No. 140 The Trusty Servant
Wiccamica
Pupil Achievements Cookites can feel proud of the initiative and generosity of two of the current VI Book 2. Over the summer, Freddie Laarman( C, 22-) packed a tent and walked the Grande Traversée des Alpes, a month-long hike across the French Alps from Lake Geneva to Nice, to raise funds to help the fight against Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. After walking 600kms over 24 days, dealing with 30km elevation gain, Freddie reached Menton on the French Riviera. He raised nearly € 4000.
Meanwhile. sports scholar, Jesse Feyita( C, 22-), travelled to Nigeria to lead some work for his charity, Lace the Dream, which provides football equipment to talented but underresourced young players in communities across Nigeria. Many children there still compete barefoot or in slippers, but in just three weeks Jesse managed to reach over 300 children, donating boots and organising and refereeing matches.
Not to be outdone, Common Room joined pupils in the now annual Charity Run, on a day which begins with Morning Hills, and ends with the first Exeat of Short Half – richly deserved by those who volunteer for the half-marathon. The whole school participates, but can choose their distance: the minimum run is the six and a half kilometres of Jun: Jun; those who prefer to appreciate their countryside at walking pace can take a vigorous fifteen-kilometre stroll through the Hampshire hills. The school’ s current international charity is SolarAid, which provides solar-powered replacements for dangerous and toxic kerosene lamps and paraffin candles: the money raised will protect 8,000 people at home and allow 1,600 children to study after dark.
We’ ve rejoiced in these pages before over success in the Stephen Spender prize, and other feats of translation, but Phuc Nguyen( I, 21-) has taken it to a whole new level. Over the last school year and into the summer, Phuc co-translated An Introduction to Political Philosophy by Professor Jonathan Wolff into Vietnamese. Professor Wolff is the Emeritus Alfred Landecker Professor of Values and Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government at the University of Oxford.
After discovering the book on the Oxford PPE undergraduate reading list, Phuc collaborated with a Vietnamese publishing house to translate it. The book is now published by the Vietnam National University Publishing House. Phuc and his co-translator hosted Professor Wolff in Vietnam for a series of book launch events, and he also gave talks at the Vietnam National University and Fulbright University Vietnam on the topics of“ Marxism in the 21st Century” and“ Social Trust and the Role of the State.” The philosophy departments at Vietnam National University are now planning to incorporate the book into their undergraduate courses.
Pianist Laurie Sawbridge( H, 22-) is now a Fellow of Trinity College, London, having given his recital just after finishing his GCSEs last term. The Diploma is equivalent in standard to a postgraduate course recital at a conservatoire or university, and indicates a professional standard of performance and musical understanding – an extraordinary achievement for a sixteenyear-old.
In a different area of precocity, Harry Ho( I, 23-) finished 2nd in the Vietnam Amateur Open, and qualified for SE Asia Games.
63,328 under-eighteen-year-olds entered this year’ s John Locke Institute Global Essay Prize, and four Wykehamists made it to the short list: Lachlan MacBean( B, 23-), Zain Naqui( A, 21-), Wilson Tang( Coll, 21-) and Jacques Scully( B, 24-). They chose to write on human freedom, animal rights and a provocative quotation from Bertrand Russell:‘ Hitler is an outcome of Rousseau; Roosevelt and Churchill, of Locke.’ The Warden will perhaps be disappointed that the boys who wrote on the socio-economic impact of VAT on school fees were only Highly Commended – they should have read his editorial( see TS 139) with greater attention.
Action Men Led by Jad Darkazally( D, 21-) the Pringle Trophy team delivered an outstanding performance, achieving 2nd place out of 16 schools. They also won the iconic Endurance Run and Assault Course exercises, on the same course that forms part of the Commando Tests which Royal Marines must pass to be awarded their green beret. There’ s also a charming – and impressive – footnote: Freddyite Hugo Dunfield-Prayero( E, 21-) was chosen by Royal Marines commandos to receive the Royal Marines Spirit Challenge Coin for volunteering, without hesitation, to fill a gap in another team to allow them to complete the assault course, having just finished his own- winning- run of the course.
Recita The King’ s Silver Medal for English Speech was won this year by Oliver Jing( Coll, 22-), whom you’ ve encountered in these pages before, as the youngest and most successful Wykehamical competitor in last year’ s Chemistry Olympiad( 4th out of 16,216). His rivals in Recita were less numerous, but
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