CGA July 2010 Newsletter

1. “Excellence in Education for All”
Newsletter July 2010
Some girls are still members of the riding
Sue Kayser Stands Down as Chair of club they were introduced to in year 7.
Governors
Since Sue ‘retired’ from teaching she has
been busier than ever. Already on the John
Sue Kayser’s long Kelly board she became Chair of Governors
association with John in 2008 and when John Kelly became The
Kelly Girls’ Technology Crest Girls’ Academy she continued in this
College and more role.
recently The Crest
Girls’ Academy, began Always a ‘hands on’ person she has worked
in 1990 when she tirelessly to ensure that the transition from
became head of the John Kelly to The Crest Girls’ Academy has
modern languages department. She taught been as seamless as possible. Her
German and led a large and thriving innovative ideas about the new academy
languages department. buildings and structures will form part of
her legacy.
While continuing as head of department she
took on a new role in initial teacher training Whatever Sue decides to take on next she
at the SSAT and when this became a full will surely pursue it with her customary
time job Sue left John Kelly. enthusiasm and zeal and of course she will
be continuing the weekly horse riding
However she did not stay away for long. lessons at The CGA.
When she returned she fulfilled a number of
roles; Assistant Principal, Head of 6th form Mrs P Webber, Assistant Principal
and the college bursar.
Sue believes that our students’ lives should Year 10 Brent Art Competition
be enriched by a diverse range of activities ‘Hate Crime’
which they would not normally be exposed
to. As head of department she organised Year 10 GCSE art students were invited to
trips abroad and when she became a local take part in an art competition based on
magistrate she set up workshops for pupils the theme of ‘Hate Crime’. The competition
in Brent to experience the workings of a was organised by Brent police and fourteen
magistrate court first hand. schools in Brent took part.
One of Sue’s great passions is horse riding The students investigated the theme and
and she has enabled our students to have came up with a wide variety of different
the opportunity to attend horse riding ideas.
lessons, an activity that was unique to
pupils in Brent when it started. Hundreds The competition was judged at Capital City
of girls have attended the weekly lessons, and Anastasiya Kurlovich came second.
taken part in competitions, participated at Ethel Fuenzalida , Mehrun Shah, Kristen
events in Wembley and helped with fund Beaumont and Samana Gurung were all
raising activities. runners up.

2. “Excellence in Education for All”
Newsletter July 2010
Ms C. Blackburn, Curriculum Leader
Expressive Arts
NFTE Win, Lose or Draw
by Anastasiya Kurlovich The £1 Game
The Year10’s attended an awards ceremony
at Al-Khoei Foundation on 7th July.
The ceremony began with a speech by the
Mayor of Brent and was followed by
speeches by other notaries. The girls really
enjoyed the speech by Chris Preddie from
Crime stoppers. Sarah Teather, MP for
Brent gave out the awards.
After the ceremony the girls were given
lunch and prizes; a £10 voucher for the
cinema and Anastasycia received art books
from the Tate Gallery. Anastasycia will now
The Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship
be helping at the Willesden Gallery for the
(NFTE) five day programme gives year 9 an
day with Lorenzo Belenguer helping him
opportunity to learn about how to start and
mount his next exhibition. This will give her
run their own business.
an interesting insight into the working
practice of an artist.
Day 1 was a fun packed day full of
The five runners up also went to the South
inspirational business ideas. The students
London Gallery on the 18th July for a day of
had to complete a pre-task called the NFTE
workshops and art events. Well done to
win, lose or draw. The students had to
them all.
take £1 and try and make profit from it.
Razieh Mohammed from 9E purchased a
scarf for £1 and sold it for £3. She then
took the £3 she had made and purchased
another three scarves and sold them for £3
each. Razieh kept going back and forth to
buy and sell her scarves.

3. “Excellence in Education for All”
Newsletter July 2010
She made SALES of £120 and a PROFIT of
£119!
Razieh donated all the money to charity
(even the £1 she started off with!).
Ms Halai, NFTE coordinator
Brent and Harrow Science and
Technology Challenge
The students are always very eager and
they participated in all the activities with
Twelve of our year 8 gifted students
participated in the Brent and Harrow great enthusiasm.
Science and Technology Challenge day held
Ms van der Walt, science teacher
on Thursday 24th June 2010.
They worked in teams with other schools on Year 10 Geography Trip to Worthing
a rota basis and completed three of the four
challenges on the day; bridge building,
programming a toy robot, building a model
car and designing a floating buoy. The
students did very well and enjoyed the day.
The geography department took forty two
year 10 students to the seaside in
Worthing, West Sussex on Monday 12th
July.
The students collected data for their GCSE
coursework as well as enjoying the sea and
Science Primary Outreach the tourist attractions of the town.
Everybody had a wonderful time – Amina
We had yet another successful year giving
Adan wants to go again as soon as
primary school pupils the opportunity to
possible!
visit The Crest Girls’ Academy and
experience working in a laboratory.
We look forward to taking the new year
10’s there next year.
The topics this year varied from micro
organisms with Wykeham Primary school to
Mrs Sheehy, geography teacher
states of matter with Brentfield Primary
school.

4. “Excellence in Education for All”
Newsletter July 2010
Day Trip to Wimereux, France EMTAS/SEN Trip to Greenwich
On 20th July the EMTAS and SEN
On Tuesday 13th July eighty students from
departments organised a trip to Greenwich.
year 7 and year 11 went on a day trip to
France with seven members of staff. We
Fifty girls took part in this ‘new experiences
left at six o’clock in the morning and
day’. Some girls had never been to central
returned at ten in the evening.
London before and this trip gave them the
opportunity to encounter a whole new
We travelled on the ferry to Calais and then world.
drove to Wimereux, a lovely town by the
sea. The students played by the sea and
We took the underground to Westminster
ate their lunch on the promenade. Some
where we looked at The Houses of
students used the French they had learnt in Parliament, Big Ben and the London Eye.
the classroom to buy ice-cream from the
From there we took a boat and had a
shops.
guided commentary along the river
Thames. Not only did we learn a lot about
the surrounding buildings but we were
greatly amused as the presentation was
very humorous.
Then we went to City de l’Europe, a
shopping centre where girls bought lots of
souvenirs and sweets for their friends and
family.
The students were well behaved and
enjoyed their very long day, but they were
very tired in lessons the next morning.
On arrival at Greenwich we admired The
Royal Naval College and had a picnic in the
Ms Hemamda, Curriculum Leader,
park. We played and ate ice cream.
modern foreign languages

5. “Excellence in Education for All”
Newsletter July 2010
For our return journey we took the DLR With an increasing number of Brazilian girls
which allowed us to have a close look at the now in the academy it also provided a good
beautiful buildings in Canary Wharf. opportunity for the rest of the girls to learn
a little bit about the history and culture of
The day was full of fun and everyone their new friends.
enjoyed it immensely.
Mr MacKenzie, Spanish teacher
Ms Stoyanova
The First Crest Girls’ Academy Sports
Year 8 Brazil Stop the Clock Day Day
On 9th July The Crest Girls’ Academy
completed their first sports day at Willesden
sports centre. There was glorious sunshine
which made the day special. The girls took
part in a variety of events from football to a
On Wednesday the 8th July all of year 8
tug of war tournament. Other events
participated in a Stop the Clock day
included 100m, 200m, 300m, long jump, 3
workshop organised by Mr Mackenzie and a
legged race, space hopper race and finally
team of Brazilian facilitators.
the 4x100 relay.
Inspired by images taken by a group of
The event which caused the most stir was
street children from Rio de Janeiro, the day
the bucking bronco competition. It was so
involved learning about aspects of Afro-
popular that even the staff joined in on the
Brazilian history and participating in some
fun.
cultural activities. These were then used to
explore some of the difficulties faced by the
The houses became alive throughout this
poorest and most vulnerable groups in
event and a real sense of pride and
Brazil today.
belonging became more apparent. There
were house songs and banners and looking
Through these activities, which include
down the stands all you could see was a
‘Capoeira’ (a Brazilian martial art form),
sea of colours. The girls poured their heart
percussion, theatre and image analysis, the
and souls into their events with Turquoise
girls saw how culture is being used
House becoming overall house champions.
creatively to challenge negative stereotypes
and empower young people in Brazil.

6. “Excellence in Education for All”
Newsletter July 2010
CABARET
Expressive Arts Performance
On Thursday Evening
15th July fifty actors,
musicians and dancers
presented a
“Cabaret!” in the main
hall at The Crest Girls’
Academy. Led by
Thank you to all students and staff for
Chante Joseph and
making The Crest Girls’ Academy first
Elleyne and Elham
sports day so special.
Asghari as our
incomparable hosts, the audience of
Ms T Ayles, Year Director of Learning,
families and friends were presented with a
year 8
whirlwind of famous scenes and songs from
stage and screen.
Food Technology comes to the CGA
Highlights included scenes from “Titanic”,
“Finding Nemo”, “Blood Brothers” and there
From September was a surprise highjacking by the evil Dr
2010, we are finally Zorg (who looked uncommonly like a
opening the doors to teacher in the technology department…)
our Food Academy Thank fully the twins were armed with
for all students. This unlicensed nuclear accelerators strapped to
has been a 2 year their backs and they saved the world from
project for the Design Technology imminent destruction by Dr Zorg’s ray-gun.
department and we are very excited that
we are now ready to start cooking! There were moments of real tenderness,
especially in the scenes presented by the
Licence to Cook is an entitlement for all year 10 drama class. We were taken to the
students in secondary schools in England. It trenches of World War 1 to that special
provides a programme to enable students Christmas Eve when there was a voluntary
to learn to cook and understand the ceasefire, and then to the drawing room of
principles of diet and nutrition, health and a soldier’s wife who shared a letter with us
safety and wise food shopping. from her husband, and who never made it
home from the front.
More details to follow….
But – as Chante so aptly put it – “life is a
Mr McGill, Assistant Principal cabaret old chum!” and the evening
finished on a high note with Siti Awled and
Maryam Osman leading the great Queen
song “Somebody To Love”.

7. “Excellence in Education for All”
Newsletter July 2010
It was a mammoth undertaking at such a
busy time of year and thanks must be
made to the students behind the scenes,
without which, the evening would never
have been a success.
Special thanks to Shilan on the sound desk,
April on audio-visual, Baiyan and Koular on
lighting, Shukri and Charlotte for stage
management, the sixth form girl’s film crew Finally, the moment had arrived… the
and the front of house girls. announcement about the winning house,
Thank you also to the expressive arts team who had gained the most house points –
and supporting cast, Mr Kaveris, Mr Turquoise had won. Congratulations!
McDonnell, and Mr Tydda.
We couldn’t have done it without you!
Ms K Whitlocke, head of music
The Third CGA Celebration Assembly
On Thursday 22nd July the students and
staff celebrated their third celebration of This has been a fantastic first year for the
the year. Our special guest was Sue new house system and especially thanks
Kayser, performing her last task as Chair of must go to the heads of house: Ms Ahmed
Governors. The hall was full of students and Ms Appah (acting head of house for
eagerly anticipating the result of the house two terms), Ms Ercan, Ms Halai, Ms Hartley,
point competition. But first we were Ms Patel, Ms Pindoria, Ms Seymar, and Ms
treated to acts from the ‘Cabaret’ Shepherd.
performance from the night before.
Many students received prizes and
certificates from their heads of house and Mrs P Webber, Assistant Principal
Ms Kayser.

8. “Excellence in Education for All”
Newsletter July 2010
A Tribute to Muska Khpal Hence, in 2004, Muska’s continuous hunger
Medical Doctor for new learning experiences found her
being chosen to participate in a Channel 4
Documentary “My Shakespeare”. Produced
and directed by Baz Luhrmann and
Paterson Joseph, this was a production of
Romeo and Juliet, using young amateur
actors, some, like Muska, who had never
acted before.
Muska won the coveted role of Juliet, and
four weeks later went on to become a star
receiving standing ovations at a RADA
Theatre, when she played “Juliet” to
Fourteen years ago, in 1996, a young girl, perfection. The documentary was shown
an Afghan refugee arrived in the UK with on Channel 4 in December 2004.
her family. They had emigrated here to
escape the war in Afghanistan. Muska Khpal’s ‘A’ level results were again
The young girl’s name was Muska Khpal. amongst the best the school had seen, and
She arrived; unable to speak a word of she was given the opportunity to study
English and she came right here to The medicine at the highly esteemed St.
CGA, then known as John Kelly Girls’ Georges University of London Medical
Technology College. School.
Muska first spent a year working at JKGTC
Muska quickly established a reputation for as an LSA, helping students who were in a
herself, studying very hard, and learning similar situation to herself, when she first
English with such alacrity, that she was arrived in the UK.
soon top of the class in not only that
subject, but virtually every other subject Muska Khpal worked very hard indeed. Her
too. Teachers and staff remember her as a idea of rest and relaxation was continuing
cheerful student, always asking advanced her interests in acting, and subsequently
questions about her subjects. appearing as an actress in the film
“Exodus” in 2007.
She passed her GCSEs with flying colours,
getting some of the best results of her This summer, 2010 – Doctor Muska Khpal
year, and joined the sixth form to study graduated from St. Georges University.
biology and chemistry. Her ambition was to Muska is an inspiration to every student, in
become a doctor and build hospitals to every school, regardless of race, colour or
treat children in Afghanistan. creed. She has taught us that through hard
work and ambition, you can achieve your
Muska was an all round student, who goals, your dreams.
embraced everything positive that life had Her legacy to us is simple; work very hard
to offer. She did not have a privileged and you can achieve anything!
background, but that didn’t stop her from
attaining her goals. Mr T. Akinbule, ICT Systems
administrator

9. “Excellence in Education for All”
Newsletter July 2010