ipad launch in olympic gymnast alumnae …...alumnae meet some of our old girls and learn how to get...

IPAD LAUNCH IN THE SENIOR SCHOOL

How we’re empowering girls for their future world

Page 6

OLYMPIC GYMNAST VISITS AESG

Beth Tweddle meets our Senior girls for a Q&A session

2

ALUMNAE

Meet some of our old girls and learn how to get involved

not to have more, but to be more

AUTUMN TERM 2016

Contents

Welcome from Helen Jeys 3iPad Implementation 4Sporting Success 6Beyond the classroom 8Autumn Trips 10Alumnae 12Farewell to Mrs Waterhouse 14

AUTUMN TERM 2016AUTUMN TERM 2016

ASPIREALDERLEY EDGE SCHOOL FOR GIRLS 03

Welcome

I am very excited to introduce the first issue of Aspire, which aims to provide a review of each term in school; from sport to trips and from enrichment activities to academic developments. You will also see a focus on alumnae – our ‘old girls’! As you will have seen from the beautiful boards in the PA Hall, I am keen to develop links with the girls who have left AESG, Mount Carmel and St Hilary’s. Not only can their post-school adventures and careers inspire our girls but they can also provide us with a wealth of experiences that our girls love to hear about. I hope you enjoy reading about our alumnae and, please do contact Debbie Dawson – our new Development Director – if you are an ‘old girl’ and would like to visit us in school.

The Development Director is a new addition to our Senior Leadership Team in school and we are delighted that Debbie Dawson, once marketing officer, will be taking on the challenge of this new post from January 2017. She will be responsible for developing further links with our alumnae and the local community as well as initiating other exciting plans which I will talk more about in due course.

It has been a really busy first term as Head and I have so enjoyed getting to know the staff, girls and parents. The staff do an amazing job in supporting our girls and their willingness to go ‘above and beyond’ in providing the girls with trip and enrichment opportunities is inspiring. Developments within school, such as our new sporting facilities, minibus and the launch of iPads, for instance, reflect the fact that we are not willing to be complacent. As a school, we keep moving forward; challenging ourselves and the girls to be the very best we can be.

We say ‘goodbye’ to Mrs Waterhouse at the end of this term and you can read a wonderful dedication to her at the end of our magazine. Mrs Waterhouse has been a loyal and committed member of our school community for many years and we will all miss her wisdom, good humour and dedication. I wish her well for a healthy and happy retirement.

I would also like to thank you for your warm welcome and huge support since September; I am excited to see how our wonderful school continues to flourish.

Helen Jeys

#1. DREAM To be loved and trusted as an academic school that nurtures girls to be happy, confident and resilient and who reach their potential in whichever field they choose.

#2. CHARACTERHappy Dynamic Academic United Nurturing Ambitious Fun Committed Inclusive Friendly Aspirational

#3. BELIEFSProviding an outstanding, educational journey to girls from the age of two to eighteen

Inspiring girls to achieve and to be the very best they can be

Giving every individual girl a truly holistic educational experience

Embracing the very best in technology to provide a personalised approach to learning

Welcoming girls of all faiths in a school with a strong Christian ethos

Producing successful citizens for the future with global awareness, empathy and a strong moral compass

Supporting girls with superb pastoral care; one which develops girls’ resilience, self-confidence and self-belief

Working in partnership with parents to guide girls throughout their school life

#4. SPIRIT“Aspire not to have more, but to be more.”

#5. FOCUSConfidence and self-belief

School VisionWelcome to the first issue of our new Senior School

termly publication, Aspire

Mrs Helen JeysHeadmistress

As a new Head, having inherited a plan to roll out tablets for Years 7 – 11, I did feel some trepidation. After all, the global report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development suggested that education systems that had heavily invested in computers had seen ‘no noticeable improvement’ in their PISA test results. Furthermore, a 2015 Guardian article reported how the Waldorf School of the Peninsula, in the heart of Silicon Valley, was rejecting any use of digital media in the classroom; preferring (in the words of the journalist) a ‘hands-on, experiential approach to learning’. Other reports relating to the potential distraction caused by access to social media and the general negatives regarding screen-time added to my concerns.

Indeed, as someone new to the school, it’s been interesting to evaluate the impact of this technology from an objective standpoint. Have there been issues? Well, yes of course. There are always going to be minor delays in ensuring that all girls have access to pre-purchased apps and that the filtering systems are fully installed before

But, what about the educational value? Should I continue to feel trepidation? A resounding ‘No!’ is my response. My experience is that tablet use has enhanced and enriched learning. Seeing girls using iTunes U to broaden and extend their reading and the younger girls being able to airdrop photographs of their own cheek cells onto the interactive screen brings Biology to life and out of the textbook. This might have completely transformed my attitude to science as a 13-year-old girl trying to engage with (for me) difficult subject content.

Mr Chadwick talks of ‘evolution not revolution’ when it comes to using tablets in the classroom, and he is right. We have a duty to ensure that our pupils leave school able to cope with the demands of jobs, some of which are not in existence yet. Our girls will be digitally literate and this is absolutely crucial to their future success. Will it give them improved PISA results? Only time will tell. But, will their educational experiences be enriched and more enjoyable? Absolutely! And isn’t this just as important?

school access is permitted; filtering systems that are important if pupils are to avoid those social media distractions.

What has surprised me, though, is not only what I have seen in the classroom since tablets have been introduced, but the ways in which staff and pupils have become empowered. Our outstanding IT Development Manager, Mr Plews, improved the computing infrastructure hugely and worked together with the Curriculum Team, Governors and a totally supportive Senior Leadership Team, to get the venture underway. Furthermore, IT Pioneers – those staff genuinely excited about using tablets in the classroom – have led the way on how technology and apps can be used, both in their departments and with those who were less confident. Providing staff with a year’s lead-in time enabled all staff, both those confident and those less so, with the time needed to really engage with the technology. Student ambassadors have also been introduced; who are fundamentally involved in setting up the rules for classroom engagement. The rules followed by the pupils are those

set up the pupils themselves and this committed group of ambassadors continue to be involved; monitoring use and raising potential issues with our Director of Technology Enhanced Learning.

Our Director of Technology Enhanced Learning, Mr Chadwick, is a passionate advocate of the benefits of the ‘enriched classroom’. He talks of tablets enabling teachers to be ‘agile task-setters’ and to flip learning in an effective way. Other institutions and their experience have been invaluable to him; particularly the Stephen Perse Foundation, and their passion for classroom technology continues to inform him and his team about future developments.

Moving forward is an ongoing theme; the introduction of tablets to all pupils in Years 7 – 11 is only the start. Regular emails informing me of the benefits of Socrative, eChalk, Explain Everything, Book Creator and so forth, remind me that there will be no pause in this exciting educational venture.

Friend or Foe?

ASPIREALDERLEY EDGE SCHOOL FOR GIRLS

ASPIREALDERLEY EDGE SCHOOL FOR GIRLS04 05

AUTUMN TERM 2016 AUTUMN TERM 2016

“ My experience is that tablet use has enhanced and enriched learning. Seeing girls airdrop photographs of their own cheek cells onto the interactive screen brings Biology to life and out of the textbook.” Helen Jeys, Headmistress

Technology inthe Classroom

This article was published

in the December 2016 edition

of Independent Education

Today.

I loved using the iPads in DT, when we made a video showing the micro:bit working.Charlotte MacDonald – Year 8

The Quizlet app is great for learning key words in French!Shanice Donatien – Year 10

It’s much quicker to take notes and I can organise my homework using the diary function. Madi Ashurst – Year 10

iTunesU is brilliant for teaching as it offers a quick and easy way of testing and setting different tasks according to the pupil’s ability, which is fantastic for stretching and challenging the girls. Mr Chadwick

It’s great in English as we don’t have to carry around lots of books – they are all available electronically on the iPad!Emily Davies – Year 9

We used the iPads in Science to make a time-lapse video of experiments – it was really cool!Lucinda Beeson – Year 11

I have difficulty reading, so being able to change the text colour and background and make text bigger really helps and makes it easier on my eyes.Emma Gorman – Year 7




Sporting Successes

A Sunday morning run in Macclesfield – a personal view.

On Sunday 25 September a small but committed team from AESG took part in the Macclesfield half marathon/ 5k run. Charlotte MacDonald in Year 8, Mr Garfield and Miss Johnson are all

experienced runners but this was my first 5k run and frankly, I was very nervous. Mr Garfield set off on the half marathon and the rest of us did the 5k – Charlotte shot off like a whippet while Miss Johnson, my running buddy kindly ran alongside me, more slowly than she had ever run, encouraging, cajoling and bribing with jelly babies to get me through the course which was more hilly than I had ever anticipated. The support from complete strangers on the roadside was so encouraging and other staff had also kindly turned up to support us. We all did well, although timings weren’t an issue for me – I just couldn’t believe I actually did it, but it was worth it – and I also raised funds for Alzheimer’s in memory of my Mum. To paraphrase Nadiya Hussain from BakeOff, I’ll never say I can’t do something again! Mrs Wood, School Librarian.

An Olympic visit

We were lucky enough to have a visit from Olympic gymnast Beth Tweddle who participated in a fantastic Q&A session with our Senior School Sports’ Scholars in addition to meeting some of our other pupils, including a very happy India Davies who was delighted to meet her idol!

Sports Tours

Looking forward to next year, we are excited to announce that there will be two brand new sports’ tours – a hockey tour to Belfast in February for girls in Years 10 to Upper Sixth and a tour to Spain for girls currently in Years 7 to 9 for Netball, Hockey and Rounders which will be taking place in October. We can’t wait! More news to follow in 2017.

Sporting highlights from our teams and individual Senior girls is as follows:

Hockey

U13 ISA North Tournament (13/10/16)Plate winners.

Cross Country

English Schools Cross Country Cup (7/10/16)

Junior Team (Years 7 & 8):Clarissa Rigby 4th,Thea Rankin 5th out of 86 runners.

Inter Team (Years 9 & 10):Hattie Rigby 8th out of 68 runners.

Other sporting heroes this term include:

Lacrosse

Lauren Reid – Upper SixthLauren has been training hard with the Under 19 Scottish Lacrosse team this term in preparation for an international festival next year alongside the Womens’ Lacrosse World Cup. Lauren has been playing for the Under 19 Scotland team for the last 3 years and she regularly travels up to Edinburgh to train at weekends.

Lauren is keen to pass her expertise onto others and is hoping to set up a school club in the New Year. Watch this space!

Squash

Lauren Hall – Year 7Lauren has continued to train hard and compete with tremendous success in squash. Even though Lauren only turned 12 in October, she became the girls Under 13, Under 15 and Under 17 Cheshire County Champion in September and more recently she came 2nd at the Under 13 North West Regional Junior Championships. She is expected to be playing in position 1 for the North West Regional Team at the end of the year and has a top 15 national ranking at Under 13. Lauren is also the youngest player to have ever played in the Cheshire Ladies Leagues Teams and competes for Bowdon Squash Club. Lauren is definitely one to watch!

It’s been a fantastic start to the school year with sporting successes and new clubsbeing added to the enrichment timetable such as hockey goalkeeping, table tennis

and handball. We are also awaiting delivery of a second trampoline which has been funded by the PFA so that we can increase provision in this area.

Dressage

Jessica Allwright – Lower SixthJess began competing at dressage in April 2016. She competed at an introductory level whilst training at preliminary. Over recent months, Jess has competed in the BYRDS Team Quest competition where they reached the National Finals and came 21st in England, Scotland and Wales. Jess also competed individually in the summer league championship where she was placed first in the league. She is now beginning the new season of Team Quest competitions and competing in both quest and individual competitions. We wish her the best of luck.

Swimming

Ella O’Donnell – Year 9Congratulations to Ella who won gold in the 50m butterfly at the CP Development Gala in Nottingham earlier this year. Additionally, Ella also competed and gained three personal bests in the ASA North East Regional Para-Swimming Championships, held in Harrogate on the 24th September 2016.

Ella qualified for the Nationals which take place on Saturday 10th and Sunday 11th December and will be competing in the 100m, 200m, 400m freestyle and the 100m breast stroke. We can’t wait to hear how you get on!

Macclesfield and District Cross Country Championships (9/11/16):

Year 7 TeamClarissa Rigby 4th – qualified to represent Macclesfield and District at the Cheshire Championship in January.

Year 8/9 TeamLara Coulter 10th,Thea Rankin 11th – qualified to represent Macclesfield and District at the Cheshire Championship in January.

Year 10/11 TeamHattie Rigby 6th, Millie Thompson 9th,Lucy Ferris 10th – qualified to represent Macclesfield and District at the Cheshire Championship in January.

John Leigh Park Cross Country League Results (19/11/16)Clarissa Rigby 3rd in the Year 7 league, Zara Thompson 1st in the Sixth Form league.

England Schools Fell Running Championship (25/09/16)Clarissa Rigby (Year 7), 9th out of over 40 starters.

Netball

U16 ISA North Tournament(28/09/16)Runners up and qualified for the National Finals.

Badminton

Under 16 Macclesfield and District Tournament(17/11/16)

Under 16A Winners – qualified for Cheshire Round of the competition.

Under 16B Runners up.

Swimming

ISA North Swimming Gala (11/10/16)Emily Cameron qualified for the ISA Nationals in the butterfly relay.

Football

U13 ISA National Tournament (13/10/16)Reached the semi-final of the plate.

Tour of Britain

We had an exciting start to the new school year as we welcomed the Tour of Britain to Alderley Edge. There was a real sense of excitement and anticipation as the lead riders were followed by the peloton. This was a great opportunity for our sports’ scholars and examination groups to see elite sport on our doorstep.

Netball

We hosted a really competitive netball tournament for our feeder primary schools in November. We were lucky with the weather and the girls really enjoyed an afternoon full of netball. Well done to all who played.

Masterclasses

In the Masterclass on Coco Chanel, six Year 7 girls learned about the revolutionary designs of Coco Chanel. Chanel put women into trousers, comfortable suits and, most famously, the “Little Black Dress”. Perhaps most importantly of all, Chanel got women out of the corset. Chanel’s clothes were about much more than fashion, they represented the “New Woman” of the Twentieth Century: women were working, had more freedom and, of course, had the right to vote. The girls then designed their own Chanel inspired outfits; the two examples on the opposite page are by Grace Irving and May Bagnall.

Model United Nations

The Model United Nations (MUN) competitions are well attended by schools from the length of the country and we are proud to be part of the extra-curricular culture that is MUN. October 2016 saw the exceptionally organised conference at Cheadle Hulme School, commonly known as MUNCH.

Eight girls from Year 8 to Upper Sixth representing The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) and Pakistan planned policy statements and resolutions in order to discuss topics such as The Issue of Forced Child Labour, The Issue of Prevention of Poaching and The Issue of State-Sponsored Militias. They took the floor and debated all day on Saturday and went back for a crisis meeting on the Sunday and General Assembly to close the weekend. The DPRK team of Ella Myers, Amy Myers, Holly Bennett, Jewel Bennett and Bertie Dudley won the best delegation in the General Assembly with Ella also receiving the Highly Commended delegate Award for Human Rights. Holly and Anna received special mentions in the awards ceremony.

The girls had each put in extra hours after school and at home in order to be as prepared as they could be. Taking part in MUN has improved girls’ confidence in the classroom. For one pupil it alerted her to how male dominated politics appears to be which then gave her the desire to make a change in society and to express her opinions and desires.

The next adventure is with MUNHIGH in January 2017 where the girls will be representing Afghanistan and Kenya.

Engineering Education Scheme

The Engineering Education Scheme offers four Lower Sixth Students the opportunity to get a real insight into engineering and project management. This year the team is Jessica Allwright, Bianca Boren, Nina Fraser and Chikako Kawato. We are pleased to continue our partnership with Siemens and on the launch day at The University of Liverpool, the students received their project brief:

The Lancasterian Specialist School for Communication & Interaction is a 3–16yr community special school situated in West Didsbury, Manchester. The school provides education for pupils with physical difficulties, severe medical conditions and communication needs, and as close neighbours, Siemens have a long standing relationship with the school. The school now require a clock system, sited outdoors in the school playground, to provide suitable audible and visual signals to give indications in several stages when playtime is about to end, triggered either manually or automatically. The system is also to be extended to control a set of traffic lights on the playground wheelchair run. The project is to design and build a suitable system based on Siemens technology following research into operational requirements based on dialogue with school teaching staff and occupational therapists.

This is perhaps the most exciting project the engineering teams have been set to date. It offers the opportunity for creative design as well as high level engineering. The students spend six months working on the project, including a residential at The University of Liverpool where they will get hands on workshop experience. It gives the students the chance to put into practice theory they have learned throughout the curriculum including Physics, ICT, Maths and Design Technology.

Gardening Club

Gardening Club has had a frenetic start to its time in the AESG extra-curricular timetable, as we have raced to get some planting done before the weather and light turned against us. The girls have begun by doing research in to the flowers, fruit and vegetables they would like to grow, looking at the best conditions to grow them in and the ideal time for planting. The girls have also been busy planting bulbs around the front of the school in the hope of providing a real splash of colour come springtime. As the nights draw in, we will be planning for the warmer weather, when we hope to have some seedlings ready to plant out, as well as broadening our horizons to include the junior school. We also hope to grow some produce for the girls to be able to plan and produce some delicious food.

Making for Malawi

In Design Technology club the girls have been “Making for Malawi” in support of the local Retrak charity that works with street children around the world. The girls are creating wash bags and collecting donations of toiletries to fill them, as well as sewing beautiful dresses for the children in Malawi. Each student has made a tag to attach to the item they have made with a personal message letting the recipient know that another girl from across the world cares for them. The dresses and wash bags will be taken to Malawi in January by Clare Shaker from Barclays. She is leading a team from Gadbrook Park, Northwich who will be spending a week doing outreach work with Retrak.




Beyond the classroom Clockwise from left:Engineering, Model United Nations, Coco Chanel Masterclass, Make for Malawi and Gardening Club.

Latin Trip to the Bay of Naples

14–18 October 2016It was with great excitement that twenty-five members of the Year 8 and 9 Latin classes and three teachers, gathered at Manchester Airport for our flight to sunny Naples. On the way we endured a rather bumpy flight, which everyone except Maldini Simic found a bit frightening, a silent disco and a ten-degree rise in temperature. We stayed in Piano di Sorrento and visited several sets of Roman ruins. Our wonderful guide Christina showed us the buried towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum, the latter famous for its collection of bones in the boathouses, cast in resin. We also got the chance to see how the ‘other half’ lived when we visited a palace belonging to Nero’s second wife,

Poppaea. These visits gave the pupils a chance to experience some of the places where Romans lived, worked and wrote the passages they have been translating. They also provided a stimulus for discussion, in particular Lauren Galligan’s philosophical musings on the frailty of man. It will be of great benefit in lessons to be able to say “remember that bath house we saw in Pompeii” rather than relying on pictures or descriptions. Another valuable aim was achieved when the girls realised how much their knowledge of Latin helped them to understand modern Italian. The girls were also able to enrich their understanding of other subjects. A somewhat arduous and very foggy ramble

brought us to the lip of the creater of Mount Vesuvius, where a friendly Italian guide gave us a crash course in Vulcanology, beginning with the first recorded eruption in 79CE, as recorded by Pliny the Elder. We also visited the dying crater of Solfatara, where the girls (and the men) were unconvinced by the health benefits of the sulphurous fumes. The Food Technology box was ticked by our sampling of several different types of ice cream, pizza and pasta. We even managed a little Music, as Lara Coulter, Georgie Saunders and friends attempted a remake of the video to the song Pompeii by Bastille. What a fantastic trip!

Geography Field Trip to Cranedale

Where did you go and when? The Lower Sixth Geographers went to the Cranedale Field Study Centre in North Yorkshire in September.

What did you do? Glorious weather greeted us when we arrived at the field study centre. By 10 o’clock it was already 25 degrees outside. On the first day of fieldwork, the girls used a variety of innovative techniques to explore their lived experience of Scarborough, how the town was represented and perceived by others. They also used quantitative and qualitative techniques to investigate the socio-economic and demographic characteristics of the town. The following day was even hotter and the girls looked at the different management policies and strategies implemented along the Holderness coast – the fastest eroding coastline in Europe. How did the work benefit the girls when they returned to the classroom? The girls analysed the data they collected and will be drawing conclusions which will help them in their external summer examinations.

History Trip to the USA

In October, twenty-eight Year 10 and 11 girls and three members of staff flew off on their visit to the USA. The trip has been offered regularly by the History Department since 2012 to compliment the girls’ studies; American History constituting approximately one third of their GCSE content. The trip incorporates five days immersion in American History and Culture.

The first two days were spent in Washington DC and the remaining three in New York City. Visiting the Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) Memorial in Washington reveals Roosevelt’s inspirational approach to restoring the American economy and society following the Wall Street Crash. Girls stood in a “breadline” to experience first-hand the ignominy of queuing for charity as one quarter of America’s working population did in 1932 and experienced how FDR harnessed America’s physical resources to create jobs by touching the water within the Tennessee Valley Authority fountain exhibit. Walking through the Martin Luther King memorial revealed quite literally how he had “moved mountains” in his pursuit of Civil Rights.

Completing workbooks on an organised tour of the United Nations Buildings augmented Year 11 girl’s understanding of the Cold War whilst walking through Manhattan past the Empire State, Chrysler, Rockefeller Buildings and Wall Street and visiting Ellis Island revealed at first hand the American Dream in bricks and mortar; America’s roots in immigration and all its opportunities and inequalities.

Paraphrasing the late John Fitzgerald Kennedy; Let the word go forth from this time and place that the torch of knowledge was passed to a new generation of historians who now see clearly that historical knowledge is valuable, practical and informs the future and is not just nostalgia.

Geography Field Trip to Castleton

Where did you go and when?The Year 11 Geographers went to Castleton in the Peak District in September.

What did you do? The Year 11 Geography students carried out an intensive and successful day of fieldwork in the Peak District. The girls started off their day with a climb up to Peveril Castle so that they could draw a field sketch of the breathtaking views over Hope Valley. The rest of the day was spent measuring the footpath erosion along Cave Dale, conducting questionnaires on the residents of Castleton and carrying out a detailed environmental quality survey of the area. Despite working incredibly hard, some of the girls managed to sample the delights of Castleton’s homemade ice-cream. How did the work benefit the girls when they returned to the classroom? The girls have used the data collected in order to complete their controlled assessment, which accounts for 25% of their GCSE.




Autumn Trips“Tell me and I’ll forget; show me and I may remember;

involve me and I’ll understand.” Chinese proverb

The girls infront of theLincoln Memorial, Washington DC

Alumnae

Katie MorumStudiesBA English Literature (First Class) MA Literary Studies (Distinction) The University of Exeter (2016)

PositionPartner & ResearcherSaxton Bampfylde

Class of 2010 Class of 2012Misbah SherazStudiesMasters of Pharmacy (Hons),University of Central Lancashire

PositionPre-Registration PharmacistTims and Parker

Class of 2003Caroline Williams (née Copeland) StudiesBSc PharmacologyUniversity College London Integrative Biological Sciences MRes Imperial College LondonPhD NeuroscienceUniversity College London

PositionLecturer in NeuropharmacologySt George’s Medical School,University of London

“Most of my memories of AESG are from outside the classroom – playing the trumpet in the jazz band and orchestra, or in goal on the hockey pitch. These extracurricular activities equipped me with several transferable skills that I have used to forge a successful career in academia as a neuroscientist.”

Class of 2000Class of 1984Kate Comer

(née Malcomson)StudiesBA (Hons) Marketing UWE BristolMSc Human Resource Management University of Salford

PositionHR Change ManagerLloyds Banking Group

“St Hilary’s, and latterly AESG, was small enough to care about me as an individual but big enough to give me opportunities to grow and flourish – that’s why my daughter’s name is already down for joining! My best memories were the end of year house plays and drama productions, and winning the national public speaking championships! My advice is to the girls is to choose to do something you love whether that’s through further study or a future career - when you do something you love, your passion will shine through and you will achieve great things”.

Marianne ElliotMarianne Elliott was born in London in 1966 but moved to Alderley Edge with her parents and spent some of her education at St. Hilary’s.

As the director of hugely successful productions including War Horse and The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Marianne has recently left the National Theatre after a decade as an Associate Director to form her own production company. Marianne enjoyed her time with us immensely and had the following to say about her school days – including some advice for our girls.

“St Hilary’s was like a family to me. I found such amazing friends there. And teachers that allowed me to grow, in my own time. Academic pressure is so huge on pupils nowadays, I hope everyone at the school is able, once in a while, to just well, enjoy it. From there will come great memories, and from there will be formed great characters. Work hard, but play hard too: In the words of that immortal Ferris Bueller: Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.

Class of 2004Karla ZapolskiStudiesFoundation Fashion DegreeLondon College of FashionBA (Hons) AdvertisingLeeds College of Art & Design

PositionCEOFashionDollz

“Looking back at my memories of school I loved it! I loved going to school at Mount Carmel through to AESG from the brown uniform to the blue, meeting my best friends and fantastic teachers”.

Emma SpeddingStudiesBA Hons English LiteratureDurham UniversityMA Magazine JournalismCity University, London

PositionActing Fashion News and Features Editor The Telegraph Former Deputy Digital EditorGrazia Magazine

Class of 2008

This Autumn saw the start of a long term project to celebrate our oldgirls and their achievements. So whether you are an old girl of Alderley

Edge School for Girls, St Hilary’s or Mount Carmel, we would like to speak to you! Here are some of the comments from our Old Girls.



“School life is not only about gaining top notch academic credentials. It is also about becoming a rounded individual; someone who is open to seizing career opportunities and life experiences. My time at AESG not only helped to open my eyes to the myriad of career opportunities out there, but also prepared me to seek them out. Making the most of work experience, university placements and extra-curricular activities whilst at school absolutely set me on the right path to gaining my degree and graduate role.”Katie Morum, Class of 2010


If you would like to be included in our next edition of Aspire or get involved with our Alumnae projects, please contact Mrs Debbie Dawson [email protected] 01625 583028 ext 239.

Jackie started in 1996 as a part-time Head of Economics and Business. She joined the school as a spritely 39 year old and her reputation from Glossop Community College as a ‘hardworking, caring and enthusiastic teacher’ has continued.

Her talents have stretched far and wide whilst being at the school. She has been the Sixth Form Curriculum Co-ordinator (2000 onwards – Key Skills and Enrichment programmes with Liverpool University), Head of Upper School (2002), group leader for the Sixth Form Paris trip (since 1997, making friends with Ann Brayne who was the Head of Sixth Form at the

time), ‘Timetabler’ – helping Wendy Walmsley and Brenda Davidson, taking this over in 2006 (this involves re-creating the timetable about five times over each academic year, in pencil!), member of the Senior Leadership Team, Director of Pastoral Care... and a teacher of PSHE, Gym Club and a spot of Maths along the way!

Having served three Heads, it is now time for her to take control of what she wants to do and when; travelling, spending time with her family and having fun with friends!

We all wish Jackie a very long, happy and healthy retirement.




A fond farewellIt is with great sadness that we have to say goodbye to Mrs Jackie Waterhouse,

as she retires following 20 years’ service to Mount Carmel and AESG. Thank you for the kindness you showed me throughout my time at AESG. When I reflect, I think my AESG (and Mount Carmel) years were incredibly happy, both in terms of the social and school life. Many thanks for the large part you played in my life at this time.Sarah Griffiths

She has touched the lives of so many girls here – as well as staff... Jackie’s combination of patience, humour, intelligence, dedication and fun is truly unique; I know she will be missed greatly at AESG.Sue Goff (former Headmistress)

We will always miss how much you make us laugh and how you make Bridgewater Hall such a special day.Immy Hughes (Year 10)

Thank you for all your very sensible, practical and empathetic support for my daughters over the last few years... You were very influential in my decision that they went to the school... Take care and best wishes.Mrs Thornber

You were always a safe pair of hands and not one to make a drama out of a crisis. Best wishes.Philip Watts (Former Teacher of English)

Our careers at school overlapped by 16 years and for almost half that time we shared an office. We shared many things – tea, coffee, biscuits, make-up, hairbrushes, money, reading glasses, being untidy, as well as the up and downs that life throws at us all from time to time, but mostly I remember having fun and laughing a lot. Jackie you were a joy to work with and are a wonderful friend – I wish you a long, happy and healthy retirement.Alison Baker (Former Head of Lower School)

Many thanks for all your love and support over the years. Here’s to a wonderful retirement. Lots of love.Lucy Wildig (Baker) and Liz Solomons (Baker)

Comments from our

Parents, Pupils and Colleagues

past and present!

Alderley Edge School for Girls, Wilmslow Road, Cheshire, SK9 7QET. 01625 583028 E. [email protected]

www.aesg.co.uk @schoolforgirls /Alderley-Edge-School-For-Girls

Registered Company No. 2659703 Registered Charity No. 1006726

ipad launch in olympic gymnast alumnae …...alumnae meet some of our old girls and learn how to get...

Documents