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.’

Year 8 Trip to Mull and Iona

At the start of June Jeremy led a group of our Year 8 students on a trip to Mull and Iona. Here is a short great review of the time spent in the residential centre at Camas and the activities that the group participated in during the trip.
 

New Confirmation Programme

Pentecost Sunday seemed like a good day to launch our all-new confirmation programme! Forty young people gathered at St. Patrick’s to hear what the Holy Spirit might do for them now and throughout the rest of their lives. Called ‘On the 3rd Day’, the programme aims to gather these young people together each month (guess when?) to experience and then reflect on something of faith.

Future meetings will feature Gram Seed, former football hooligan and drug addict whose life was saved by faith, a game of rounders that will explain what the church is (at least that’s what Fr. Adrian reckons) and a trip to The Source, YMT’s monthly youth event. We know that the programme will be great so watch this space for more news!

Exam Stress Busting

Exam season is well under way now, how are you coping with that? Some of you will be sailing through it but a lot of you may be stressed, worried, wondering why others can take it so easily and yet you still find it hard to relax during this time of year.

Anne-Marie and Jeremy are going to take a group of Y11 toY13 students to Ampleforth on Wednesday 30th May to meet Father Terrence for an exam stress-relief trip. Anyone who is interested then get in touch with Anne-Marie asap to book your place!

Film Night

Tonight at The English Martyrs Sixth Form College, we will be showing the movie Karol. This is a full length feature film about the life of Pope John Paul II before his papacy. It is one of the most inspiring films ever made and recommend that if you have nothing else to do tonight you should definitely come along and join us. It begins at 6.30 and will finish at 10.00 (there is an interval)

The certificate of the film is 12 so anyone under 12 are unfortunately not able to come.

See you there!

Year 9 Retreat - Day 2

Here we are, day 2 on the Year 9 Retreat and it is just fantastic. Right now, Cody is talking to us about the parable of the Lost Sheep and the choices that we make in life. Sheep always know the voice of their shepherd and that is our choice to listen to the voice of God calling us and talking to us! Find the good in life even when bad things are thrown at us.

We watched a video reflection about a surfer called Bethany Hamilton who lost her arm after being bitten by a shark but she made a choice to still serve God and use the gift of surfing he has given her even if she has a disability.

Earlier today we played an epic game called Capture the Flag. We all got really muddy and it was loads of fun but it was totally worth it. It was really a brilliant game!