Young Enterprise Success!

Northern Lights, one of Albyn’s Young Enterprise companies have been selected as one of the six finalists in the 2011 Grampian Young Enterprise Final. Competition was tough as sixteen companies submitted their business reports in the first stage of the competition.
Northern Lights organised a team building event at Curl Aberdeen earlier in the term to improve their teamwork- this was a a great idea!

The Final will take place at the Marcliffe Hotel on Wednesday 4th May 2011. Top business entrepreneur and current Dragon of BBC’s Dragons Den, Duncan Bannatyne, will be a special guest judge and speaker at the 2011 Awards. Northern Lights will inform the judging panel of their amazing business experience through a 5 minute presentation and an interview. They will also set up a trade stand for their innovative hot water bottles and covers and will be able to sell to the local business community at a reception in the evening.

The winners of the Grampian Final will go on to represent their area at the Scottish National Finals in Glasgow in June 2011.

Albyn Pupils Take Part In UK Mathematics Trust Team Challenge

On Tuesday 22 March 2011, Emer Cunningham (U2), Findlay Douglas (U2), Skye Arnott (U1) and Alex Scott (U1) represented Albyn in the Aberdeen regional heat of the UKMT Team Challenge in Elphinstone Hall at the University of Aberdeen. They came fifth out of fourteen schools, with teams coming from as far away as Dundee and Lerwick.

They completed a team round (getting an impressive nine out of the ten questions correct), a taxing cross number puzzle, a head to head round and finally a fast paced relay round.

Mrs Prentice said; “They worked extremely well as a team and were a credit to the school”. Well done!

Albyn Pupils Raise Money For The Cyrenians

Senior pupils and staff at Albyn School slept at Transitions on Saturday 26th March 2011 and have raised over £300 for the Cyrenians. They were among 500 people who attended this event from schools and groups around Aberdeen. Many pupils dressed up for the occasion but it was Mrs Findlay, the head of religious education at Albyn, who dressed as a hot water bottle which was the best costume.

Maggs Simpson, the School nurse who also attendee the event, said: “it was good to see so many young people together doing something for a worthy cause.”

The Cyrenians are a charity that provides food, shelter and aims to meet all the varying needs of people affected by homelessness in Aberdeen and the surrounding area. They currently have three care projects; Duty & Advice Service, Violence Against Women Project and the Integrated Drug Service – Community Rehabilitation (IDS -CR).

Crufts

Jill Russell, a senior pupil at Albyn School, along with the Scottish team competed at Crufts earlier this year. The team came 5th out of 12 teams from around the UK and all members went home with a coveted crufts rosette.

Well done Jill!

Mary Gardner

Former pupils and others may be sad to learn of the recent death of Mary Gardner, a former pupil of Albyn School. She was recently killed in the Jerusalem bus bombing.

The eldest of five children, Mary was born in Nairobi, Kenya, but moved to Aberdeenshire when she was 15 where she attended Albyn before studying for an MA in English and French at St Andrew’s University. After graduating she returned to Kenya as a volunteer teacher for two years.

Mary had been working for Wycliffe Bible Translators in Togo, living among the Ifé people for the past 20 years, learning the language, translating the bible and teaching literacy and mathematics.

Cowdray Hall Performance Review

The Cowdray Hall was packed to capacity and beyond for Thursday’s performance by pupils of Albyn School. The School fielded two large choirs for their performance, one senior and one junior, both directed by Laura Jarret whose knowledge of a repertoire that will make youngsters keen to get involved in singing shone through in a performance from both choirs that radiated enthusiasm not just in the sound of powerful committed singing but in the confident smiling faces of everybody taking part.

Jill Gallina is an American composer who along with her husband Michael is involved in composing for schools and colleges to encourage singing among young people. The senior choir which now includes a small contingent of senior boys opened the performance with Jill Gallina’s joyful and exhilarating call to worship, Sing to the Lord with a Joyful Sound. The choir certainly lived up to the title and they followed this with a choral arrangement of Cesar Franck’s Panis Angelicus. Although there are not many senior boys compared with the huge drift of sopranos and altos filling the stage of the Cowdray Hall, they certainly stamped their mark on the performance singing with superb gusto.

Jane Murray provided the piano accompaniments for these pieces but the choir proved their capability in a cappella singing with Thomas Morley’s Do You Not Know? A fascinating arrangement of Pachelbel’s Canon followed with a gloriously lavish piano contribution from Jane Murray and fabulous singing from every section of the choir. This was followed by Alec Rowley’s cheerful arrangement of Bobby Shafto.

There were two solo performances from individual pupils, both of them clarinet players accompanied by Craig McDermott who also lent his singing voice to help boost the male chorus. Victoria Leng gave a fine sinuous performance of Mendelssohn’s Spring Song then, later in the programme Julie Marshall gave an accomplished performance of the Adagio from the Clarinet Concerto Op.36 by Franz Krommer (1759-1831).

The junior choir which also has a fine contingent of boys these days opened their contribution with two songs from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Boy soloists and a duet from two of the girls gave this performance a special lift then in Bob Chilcott’s Can You Hear Me, the singers supplemented the choruses by shadowing the words with sign language, adding a special choreographic element to the performance.

Car Wash by the Motown composer and arranger Norman Whitfield was performed in uninhibited swinging style by the senior choir who followed it with An American Trilogy which was an Elvis favourite once upon a time.

Laura Jarret had persuaded the senior boys to sway along to the music of Something Latin, no mean feat where male teenagers are concerned! The concert concluded with Home which was a hit for Michael Bublé. Although most of the music was on the lighter side, all the arrangements were of sterling quality and the choirs obviously enjoyed singing – something that is a great achievement with any choir but especially with young singers.

Weekend Fixtures

SATURDAY 26 MARCH

L6- U6 HOCKEY FESTIVAL 8.50-10AM MILLTIMBER

L5-7 FOOTBALL MATCH 9.30AM MEET 10AM KO
@ MILLTIMBER V FOREHILL

U2/3’S FOOTBALL FESTIVAL V ST MACHAR @ MILLTIMBER 8.45AM MEET

L3’S FOOTBALL @ MILLTIMBER MEET 09.45AM
L1/2’S FOOTBALL @ MILLTIMBER 11AM

L4’S FOOTBALL V TBC

U1 FOOTBALL v BUCKSBURN @ MILLTIMBER 0845AM MEET

Please remember your sandwiches and cakes for picnic after games. Parents welcome!

Albyn & RGC Invitational Cross Country Championships Results

On Friday 18th March junior and senior pupils from Albyn School competed in the Albyn & RGC Invitational Cross Country Championships. It was a very successful event with over 1600 runners competing throughout the day. Albyn won 5 individual prizes and 6 team prizes – well done!

Individual prizes:

2nd place for Ellie Buchan in the Senior Girls event.
2nd place for Ailsa Duthie in P7 Girls event.
2nd place for Elliot White in S1 Boys event.
3rd place for Poppy Clayton-Littler in the S1 Girls event.
3rd place for Niamh Duthie in P7 Girls event.

Team prizes:

1st place for P7 Girls – Ailsa Duthie, Niamh Duthie, Milly Kinghorn
1st place for S1 Boys – Elliot White, Gregor Dewhirst, Rory McGuckin
2nd place for Senior Girls – Ellie Buchan, Abbie Buchan, Lindsey Young
2nd place for S1 Girls – Poppy Clayton-Littler, Lydia Newman, Eilidh Duthie
3rd place for S3 Girls – Anna Rennie, Esther King, Laura Jack
3rd place for S2 Girls – Rebecca Bews, Gwen Newman, Emer Cunningham

Weekend Fixtures

WEEKEND FIXTURES SATURDAY 19 MARCH

U1-3’S FOOTBALL 9.00-10.15AM @ MILLTIMBER

U2 FOOTBALL 9.00AM FOR 9.30AM KO AGAINST HAZLEHEAD @ MILLTIMBER

L3’S FOOTBALL MEET @ MILLTIMBER 0840AM

L6/7 GAME @ MILLTIMBER MEET @ 0930AM

L4’S FOOTBALL @ CULTS 0845AM MEET

HOCKEY L6-U3’S @ MILLTIMBER 0900-10.15AM

NO SENIOR HOCKEY

NO L1/2 FOOTBALL TRAINING

PLEASE CHECK GAMES MACHINE FOR UPDATED INFORMATION

Albyn School Spring Concert

The Albyn Spring Concert will be held on Monday 28 March 2011 at 7pm in the main school hall.

The groups taking part will be the Elementary and First Orchestras, the Lower School Vocal Ensemble (The Showstoppers), The Upper School Vocal Ensemble, Ceilidh Band, Blues Band, Lower and Upper School Recorder Group, Cantabile and a number of our Certificate pupils.

Tickets are available from Mrs Jarret, Mr McDermott or at the school reception; Adults £5.00 (Conc. £3.50).

Parents can find further details in the music area under the secured areas of the website.