The 2019 British Judo National Team Championships took place in Scotland at the Ravenscraig Regional Sports Facility in Motherwell over the weekend. At this year’s event it was the first year using a new format of team  composition that saw teams comprising of males and females. Callum Davidson (Year 10) was again selected as part of the North West Squad and following a number of contests the North West Cadet Squad came away as bronze medallists.

This follows a strong performance in the British Schools Judo Championship earlier in the year where Callum finished a creditable fifth narrowly missing out on a bronze medal.

On Tuesday 25th June, the Year 10 GCSE PE group attended the Athlete Factory in Chester, for the annual fitness testing trip.  The Athlete Factory is a high performance gym, where everyone from novice gym goers to professional athletes and teams train in their state of the art training facility.

The purpose of the trip, was to be able to complete a variety of fitness tests to gather data which will be used during their coursework next academic year.  Throughout the day the boys where tested on the various components of fitness as well as given a nutritional talk by former England Rugby international and British and Irish Lion, Phil Greening.  Phil has a wealth of experience with Strength and Conditioning, as well as Nutrition to which he is currently working as a Performance Coach for the USA Rugby XV’s and VII’s teams.

All the boys had a fantastic day, took in all the advice and guidance on how to improve their game, through the knowledge of the coaches there.  Thank you to Phil, Ryan and Chris for the fantastic experience and we hope to see the Athlete Factory brand keep growing each year.

On Tuesday 18^th June, 16 boys from Years 7-9 gathered in the library for our annual Carnegie lunch, which has been held every year since 2002.

The Carnegie Medal, a national award for a work of children’s fiction, was this year given to The Poet X, a novel in verse by Elizabeth Acevedo, a Dominican-American writer.  In her acceptance speech, she said that a novel should be both a mirror, reflecting the culture of the readers, but also a window, enabling children to experience the lives and emotions of characters very different from themselves.

The Shadowers’ Award, voted for by all the groups that take part in the reviewing of the shortlisted books, was also awarded to The Poet X.  We watched the event live at MTBS, which took place in the British Library in London.

Our own favourite book was Rebound by Kwame Alexander, also a verse novel.  Although all pupils who posted reviews on the Carnegie website received a prize, the winner was Alex Meadows, who wrote three perceptive reviews.  On the Carnegie website children from reading groups throughout the country posted over 7000 reviews, which can be read by other participants, and the authors.

Mrs Rea, MTBS Librarian – June 2019