I am confident that they will take this spirit forward with them, go on to do great things and contribute to the common good.

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.