74% of our pupils achieved Grade A at National 5 level

The Sunday Telegraph reports surging interest in British boarding quoting Dorothy MacGinty, Head teacher of Kilgraston

Sunday Telegraph reports boarding in Britain increasingly popular

International interest in British boarding schools is on the increase with Britain being seen as ‘open for business’ thanks to the UKs successful vaccine roll-out programme.

Head teacher of Kilgraston School, Dorothy MacGinty, is quoted in today’s Sunday Telelgraph newspaper (6.6.21), discussing the trend.

The full Sunday Telegraph article can be read here

Sixth Form boarding at Kilgraston School

 

 

Women and Business - career inspiration at Kilgraston School

Preparing our pupils for their future starts from the first day of Reception, with the focus on professions becoming more focussed from aged 12 when girls start to work with the Unifrog careers platform.

Everyone agrees that the adult workplace can be a bewildering arena. To assist girls with these crucial choices, Kilgraston’s innovative Women and Business lecture programme was implemented.

Throughout the academic year, senior pupils – Lower and Upper Fifth and Sixth Form – enjoy talks from industry experts from a myriad of professions. Hearing first-hand from experts in their field is frequently the catalyst on which a whole life can pivot. Despite social distancing restrictions, our lectures continued online, often encompassing an even wider school audience.

“Let nothing stand in the way of learning,” Dorothy MacGinty, Head teacher

 

Industry expertise

Do you fancy creating and marketing a unique blend of tea? Our pupils did with Clare Pinchbeck of Hettie’s Tearoom with the innovative brand being launched at Etape Caledonia in September 2021.

Learning about the role of Daily Telegraph columnist, Judith Woods, gave the girls an insight into life as a journalist at the very top of the game, her route to a national newspaper and some of the characters encountered along the way: “Did she really say that?!”

Mental arithmetic proved a great qualification when tax specialists from international accountancy firm Saffery Champness described the many opportunities available within their field. Within a day, two pupils had signed-up to learn more about apprenticeships within the firm.

Potential legal-eagles were offered the chance to glean the inside track from solicitor, Nyree Conway, of Edinburgh firm Thorley Stephenson and, from the other side of the judicial divide, Procurator Fiscal Karon Rollo, detailed her professional life, representing the Crown Office, including gory stories of bodies on dark hillsides!

Energy and inspiration were clearly in evidence when young entrepreneur Helen Stewart, owner of Badvo Gin, gave girls an insight into starting and running your own rural business.

For those – and there are many – keen to pursue a medical career, Sally Ibbotson was on-hand to detail life as Professor of Photodermatology and Consultant Dermatologist, School of Medicine, University of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital & Medical School.

The hospitality industry has been much in the news and nowhere more so than in hotels. Gleneagles Hotel’s Commercial Director, Jane McGee, was kind enough to spare the time come to Kilgraston, offering insight into her incredibly demanding and varied role including some of the world’s other top establishments.

Each year, over 60% of Kilgraston leavers proceed to take STEM undergraduate courses. Bearing this in mind, the School was thrilled to welcome Rachel Battilana MIStractE, an engineer with SSE’s hydro scheme upgrade projects who works throughout Scotland, turning up the pressure on Scotland’s waterways.

Dental enthusiasts were entertained by Rhu McKelvey BDS (Glasgow) 1995, FDSRCS 1998, M.Orth (Edinburgh) who is not only a highly-qualified orthodontist but a very successful entrepreneur, starting, running and continually expanding BEAM Orthodontics in Dundee.

Since Spring 2020, being “guided by the science” is a phrase with which we have all become familiar. But for Dr Julie Maxton CBE, Executive Director of London’s Royal Society, life is actually about helping to produce the scientific facts and data that can sway governmental decisions. We were honoured that Dr Maxton was able to join us.

Putting a twist on the traditional is what businesswoman Michelle Maddox of Clootie McToot is all about. Just five years ago, the Perthshire mum took her gran’s clootie dumpling recipe, added flavours such as Plum and Gin and Banana and Toffee (yum), in the process, turning it into a massive commercial enterprise, now stocked by high street giants, John Lewis. Michelle spoke o Kilgraston girls in September 2021.

Medicine is a perennial favourite with Kilgraston leavers, and, in January 2022, Kim Dale - Professor of Cell and Developmental Biology, Vice Principal (International) School of Life Sciences, University of Dundee visited the School to speak with girls about her fascinating journey to become one of the UKs leading experts in her field.

 

Future speakers

  • March 2022 we will welcome social, philosophical and religious commentator, Catherine Pepinster, a research consultant at St George’s House within Windsor Castle. Catherine will draw on her many achievements, including as first female editor of The Tablet review; a development consultant with The Anglican Centre in Rome and an Assistant Editor of The Independent on Sunday newspaper. As a visiting Scholar (Religion, philosophy, politics) at St Benet’s Hall, Oxford University, and an alumnus of Heythrop College, University of London, together with The University of Manchester and City, University of London, Catherine has combined intense academia with a varied and stimulating career.
  • June 2022 - Mike Harvey, Technology PR specialist - Mike will chart his successful route from reading French and Russian at the University of Oxford, to working as a journalist on The Times, becoming Communications Director for multi-platform behemoth, Google, and now running his own PR consultant for the technology industry
  • September 2022 - Sally Patten, editor of Sydney’s leadership magazine, BOSS, will - with the benefit of many decade of experience of the business-world - give pupils the inside track on life in the boardroom.
  • November 2022 - Kathleen Hornby, South African-based entrepreneur, trained with legendary chef Pru Leith in London before returning to her native country, starting and building a bespoke safari company
  • Continuing the entrepreneurial theme, young mum Sophie McEwan of the beautiful home wares and interiors outlet and online venture, Quince & Cook, will come to Kilgraston in January 2022 to describe her idea for the business, finding premises, opening-up then - boom - Covid caused lockdown and a swift volte-face to an online business model was required. Resilience and flexibility, two of the core principles taught at Kilgraston.

In line with our on-going commitment to building the next generation of entrepreneurs, in 2019 Kilgraston was also the proud sponsor of the Inspirational Women category at the 2019 Business Women Scotland Awards.

Learning life always goes on.

Seeking ‘space’ and ‘fresh air’ - Scottish boarding market sees domestic, post-lockdown, uptick

Dorothy MacGinty, Head teacher of Kilgraston School: “Life at a boarding school is always challenging but, like everywhere else, the last fourteen months have been specifically difficult for myriad reasons. Apart from ensuring pupils were academically and pastorally fulfilled, an independent school is a multi-million pound, international business and, obviously, Covid-19 has thrown-up many additional hurdles to parents from abroad contemplating sending their child to a British boarding school.”

Mrs MacGinty continued: “However, life is always surprising. Interest from the domestic boarding market has seen a remarkable upsurge. Parents (and their daughters) are quoting ‘space’, ‘smaller classes’, ‘fresh air’ and, most interestingly, ‘having a bedroom to escape to and their own personal space’ as the last few months have been so confined. Also fascinating is the move from the English GCSE and A-Level curriculum to our SQA, Highers and National Fives. Parents from down-south are clearly thinking ahead to university places and now seeing the Scottish school timetable as positive move to getting into Scottish universities.”

The full article can be read here: Daily Telegraph

National and personal athletics success for Kilgraston pupil

Huge congratulation’s to Kilgraston School pupil, talented athlete Freya H, who took part in last weekend’s British Athletics Coventry Spring Meet, producing a personal best performance in shot-put and finishing top of the F37 classification.

Lined-up against some of the country’s best para athletes, the Sixth Form pupil was representing her hugely supportive club, Perth’s Strathtay Harriers.

Commenting on her recent performance, Club Head Coach, Jim Hunter, said: “Freya’s continual improvement - she is also a talented javelin thrower and runner - is just reward for all the hard work she has put in to this point. From a club perspective, we are really chuffed for her.”

Picking up on the story, the Daily Record ran a feature on Freya, which also highlighted the difficulties the last year of lockdown has had on athletes and the sheer dedication needed to maintain standards.

Freya competing on Saturday in Coventry on Saturday 24 April 2021

Picture credits: the Perthshire Advertiser, Richard Wilkins, & Alison Howgate

Kilgraston food bank drive

Kilgraston’s Charity and Community Prefect, Upper Sixth’s Katie, has been spearheading a drive to help local families facing food shortages with a campaign to donate to local food banks.

Kilgraston pupils and staff donated what they could to the food bank collection points at their local supermarket. Donations would go to their local food banks.

Thank you to everyone who kindly donated.

Women and Business at Kilgraston School - Dr Julie Maxton of The Royal Society

“Nobody has a monopoly on wisdom, always be open to learning.”

Wise words indeed from Dr Julie Maxton CBE, Executive Director of London’s historic Royal Society, spoken via Zoom while giving her inspirational talk as part of Kilgraston School’s Women and Business lecture programme.

Brought up in Edinburgh, and originally training as a barrister at the Middle Temple in London, Dr Maxton talked to girls about her career-trajectory and what had brought her to the position of the first woman in 350 year to hold the post at the world’s oldest, continuous, scientific academy: “I’ve had a lifetime of looking at evidence,” she told girls, “always try to look through the eyes of each side.”

The Royal Society enjoys patronage of scientific super-brains including, Sir Christopher Wren, Sir Isaac Newton, Jennifer Doudna, Dorothy Hodgkin, Sir David Attenborough, Jocelyn Bell Burnell, together with Elon Musk, one of only five, global, centibillionaires.

It’s motto ‘Nullius in verba’ means ‘take nobody’s word for it’: “This is an expression of the determination of members to withstand the domination of authority and to verify all statements by an appeal to facts determined by experiment,” expanded Dr Maxton, “we always look for the facts, we’re the opposite of ‘fake news’”.

Part of Dr Maxton’s job is to administer the RS’s £100m annual grant budget, nurturing a pipeline of over 3,000 young scientists who benefit from the global network of experts offering mentoring, investment and business advice. “I didn’t know a thing about spreadsheets,” laughed the good-humoured speaker, “but I sat down and learnt and knew how to ask if I didn’t!”

Girls also learnt how Dr Maxton’s progression drew on various life- influences, including, in her current position, legal contacts nurtured during time as a barrister: “I knew quite a few judges and one of the recurring subjects was the need for better understanding of the strength of accurate scientific evidence presented in court.” Continuing, she added: “the right questions must always be asked, based on a clear statement of science.”

This thought-process resulted in RS Fellow and renowned University of Cambridge Professor of Public Understanding of Risk in the Statistical Laboratory, Sir David Spiegelhalter OBE, giving several senior judges topic-specific lectures on scientific assessment: “Remember,” commented Dr Maxton, “you must always keep learning; learn anywhere and from anyone.”

As a result of this collaboration with the Royal Society of Edinburgh, benchmark-documents, on subjects such as ‘Forensic DNA analysis,’ ‘Forensic gait analysis,’ and ‘The use of statistics in legal proceedings,’ are now embedded in the UKs legal framework.

Pupils were quick to fire questions at the impressive guest-speaker with one Sixth Former intuitively asking how she dealt with career set-backs.

Answer? “At my first job, I was the only woman in the faculty. Always be analytical and objective, your professionalism will carry you through. Very quickly, I learnt that you have to look after yourself.”

Hugely impressed by the visiting speaker, one Fifth Form girl described Dr Maxton as “inspirational,” adding that it had “opened her eyes to global possibilities.”

Concluding the lecture, Dr Maxton urged pupils not to feel pigeon-holed by following one path: “Be prepared to change career, take opportunities. No one will think for you. Put your own hand up.”

Sound advice indeed.

 

 

 

Sixth Form at Kilgraston - Glasgow University virtual information event

Despite the school building being physically closed, preparation for life after school is still going ahead in the Sixth Form.

As part of our Sixth Form Studies programme, we recently welcomed Kirsty Notman from Glasgow University to talk to talk to out Lower Sixth and Upper Sixth about Higher Education and what Glasgow university has to offer.

This was via Zoom rather than in person but the talk still created a sense of enthusiasm and excitement, particularly for our Upper Sixth who will be embarking on their own Higher Education journeys soon.

The talk was very engaging and gave our students’ lots of food for thought. The question and answer session was especially interesting with lots of great question about entry requirements, degree structures, student accommodation, as well as what universities are doing regarding the Erasmus scheme and how they have adapted to online learning.

Over the coming weeks we have other speakers from different institutions lined up to give virtual talks so the Sixth Form have a broad range of experiences to help inform their future decisions.

You can find out more about Sixth Form at Kilgraston here and you can attend our next Sixth Form Information Event on February 6th 2021. Contact us for information on how to attend.

Kilgraston Sixth Former writes in national magazine

Kilgraston Sixth Former, Anna, has written an article for a national magazine about embracing the return to school in September.

In the autumn edition of magazine, Independent School Parent, Anna discusses how she is relishing the human interaction of being back in school, and has got used to the ‘new normal’ of face masks and temperature checks.

The autumn term senior school special digital edition of Independent School Parent features some of the winners and finalists from the Independent Schools of the Year 2020 awards, including an interview with Captain Sir Tom Moore’s grandson Benjie, who won the Rising Star category for his fundraising efforts.

You can read Anna’s article on page 23 in the link below.