A Coach's Prayer

The London 2012 Olympic Games are now upon us, we have had the opening ceremony and we're now heading into the serious competition. We all hope that Team GB can bring some success to our shores over the next few weeks in both the Olympics and Paralympics but it's worth reminding ourselves of how each and every person can be a champion, medal winner or not. This Coach's Prayer sums that up perfectly, have a read for yourselves and see what you think...

Build me an athlete, who will be strong enough to know when he is weak and brave enough to face himself when he is afraid, one who will be proud and unbending in honest defeat and humble and gentle in victory.

Build me an athlete whose wishbone will not be where his backbone should be, an athlete who will know You and that to know himself is the foundation stone of knowledge.

Lead him, I pray, not in the path of ease and comfort, but under the stress and spur of difficulties and challenge. Here let him learn to stand up in the storms; here let him learn compassion for those who fall.

Build me an athlete whose heart will be clear, whose goal will be high; an athlete who will master himself before he seeks to master others; one who will learn to laugh, yet never forget how to weep; one who will reach into the future yet never forget the past.

And after all these things are his, add, I pray, enough of a sense of humor, never to take himself too seriously.

Give him humility, so that he may always remember the simplicity of true greatness, the open mind of true wisdom, the meekness of true strength. Then, I, his coach, will dare to whisper, "I have not lived in vain."

Ampleforth Exchange

In June, four students from The English Martyrs School Sixth Form College spent two days living as pupils in Ampleforth College with four of their students, who then returned to spend two days with us. If you’ve never been, Ampleforth is both a monastery and an exclusive boarding school, which offers and educational experience quite different from that of our school. The purpose of the exchange was to give all the students an opportunity to explore the similarities and differences between each school in terms of how they seek to provide an education that is distinctively Catholic. By doing this we hoped that to better understand the nature of Catholic education and identify ways in which each school might learn from the other.

All the students involved thoroughly enjoyed themselves and had a unique educational experience. To quote Angelika:

‘Ampleforth has something very special and different, maybe because of the strong religion. Both are Catholic schools but the feeling is different when you are participate in school and social life in one school and then another.’