Yesterday evening was our annual school Founder’s Day. It was a great event and a wonderful celebration of our Year 11 students in particular, but also many prizewinners in Year 13 and other year groups. We enjoyed performances from the Decibels and Bigg Band and were particularly delighted to welcome Mr Michael Skinner as our honorary guest in order to recognise his very significant contribution to Wallingford School over many years as school governor, trustee of the Walter Bigg Foundation and, perhaps most importantly, friend of the school.

It was an excellent evening and thank you to all of those families who attended and also to all of the staff in school who were involved in the planning of the event.

While mentioning events, we have this week launched our Sponsored Walk. This is our biannual walk from the school to Wittenham Clumps and back in which the whole school participates. It is great fun and was a tremendous success when it last took place in 2021 when over £20,000 was raised for the Thames Valley Air Ambulance. This year we are supporting the Teenage Cancer Trust and are looking to exceed 2021’s fundraising total – ambitious but we are going for it! Much more information about how to support this will be available shortly through the school’s social media channels.

Finally, we are now firmly in the trips and visits season. Half of Year 7 had a great day at Kew Gardens on Wednesday with the other half going in a couple of weeks’ time; our Year 8 German students are currently in Aachen; and the Year 9 Residential visits are out all of next week. It is a busy but memorable point in the school year.