News & Events Archive

The LilyPad - 16 July 2014

The July 2014 edition of the LilyPad is now out. If you have not received the newsletter, you can view a web version by clicking on Read More below.

The LilyPad is a facility for parents and former parents of St Mary's and St Margaret's, as well as Calne Girls and supporters of the schools, to post announcements which will reach the whole school community whilst supporting The Calne Foundation Trust. If you would like to receive future copies of the LilyPad, please email office@calnefoundation.org. To advertise on the LilyPad, please click here for more information.

Old Girl Diaries

Calne Old Girl and school archivist, Elizabeth Christie, has been working to make many of the old school diaries, the original of which are kept in the Gabriel Archive at the school, available to be read by all old girls, whatever their location.

The diaries contain a wealth of information from the school at the time, from pupil and staff lists to an in depth account of the day to day activities of all those at the school. More diaries will be added soon - they will eventually cover the years from 1915 to 1960.

1989 Leavers' Reunion

On Saturday 28th June, many of the Leavers of 1989 were reunited back at St Mary's Calne. 21 old girls from the year group gathered together, catching up on all the news since they last saw the school and each other.

A report and slideshow from the day are now available.

CBE for Calne Girl

Dr Christie Peacock (1975) has been recognised in the Queen’s 2014 Birthday Honours for her work over three decades to improve the lives of some of the poorest and remote people in Africa.

The founder and Chair of Sidai Africa Ltd, a social enterprise that provides livestock care services to farmers across Kenya as a commercial business, has been awarded the CBE for services to Agricultural Development in Africa. Dr Peacock, who in 1988 started Farm Africa’s first goat project in Ethiopia, became the CEO of Farm Africa in 1999, a position she held for the next 11 years.

“I am highly honoured by this award that also honours my former and current colleagues in Farm Africa and Sidai. I hope that in some way we have all made the world a better place and that I have made a contribution to developing my profession.  I also hope that the award recognises the vital role that agricultural development plays in Africa.”

Calne Girl Receives Queen's Honours

Calne Girl Elizabeth Moir Tenduf-La (1959) has been awarded an MBE (Member of the Order of the British Empire) by Her Majesty The Queen in her Birthday Honours List 2014, for her services to British education and the teaching of English in Sri Lanka.

Ms Moir founded the Colombo International School (CIS) in Sri Lanka in 1982, and in 1990 was requested by President Premadasa to run a multimedia English language programme on television and radio. Elizabeth then founded the British School in Colombo in 1994, and, persuaded by a group of parents, started the Elizabeth Moir School in 1995. The school has enjoyed enormous academic success, and Ms Moir's students have gone on to universities such as Oxford, Cambridge, LSE, UCL and Imperial College in the UK and to Harvard, Yale, MIT and Princeton in the US.

"This is a huge honour, and in my case too it is very much a shared honour which recognises the work and commitment of so many people especially the inspired vision of my late husband Kesang Tenduf La. it is wonderful that we should be honoured for doing what we all enjoy so much and that this in itself inspires others. Miss Gibbins inspired our generation with her work and that this has given us the confidence to follow in her footsteps."

The LilyPad - 11 June 2014

The June 2014 edition of the LilyPad is now out. If you have not received the newsletter, you can view a web version by clicking on Read More below.

The LilyPad is a facility for parents and former parents of St Mary's and St Margaret's, as well as Calne Girls and supporters of the schools, to post announcements which will reach the whole school community whilst supporting The Calne Foundation Trust. If you would like to receive future copies of the LilyPad, please email office@calnefoundation.org. To advertise on the LilyPad, please click here for more information.

An Award-Winning Garden

Cave Pavilion, designed by Sophie Walker (2004), has won a Silver award at the 2014 Chelsea Flower Show.

Working with RHS President Award-winning Sue and Bleddyn Wynn-Jones, the garden illustrates the relevance and importance of plant collecting in the 21st century. Cave Pavilion is also the first garden in RHS Chelsea history to use only wild origin plants, many of which will not have been seen before in cultivation.

www.sophiewalkerstudio.com

2014 BAFTA Winner

Calne Girl Marina Parker (1997) won her second BAFTA at the award ceremony on Sunday 18 May.

Marina, who won her first BAFTA in 2011, won the award for a Single Documentary in 2014 for The Murder Trial, along with Nick Holt, Kate Barker and Ben Brown.

In October 2013 Marina and her sister Victoria, who works for Harvey Weinstein, came back to St Mary's to talk to current pupils as part of the CGA Talks.

A Calne Girl Olympian

Laura Tomlinson (née Bechtolsheimer, 1998–2002)

On Monday 12th May we were particularly excited to welcome back to school, for the first time since she left in 2002, old girl and Olympian Laura Tomlinson.

Laura's talk entralled both pupil's and staff, and her description of the weeks surrounding the London 2012 Games were both enspiring and poigant. For the full article please click on the link below.

Paris to Geneva Cycle

In July, Candida de Silva (nee Hall, 1989) will attempt to cycle over 500km from Paris to Geneva, along with 93 colleagues from BlackRock from 11 different offices. The four day trip will go through Burgundy and up, up, up into the Jura Mountains on a Tour de France climb before the descent into Geneva.

CGA Talks 2013-14

The 2013-14 series of CGA Talks concluded on Friday 25 April with a talk by Harriet Marlow (1989). For the past 10 years Harriet has concentrated on the sporting world, and now works as a freelance operations consultant for IMG, Human Race, Go2 events and D3 Active. The larger scale events include the London Triathlon and Run to the Beat half marathon.

For more information on this talk, along with all past CGA talks, please see our Past CGA Talks page.

Information about the 2014-15 series, starting in September, will be available shortly.

2009 Leavers' Reunion

On Wednesday 16th April, the Leavers of 2009 were reunited in the ‘cool’ nightclub space JuJu London on the King’s Road. About 30 girls from the year group gathered together and caught up on news, some meeting up for the first time since leaving Calne, others catching up since they last saw their Calne friends.

Mrs Depla and Mrs Rothwell also joined this happy throng, as well as Cate Bell from the Calne Girls’ Association (who snapped photos for the next CGA magazine). Drinks and canapés were served as girls swapped news about their new jobs, internships or final years at university.  It was great to be able to get so many girls from the year together and thanks go to the CGA for so generously hosting the event.

Click on Read More to see a slideshow of images from the reunion

Gladys Beale

We were sad to hear that Gladys Beale, our oldest alumnae, died on Tuesday 18th March 2014 at the age of 106. Gladys had been a pupil at St Mary's Calne from 1921-1926 whilst Marcia Matthews was Headmistress.

You can read an obituary for Gladys by clicking on Read More.

Life After Calne

Cate Bell gave her introductory talk about the Calne Girls' Association to the UVI Leavers on Tuesday 11 March. Cate is an Old Girl whose family has been connected to the school for generations. She is responsible for producing the new look CGA magazine, Calne Girls Connected, and is currently the Communications Manager for the CGA.

For information about last year's talk, please click here.

All current UVI Form pupils have been invited to register with the website - please click on Read More to go to the UVI Form Registration page.