Hampton@Home: June 19, 2020

Welcome to this week’s edition of Hampton@Home, which is the ninth published since the beginning of the e-Hampton era in March.

There has been particular reason to celebrate at Hampton this week as some of our Fourth Year boys returned to our senior school site under the updated Government/Public Health England guidance that applies to their year group. More Fourth Years will be able do the same next week, along with members of our Lower Sixth. It has been wonderfully uplifting to hear echoes of boys’ laughter and happy conversation around at least some of our corridors, on the playing fields and during a socially-distanced lunch in the Dining Hall. As this week closes, it feels that our School community has successfully taken a significant step forward, although one that has only made me anticipate more eagerly than ever the day when all Hamptonians are back here with us.  Let us hope that today’s welcome news of the UK’s Covid-19 alert level being reduced is an indication that boys from all year groups will be permitted to be together on-site when our new School year commences in September.

I know that many of you enjoyed participating in the Hampton vs Sevenoaks ‘virtual’ sporting fixture last weekend and I was pleased to contribute 34.37 km of cycling myself to an impressive (and victorious!) collective effort.  Congratulations to everyone involved and many grateful thanks to Mr Bolton for organising such an engaging event. Hopefully, this will have served as good practice for ‘National School Sport Week at Home’, starting on Monday. The main event during the week is a Borough-wide schools competition on Wednesday, details of which were emailed to you earlier this week. This is open to all pupils, parents and colleagues, so I warmly encourage Hamptonians and their families to join in.

This week’s e-newsletter once again illustrates the remarkable ingenuity, imagination and creativity that our boys are displaying during the extended lockdown period. You can experience some highlights of the Third and Fourth Year Arts Award tutorials to the Lower School, with boys proffering advice on everything from writing a book to producing a hit single. Please also take the opportunity to listen to our young dramatists, who have been working hard throughout the term recording podcasts of Shakespeare’s The Comedy of Errors under Mrs Moore’s expert tutelage. The final outcome is a triumph!

You are sure to enjoy Fifth Year Oskar Chu’s short film (currently showing at the Barnes Film Festival), while others in his year group have produced Lockdown Literature, a superb collection of poetry and creative writing inspired by living through the pandemic. You will also learn how our budding journalists have been recognised in the annual ‘Young Reporter’ awards. Philanthropist and humanitarian Abdul Sattar Edhi, is this week’s subject of our Who’s your Hero series, presented with aplomb by Sixth Former Firas Khalil.

Thanks are also due to Mrs Martin and Mrs Halford for this week’s Biology quest, which encourages us all to go out and engage with the natural world around us. Meanwhile, another testing press-up challenge has been set by Mr Mills.

I wish you a relaxing and restful weekend with your family. If you have been looking forward to your favourite Premier League team being back in action, I hope you have a considerably better experience than I did on Wednesday evening!

With kind regards and best wishes