The Rochester Grammar School 2018 Alumni Newsletter Welcome to the 2018 RGS Alumni Association Newsletter! You’ll notice that the newsletter has received another facelift this year, and we have been delighted to work with the School, and most notably a current student, to bring you this year’s news from the School and the Alumni Association members. Thank you to those of you who have kept in touch this year; we are always delighted to hear from you, and enjoy reading news from alumni and your associates. As always, we warmly invite all of our members and friends of the school to join us for the AGM and Annual Lunch on Saturday 17th November 2018 to see friends, share memories and see the school. It is always wonderful to see old friends and classmates reconnect and to hear about and see our school as it is today. By popular request we have looked into a different and cheaper format for our 2018 Alumni Lunch. Part of the request was to be able to spend more time chatting during lunch. As a result we are experimenting with a buffet lunch (instead of a sit down, catered lunch) which will be cheaper and should allow people to mingle and chat. A booking form for the lunch can be found at the end of this newsletter or attached to this email. You can print or copy as many as you like, so why not pass one to a friend? A membership form is also included so that you can encourage friends from school days to join us and stay in touch all year round. Now that we are electronic, we encourage you to share the newsletter with others. In light of GDPR we are sure you have been inundated with GDPR information and we too must tell you about GDPR. We of course take the security of your personal data seriously. We securely retain only name, time at RGS and contact details of members for our own purposes. If you wish to update your details or be removed from our mailing list at any point please contact us on [email protected] at which point we will permanently delete your details. This year’s newsletter features lots of news and information from 2017 and 2018 so far, but we are always open to contributions. If you feel inspired while you read this edition, please do not hesitate to contact us with ideas for next year’s content. If you have news or photographs you’d like to share, or any other questions, you can contact the Committee through all the usual channels, and Ann (Chairman) and Avril’s (Treasurer and Membership Secretary) details are at the end of the newsletter. In addition, you can email us at [email protected] or on twitter @RGSKentAlumni. Happy reading! With our warm regards, The Alumni Association Committee AGM and Annual Lunch 2018 The Rochester Grammar School Alumni Association invite you and your school friends to join us for our AGM, a tour and then lunch at the school on Saturday 17th November 2018. Our annual lunch reunites ‘Old Girls’ (and boys!), and offers an opportu- nity to catch up and hear about the school today. By popular request we have looked into a different and cheaper format for our 2018 Alumni Lunch. Part of the request was to be able to spend more time chatting during lunch. As a result we are experimenting with a buffet lunch (instead of a sit down, catered lunch) which will be cheaper and should allow people to mingle and chat. As a result, no menu is included on these pages, but we would ask that you note any dietary requirements clearly on your booking form to ensure that we cater for all. Note that we also hold our AGM before the lunch, and we warmly invite all to attend this to hear about our activities in 2017/18 and plans for the future. Mem- bers are reminded that they are entitled to vote on any matters raised at this meeting. Following this, as in previous years, we will enjoy lunch together, an update on school life, and the annual raffle. Dona- tions of prizes on the day are appreci- ated. Why not contact friends from your year and organise a reunion? If you cannot join us for the whole day, please feel free to just come to the lunch. To attend, please complete the form at the end of this newsletter. Don’t forget your camera or your purse! We would love to see and share your pic- tures of the lunch. Bring your camera along and send us any pictures with sug- gested captions afterwards; we will in- clude as many as we can in next year’s newsletter. Details of the current students who were awarded the Alumni prizes last year are included in this newsletter. We ask all those who attend the lunch to con- tribute £1 to the fund for the Alumni Award as explained in the piece. Timetable for the Day : 10.30am Registration. 11.00am Tour of the school for the Class of 1998. Conversation time for those who wish to catch up with friends. 12.00pm AGM 1.00pm Lunch 2.30pm School update from the Executive Officers. More time for conversation. School songs. 4 – 4.30pm Carriages. The Alumni Award The Alumni Award is for current RGS students, founded to celebrate the many ways in which RGS girls and boys serve others (“Service not Self ”). This year, the Alumni Award was given to Jasneet Samrai. The Award is a beautiful trophy (pictured) which is given annually. As the trophy remains in school, it is accom- panied by a gift voucher. This is funded by voluntary donations of £1 from those who attend the annual Alumni lunch. The Butterfield Cup This year’s recipient of the Butterfield Cup was Afraah Ansar, awarded for “Commitment to School”. New Alumni Student Links We welcome our newest Alumni Student Links Yasmin Ahmed and Arwen Pike to be the pathway that keeps RGS students from former and current years connected. Arwen and Yasmin both joined the school in 2012 as part of seven Hildegard and are now in year twelve as of 2017. They are also on this year’s Executive Team with Arwen as Communications and Yasmin as Community officer. For their year group and others who show interest, their connections with the Alumni can facilitate many resources such as advice and even oppor- tunities from people who have experience in work and around the world, as well as smaller things such as career guidance and tips on life after education. These two passionate classmates reach out to the year as a whole and work to keep them connected with the Alumni and with each other. 130 Years of RGS This 9th May 2018 marked 130 years since The Rochester Grammar School was founded, following the Endowed Schools Act of 1969 which allowed Charitable Trustees such as the Bridge wardens to donate money towards edu- cation. Since this time, the school has under- gone many developments, including new uni- form and school building, but the school spirit of thirst for education still soars. The Foundation Ceremony Paper The original Foundation Paper listing the first for the establishment of the official Gover- School, found within the time nors, 9th May capsule unearthed in 1989 1888 The Foundation Ceremony programme for the School, Wednesday 9th May 1988 Minutes of the AGM 2017 Apologies Gwynn Bassan, Angela Watson, Pat Boyle, Sheena Florance, Elaine Gardiner, Penny Fenn- Clark, June Woollett, Jennifer Goldsmith. Minutes of the last meeting were included in last newsletter. Sheena Florence and Gwen Pope’s names misrecorded [apologies from the editor]. Chairman’s Report This has been another interesting year. The committee has worked hard to improve our links with the school and Miss Tasker has started to work on a number of new initiatives. We are losing one of our long standing committee members - Pam Baldock - she has moved fur- ther away – and we’d like to thank her for all her help and support, in hope that she’ll continue to call in on our meetings if she is in the area. We’d like to thank Sarah Earle, our Alumni representative on the Academy Advisory Board, for representing us so well for a number of years. We are at present looking for a replacement. We’d like to thank Pat Stevens for her hard work with the School Link Database, an ongoing piece of work. This year, with the help and expertise of Christie Ransom, we have improved our social media communications via twitter and face book and we’re working on the website. The RGS Kent Alumni twitter account currently has 237 followers, and the facebook group 1146 members. I’d like to thank Avril for all her hard work in helping to put the 2017 newsletter together, we missed Christie’s expertise this year due to illness. Thank you to our members for contributing more memorabilia. Unfortunately we have not had a response to our offer to advertise any Alumni or family businesses in the newsletter. In order to encourage our school leavers to become members of the Alumni Association we are offering a £10 membership for 5 years. We hope this is a more attractive price for an 18 year old. The recipient of our Alumni Award (Service not Self) will receive a £25 gift and £10 paid for a 5year membership. Our Life Membership has remained the same for a number of years.