The Lent Term always starts with the news of how pupils have fared with their applications to Oxford or Cambridge and this year we learned that four Upper Sixth Formers and one Merchistonian had received offers from Oxbridge. Times of excitement and tension are all part of the final year of a young man’s career at Merchiston, especially those who wish to go to university, as we pride ourselves on trying to achieve as high a percentage of first choices of university as possible. So, last year 90% of our applicants attained a place at their university of first choice. In all this, we would not wish to appear academic snobs, and, as ever, what is important is that each young man finds the right way to reach his particular destination. Marion Muetzelfeldt (Director of Studies), Nigel Mortimer and Mike Gill (Academic Management Team) and Chispa Prini-Garcia (Head of Careers) all do their utmost to guide and help the young men through this vital stage of their lives at Merchiston.
 This term’s academic picture has involved many pupils sitting examinations: the Upper Sixth started the term with four weeks of AS and A2 modules (and how salutary it is that the results have already been published!); there were prelims for the AS and Higher candidates, as well as for the whole of the Fifth Form; and the Shell sat internal examinations. We should never forget that academic achievement assumes top priority at Merchiston, in other words developing the mind of every young man and proving that he has a mind with examination results, yet also fostering a sense of passion and inspiration with regard to academic endeavours. I like the fact that examinations give the boys every chance to show us how good they are!
Enlightened Curriculum
You will know that Scotland played such a strong role in the Age of the Enlightenment. There are so many entries in our calendar which epitomise stretching the boys and the young men outside the academic curriculum. Hopefully, no classes at Merchiston are ever ‘run of the mill’ and we see some genuinely inspirational teaching in so many Departments.
 A quick summary of Enlightened Curriculum events reflect their sheer variety; there were 30 in total this term – in other words, three per week – whether this is play trips or History trips and talks. Among our speakers were Professor Strachan, who spoke about the First World War; he is one of the world’s specialists in this field. We also had a talk from Annabel Goldie, leader of the Conservative Party in the Scottish Parliament. There were Engineering talks, Physics talks, field trips, Bag-a-Book Days, the Construction Challenge, the Maths Challenge, the English Speaking Board exams, the Cercle Cinémane, the First Form trip to Paris, the Fourth Form Battlefields trip, the Sixth Form Spanish trip to Malaga, the Physics trip to CERN, the GCSE History trip to Eastern Europe – all these illustrate our approach. And how wonderful it is too to see our J4 and J5 youngsters going on their own trips for they are at the beginning of their exciting educational journey at Merchiston.
|
