Dean of Studies | Mrs Julie Quinn

Academic Excellence

In Week 1 at assembly, we shared with students the statistics on the number of awards achieved for academic excellence that we will recognise at the Evening of Excellence on Monday 6 November. It was most encouraging to witness the reaction of our students to these most encouraging statistics. At this College Assembly, we also acknowledged publicly the effort and commitment that our teachers make to support and encourage our boys. Names of prize winners were published outside Student Services following this assembly.

Balancing Commitments

Last Saturday, I was invited to speak with the Rowing community about how to manage both a commitment to Rowing and to academics. It was indeed a privilege to speak with a group that was most enthusiastic in seeking ways to ensure that they could achieve their best in both their chosen sport and their studies. We shared past academic results of boys who had rowed which highlighted that boys need to be very organised around their time and their thinking if they wish to succeed in both. We discussed the need to make the classroom the key focus in the whole process of learning, understanding and revising. The challenge and importance of concentrating in class led our community to “play the concentration game”. This “game” involves students timing how long they are thinking only about what the teacher is delivering in the classroom. Many boys are quite surprised when they follow this exercise where their time of concentration is far below their anticipated outcome. The aim of the “game” is to increase the length of time that a student can concentrate for by measuring it until a pattern or habit is formed around a sustained concentration across a full lesson time. My emphasis to the rowers was that when they are involved in their rowing, rowing is their sole focus. Similarly, when in the classroom or doing homework, assignments or revision, their studies is their focus. This message is valid for any activities that our boys are involved in – not just our rowers. Time lost in a classroom means that this time must be compensated for after school along with homework, assignments and revision.

Term 4

As we come to the end of Week 3, I encourage all our boys to be fully committed to their study routines. We need to be at the peak pace that we were at across other terms. As the duration of this term is short, we need to make sure that our outcomes for Term 4 are not compromised due to lack of preparation and poor planning.