Pupils from our Advanced Higher and Higher English classes visited the Edinburgh International Book Festival at Charlotte Square in Edinburgh recently. The pupils enjoyed listening to three very different authors at the Festival: Melvin Burgess, Taran Matharu and Martin Stewart
The first session was with the Melvin Burgess, an author who is often described as the “godfather” of Young Adult fiction. Melvin talked about his prolific and often controversial writing and read excerpts from his latest novel, ‘The Lost Witch’ .
Mrs Lumsden and Mrs Moore were very excited to meet Mr Burgess at the book signing afterwards. Pupils then enjoyed their lunch and a chance to wander round the bookshops at the Festival.
After lunch, pupils listened to authors Taran Matharu and Martin Stewart, who talked about their writing. Taran started writing online and soon gained a massive readership which led to the publication of his ‘Summoner’ series.
Martin published his first novel “Riverkeep” to great acclaim and recently published his second novel, “The Last Sacrifice”. The pupils and staff were enthralled by his funny (and chilling) reading of excerpts from his latest book.
Everyone greatly enjoyed their visit to the Festival. Many of the authors’ books are available to borrow from the school library now.
We celebrated our pupils at our annual awards ceremony on 20th June 2018. The guest speaker was Dr Michelle Carlin, Senior lecturer in Forensic and Analytical Chemistry at Northumbria University and former pupil of Calderhead High School. Michelle delivered an inspiring speech about her time at Calderhead and her subsequent career, including funny stories about Harry Potter jumpers and her work with the Institut de Recherche Criminelle de la Gendarmerie Nationale (IRCGN) in Paris. We enjoyed wonderful musical performances from our piper, Douglas Pinkerton, and our drummers, Mackenzie Forrest, Morgan Lynch and Caitlyn Paxton. Our junior and senior choirs sang beautifully and there were marvellous solo performances from Carly Ogilvie and Sophie Whyte. Well done to all our award winners with special mention to our Dux, Jade McPhail, and Proxime Accesit, Kayleigh McLean, and to our S6 MVP Team, who won the Head Teacher’s Team of the Year.
Twenty S4-S6 Chemistry and Physics pupils recently made the trip to Geneva for a tour of European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN). After a quick train and tram journey from the airport, the pupils dropped their luggage at the hostel before enjoying ice cream in the glorious sunshine beside Lake Geneva.
The group took advantage of the weather by exploring the sights around the city and took a water taxi across the lake to see the Jet d’Eau.
They then made the short trip over the border to France where they were given a tour of the testing facility and central control centre. Everyone enjoyed a well earned lunch with the scientists at the the CERN restaurant before taking in the Microcosm and Globe of Innovation and Science exhibitions. There was just enough time to take in the Natural History museum the following day before making their way back to the airport to catch the flight home.
Mr Leitch and four senior pupils (Morgan Lynch, Heather McCallum, Kate Sutherland and Elizabeth Gentleman) will be flying out to Malawi next week and are still looking for donations of basic first aid items such as plasters, bandages, antiseptic wipes and sprays, anti bacterial hand gel and so on for first aid kits which can then be distributed to the Girls Go For Health coordinator there.
S3 pupil, Mackenzie, recently won an award in the Under 17s category at the recent Glasgow and West of Scotland Branch of the Royal Scottish Pipe Band Association drumming competition held at Coatbridge High School. Well done, Mackenzie!
