Lift Up Your Hearts

Esto fidelis usque ad mortem et dabo tibi coronam vitae.

Be faithful even to the point of death and I will give you a Crown of Life (Revelation 2:10)

A Level Results

"Exams are always to be feared since the greatest fool can ask more than the wisest and most learned can answer." Not sure who said that, but it is true. Despite the allure of course work I still think exams are the best way to sort students and assess ability. It's not just that my experience was that I have always done better in exams than in course work, but that life is an exam. One is continually being asked to remember what one has leaned, marshall the material and provide an answer in the time available. That is so whether it is a driver reading the road signs or a Sunday School Teacher answering a child who wants to know who, "if God made the world, made God?" (Have a go at that, please, in the comments without mentioning, for this is an eight year old, Aristotle or Aquinas, while avoiding being simplistic or dismissive since the highly educated, but theologically ignorant, parent is listening to your answer with obvious interest.)

One of the best bits of help and advice I was given for exams (and for life in general) was given to me when I was an undergraduate from Christine Carpenter, who taught me Late Mediaeval History. She took a revision essay I wrote for her to pieces with a few brutal questions. After a difficult hour light dawned in my befuddled mind and I exclaimed "It's simple really." She pounced: "Simple, but not simplistic. Remember the difference. Those who write simplistic essays get a Third; those who write simply are the ones who get a First."

Congratulations therefore to the Haileyburians who sat A levels this year and returned the best ever results for the school. 85% at A-B 93.1% A-C and 99.7% passing. There is a full report on the School website.

Things OHs get up to!

Dom Joly (BF 1981) recently visited Haileybury Almaty. There is a splendid description of his assembly here on the blog of Dan Maurice, a teacher in Almaty.

Dom Joly himself wrote about the experience in the Mail on Sunday. He says that there weren't yellow and blue tickets (for good behaviour) in his day. There were certainly yellow ones for academics, but I think the blue ones for thoughtfulness and politeness beyond what is usually expected may be a relatively recent innovation. He suggests a new verse for the Khazakh Vivat:

The Mongols were a vicious race
Vivat Haileyburia!
They raped and pillaged down to this place
Vivat Haileyburia!

I thought this video of Dom Joly's snail stunt might bring a midweek smile.

Scaffolding

The summer holidays is time for renovations, and Haileybury has sprouted skips and scaffolding.

You may know the old scaffolding joke. The builders thought they had finished and dismantled the scaffolding, but then the house fell down. When the forman was told he was very angry. "How many times have I told you to put the wallpaper up before removing the scaffold?"

Seamus Heaney wrote a poem about scaffolding

Scaffolding

Masons, when they start upon a building,

Are careful to test out the scaffolding;

Make sure that planks won't slip at busy points,

Secure all ladders, tighten bolted joints.

And yet all this comes down when the job's done

Showing off walls of sure and solid stone.

So if, my dear, there sometimes seems to be

Old bridges breaking between you and me

Never fear. We may let the scaffolds fall

Confident that we have built our wall.

The Haileybury Society is all about relationships. I hope that the Society will continue more and more explicitly to recognize that this does not just mean alumni, but includes teachers, parents, non teaching staff and many others who have Haileybury in common.

Railways 2

Following my post on model railways, here is a video of a model railway at Haileybury.

VJ Day

Menu Card for the 1945 OH Dinner at Changi

The sixty fifth anniversary of the end of the war in the Far East us being marked today with what may be the last formal reunions of the so - called "Forgotten Army." Andrew Hambing in his Haileybury in Two World Wars records that William Marley (LeBas 1924) was a liaison officer with General McArthur and was present on the USS Missouri when the surrender was signed. As the POWs began to be able to send news and to return home harrowing stories came to light. There were also some lighter memories. In the midst of the suffering in the notorious Changi Goal Haileyburians from Hertfordshire and from Australia has saved and scraped together rations to hold dinners of the Haileybury Society. Imogen Thomas gives the details in her Haileybury 1806 - 1987. On 21st March 1943 Privates RWL McCall (M 1928), ADA Mosley (he seems not to be in the Haileybury Register) and AS Cassells (Ha 1929), Sgt RH Wade (Ha 1918) had dined on salt fish, rice, bananas and tea. On 18th August 1945 Maj FAH Magee (L 1917) , Capt JC De La Mare (M 1921), Maj J Radford (Tr 1921) and LT Cdr VCF Clark (M 1922) of England, dined with Lt JW Huddlestone and LT WE Smith of Haileybury Australia. Hambling tells us they dined on native beans and dripping. Of these McCall, Wade, Magee, De La Mare, Radford and Clark survived the war. Cassels died at Kuching PoW camp Borneo in July 1945.

Changi by Ronald Searle who was a prisoner there