St Mary's
It has been another incredible year in St Mary's!
In September we welcomed forty wonderful new ladies to our beautiful Boarding House. Within three days the house was full of the sounds of laughter, chatter and friendships being formed - this theme continued throughout the year. Our wonderful Heads of House, Pia and Sienna, were instrumental in ensuring our house was full of fun and love. As always, the way to the hearts of the St Mary’s girls is food! Pizza and sushi nights kicked off in September and were a theme for the whole year, not to mention the famous Mars Bar Slice (#iykyk). Choy and Pearl ensured there were amazing cooking smells coming from our kitchen on a regular basis.
With the nights drawing in from October, we had the pleasure of welcoming Mr Horan for an evening of much hilarity and many songs being sung from a wide variety of musicals. October also saw the ‘Swifties’ take over St Mary’s! We went to the cinema to watch The Eras Tour, and the memory of the girls singing Taylor Swift songs the whole way home will stay with us for many years to come. Taylor became a big theme of the year with evenings of friendship bracelet making, karaoke nights and trying to decide just which ERA we were currently in. Evie, Hannah H and Hannah T kept us singing for the rest of the year.
Christmas came around fast, and the girls were all very happy to receive their chocolate advent calendars, although some ladies thought it was ok to eat all 24 in one day. We had our second annual ‘pjs and pizza’ Christmas party, with loads of silly awards presented, such as ‘most likely to be on the cover of Vogue’ (Keira), ‘house comedian’ (Paula) and ‘life of the party’ (Evie).
Charity was a big theme of this year with many of our St Mary’s girls working hard on the school charity committee.
2024 started with a bang and we were able to welcome some lovely new German girls to our home. It was only a few days before it felt like they had always been part of our family. We welcomed Zoe Parfitt to our resident boarding community. As she is head gardener, our house became a place of beautiful flowers with many of the girls starting to grow their own plants. The girls voted for their favourite blossom trees, and we now have a beautiful row of them lining the road to the boarding house.
Spring soon sprung with many evenings in our glorious garden. We even had regular visits from a deer who we named Mazza!
Evenings consisted of more pizza and sushi, flower arranging with Zoe, international themed karaoke, volleyball, and flower crown making, to name a few.
We ended the school year with some tears as we said goodbye to those leaving us, but also huge smiles for the lifelong memories we have made.
Mrs Mel Gittins, St Mary's Houseparent
St Paul's
We have loved our final year at Prior Park.
St Paul’s is genuinely a home away from home, a cliché sometimes overused, but what is evident is the genuine family atmosphere of the boarding house, built with love, care and compassion. Each day has excitement and celebration. Achievements outside school, and there continue to be many, are happily attended, be they music recitals, weekly trips to football training and matches with Freshford, or boxing, badminton, rugby, athletics, orchestra, tennis, and swimming.
Weekend activities such as paintballing and Thorpe Park remain firm favourites, and dodgeball and football on the astro continue to bring the boys out in great numbers on weeknights and evenings.
We sometimes doubt if boys read noticeboards or messages, but that is soon forgotten when anything food related is mentioned by Carrie, with baking and cooking sessions always well attended. Our home kitchen is culturally enriched with smells from across the globe, the food is shared and always tastes exceptional. The daily rhythm of boarding life is never dull, but St Paul’s continues to be a nurturing environment, where boys grow in confidence and become independent which will stand them in good stead beyond Prior Park.
Mr Tony Jenkins, former Houseparent, St Paul's.
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The St Paul’s experience
From the loud summer nights, with thirty boys up on the fields with a football (the Prior Park ‘El Clásico’ was a sight to behold!), to the ‘quiet’ nights where nothing seemed to happen…
Whether it was a couple of boys deciding they would be barbers for the night, or a certain group turning to the fabled ‘Midnight Interview’, no night in the boarding house was boring. Something resembling a full cricket test match would go on in the corridors, until of course the arrival of Batman (Mr Jenkins) meant we had to call it off. Behind his steely mask, a knowing grin (and awful dad jokes) warmed us to him. Carrie was the backbone of the boarding house, either having a chat in the kitchen, or having a chat about cleaning your room (of which I have no experience).
She always knew what was needed, and she seemed to have a special, individual understanding of each and every boy in the house. I know many boys have learnt to bake and cook, and the weekends, whilst maybe quieter, were filled with her loving presence.
Over the last two years, my boarding parents became indistinguishable from my real parents, and I found myself disappointed to be going home when term ended, something I never thought I would say about school, but St Paul’s isn’t just a school, it’s a family.
Ollie Spizzirri (U5)