Upper Sixth students Avi (U6J2), Raahan (U6H1), Aparna (U6 TD) and Sienna (U6 IC) represented the UK at the Bulgarian European Youth Parliament (EYP) session in Plovdiv over Easter, following their win at the National Session in Liverpool last September. The EYP Bulgaria is an independent association that organises various debating events. It is part of a Europe-wide network, present in about 40 countries that organise more than 500 events, every year, for up to 35,000 students. It aims at raising awareness concerning European issues, whilst encouraging active European citizens and motivating students to become politically engaged. 

The students outstanding contributions earned praise from peers and encouraged cross-cultural exchange with students from Bulgaria, Norway, and Slovenia. Their discussions ranged from the protection of indigenous rights to tackling youth unemployment and examining the consequences of increasing entrepreneurship in the contemporary workplace. Throughout the sessions, Avi, Raahan, Sienna and Aparna showcased fantastic dedication and creativity, earning rave reviews for their contributions to committee work and resolution debates. 

Raahan and Aparna will continue their involvement at the ‘Harbour of Innovation’ in Greece at the next international session in July, promising further opportunities for cross-cultural exchange and spirited debate with students across Europe. 

The participation of Avi, Raahan, Sienna and Aparna in the Bulgarian EYP session not only reflects their academic success but also shows their commitment to global citizenship and adopting a solution driven approach. Their journey shows true values of leadership, collaboration and curiosity. Congratulations to the team! 

At the end of March, Mr Brennan and Miss Khurjekar accompanied seven Habs debating teams to Durham University for their prestigious annual Durham Schools Debating Competition.

As one of the pinnacles of the debating calendar, all speeches were of a high calibre, including those of our own students. 

The road to the quarter-finals

The teams faced a demanding first day, debating motions around the commercialisation of social movements and the ban on gambling. On the second day, they debated flipped learning and social housing schemes, with five qualification rounds in total.

Two of our seven teams made it through to the quarter finals. The first pair featured William (L6S2) and Sohan (L6M1), while the second was made up of Nazim (10S2) and Feeza (U5 A), the only student from Habs Girls. This placed both pairs in the best 16 out of 80 teams in all, proving an amazing achievement.

A narrow defeat

The quarter-finals were incredibly competitive, with the motion set as ‘THW abolish awards in creative fields’. Both teams delivered excellent speeches, only to narrowly miss out on a place in the semis.

Special mention must go to Rajarshi (L6J2) who placed 12^th on the best speakers list, out of 160 speakers in total. William (L6S2) and Rohitash (U6J1) also fared well, placing joint 16^th on the same list.

Our Year 10s and Year 12s put in a sterling display and we are keen to continue building on this success in the future.

Congratulations to all the students who took part, including Aarav (10H1), Samit (10R1), Richard (10R1), Lucas (10C2), Nazim (10S2), Feeza (U5 A), William (L6S2), Sohan (L6M1), Danny (10J2), Shakir (10J1), Zafer (L6M1), Zakariya (L6R1), Rohitash (U6J1) and Rajarshi (L6J2).

Two teachers and 30 students from Year 10 to Year 13 the Boys and Girls' schools welcomed Mr Stephen Pam to our joint campus. Mr Pam, a former teacher who now volunteers for Magistrates in the Community, shared his fascinating insights into the workings of the UK’s Magistrate’s Courts.

Guilty or not guilty?

Currently serving as a Magistrate with the Hertfordshire Bench, Mr Pam and his colleagues deal with all kinds of cases, including theft, drink-driving and even homicide. Talking our students and teachers through his daily work, Mr Pam explained the many different roles in a Magistrate’s Court, including prosecution, defence and probation. Students also got the chance to role-play a Magistrate’s Court hearing.

After hearing all the facts, students then debated whether the defendant was guilty or not guilty, before reflecting on what kind of sentence would be appropriate to the case.

With any mitigating factors duly considered, Mr Pam praised their excellent level of engagement with the role-play scenario, not least their curious-minded questioning at the Q&A session that followed. In fact, he placed Habs among the best schools he had visited.

Our visit from a local magistrate was an all round success. A big thank you to Alexander (L6M1), Robert (L6H2) and Evan (L6M2) for doing an excellent job of running our Law Society this academic year.

In the recent half term, Joblings collected nappies for one of our House charities, Goods for Good. Joblings have been supporting the Watford-based charity for many years, with ties originally forged by former Housemaster Mr Swallow.

Goods for Good is a not-for-profit that sources basic everyday goods from UK businesses and communities to distribute amongst vulnerable people around the world. So far the company has delivered over two million tonnes of goods to those in need, from asylum seekers and older people to those who have been affected by modern slavery and human trafficking.

Following the success of our winter clothing collection in December, the charity asked us to collect nappies on their behalf. These simple, everyday items are highly sought-after by both new and expecting mothers who arrive in the area as refugees.

We handed over the collection to Goods for Good CEO Rosalind Bluestone, who extended a heartfelt thank you to all Habs students and families who donated.

See here for ways you can support the Goods for Good programme: https://goodsforgood.org.uk/support-us

Before the end of the Spring Term, students from Year 9 to Year 13 across Habs Boys and Habs Girls immersed themselves in the vibrant world of Bollywood.

The event kicked off with an engaging presentation, highlighting the profound influence of Bollywood on global culture. Celebrating the industry’s mesmerising music and films, attendees were treated to a series of dazzling performances.

Music, food and dancing

Highlights included a captivating guitar ensemble and a spirited dhol band, along with soulful singing and dancing acts. As the evening progressed, students and staff savoured a delicious traditional Indian meal, delighting in the rich flavours of Indian cuisine.

To round off the festivities, our students danced the night away to the electrifying beats spun by the DJ, making it an unforgettable night of Bollywood magic

 

Our Year 12 team were recently awarded a semi-final prize in the MathWorks Math Modeling (M3 Challenge), securing a shared scholarship of $1500. The M3 Challenge is an engaging contest designed for High School Juniors and Seniors in the United States, as well as Sixth Form students in England and Wales. In this competition, students experience what it is like to work as a team to tackle a real world problem under time and resource constraints.

Out of 655 teams spanning the US and UK, our semi-finalists finished in the top 2%, between 7^th and 12^th place.

Working tirelessly over a 14-hour period, the students completed a maths modelling task using computer modelling and statistical analysis. The problem itself involved using several data sets to code and build mathematical models to predict housing and homelessness in Manchester and Brighton and Hove. Each paper submitted then went through rigorous examination by a judging panel made up of American PhD Applied Mathematicians.

The scholarship prize of $1,500 (£1,225) will be divided equally among our semi-finalist team and paid directly to the colleges or universities where they ultimately enrol. A big congratulations to the whole team, made up of Dawei (L6C1), Oliver (L6M2), Aryan (L6R1), Devarshi (L6J2) and Rajarshi (L6J2)

Habs played in the final of the Hans Woyda Maths Competition.

The Hans Woyda Mathematics Competition runs every year between 64 schools across London, arranged into 16 leagues of 4 teams. Each team consists of a Year 9, Year 11, Year 12 and Year 13 student from each school. The challenge is to complete difficult maths problems under timed conditions.

Habs last won the tournament back in 1991, yet our students were undaunted, beating Whitgift School 49-24 to take the crown.

The match report

The atmosphere in the affectionately named Haringmobile was jovial yet flavoured with a touch of trepidation as Joseph (9R1), Jamie (11J1), Oliver (L6M2) and Sai (U6R1), along with the titular team leader Mr. Haring, made their way to the train station. Unlike our semi-final opponents, St Paul’s, our new opposition of Whitgift School was a bit of an unknown variable, but their score of 56 points in their semi-final made clear that they were hardly a team to be scoffed at. Fortunately, as we moved onto the locomotive part of our journey into central London, head of maths Miss Harrison and maths aficionado Mrs. Brock were on hand to lighten the mood with a huge range of mathematical anecdotes, and a scenic walk from the remarkable Blackfriars station to the neutral venue of City of London School led us to a slightly undersized reception which acted as an antechamber for both us and our opponents.

Once we were seated in the competition room, with an eye-catching set of trophies and book prizes to the side, we were reminded of our mission as the key organisers enumerated the historical winners, with a set of 4 Habs victories in 6 years from 1985 to 1991 being followed by a 33-year gap now waiting to be closed. The starter questions proved to be no great challenge for our well-practised team, and we were able to build an early lead of 14 points to Whitgift’s 10. In the geometry round, Mr Haring’s joy at seeing his geometrical creations realised with some (not to scale) models of paper folding configurations provided to the students was offset by the torment of our team members who were once again thwarted by their ancestral enemy, providing only 1 correct answer out of 4. Nonetheless, strong performances on the Mental Arithmetic and Probability round led us to enter the collaborative team round with a healthy lead of 24 to 16.

A tour de force for the universally-feared Haring double-convergence strategy led to Habs going 55 for 55 on the main part of the round, with a slightly weaker performance on some more stretching questions. The round concerned the unusual function f which maps integers to the number of letters in the English name for that integer – maths fans will know that 4 is the only number n with the property that f(n) = n, and it turns out that repeatedly applying f to any number eventually yields 4 (for more exploration of the properties of f and analyses of other languages, see a good Matt Parker video on YouTube). The question posed in the competition was determining exactly how many iterations of f are required to reach 4 for any given number, with a stretch exercise asking for the largest value of n under 1 million such that k iterations are required to reach 4 for some k. I fear that the complexity of the question, which was exacerbated by a somewhat obtuse mathematical phrasing, was responsible for the misunderstanding by the Year 13 that led Whitgift to a score of 0 on that round, while we picked up 8 – in fact, this completes a streak of team round victories that has kept on through all 7 of our matches this year. This left the competition in an excellent state for us, as we now led by 32 to the opposition’s 16, and it would not be long before our score strayed into untouchable territory.

Next up was the calculator round, where Oliver’s lack of the so-called ‘brick calculator’ led to no solution, as he was forced to convert a quintic to a quartic by hand with a laborious polynomial division – Sai and Jamie, meanwhile, were more successful. It was midway through the subsequent algebra and calculus round that it became clear that our lead was insurmountable, and so we were able to appreciate the questions with a reduced level of stress but an enduring desire to push our score as high as we could. The questions, meanwhile, had other ideas, and we were actually outdone by Whitgift on the race round, despite a correct solution to a lovely question – what is the only three-digit number that divides all numbers of the form abcabc – which seems to be proof that the prime factorisation of 1001 should be top of the learning list for any future Hans Woyda hopefuls. Nonetheless, it was too little, too late – the match was over, the score was an extremely strong 49-24, and Habs, after 33 years, had done it.

The rest was formality – the presentation of the main trophy along with individual small trophies and book prizes; the team photos, including some shamelessly staged pictures of the team ‘at work’; and of course the shaking of hands with the Whitgift students, who, despite the final scoreline, have clearly done very well in the competition to get to this point. As soon as Miss Harrison can get estates to give her a maths department trophy cabinet, the Hans Woyda cup will begin its residence at a maths office near you, for the remainder of this year and hopefully more to come.

Written by Oliver (L6M2)

Proving that lightning strikes more than twice, our Bridge A team recently won the Schools Cup for the third year in a row. Our  twelfth win in five years, this year’s national champions were made up of Rufus (U6M1), Marco (U6J1), Nikhil (L6H1) and Rafi (L6J2).  

With four teams appearing in the contest on Saturday 2 March, the qualifier saw our A team make the semi-finals in second place. Meanwhile, our B team finished joint fourth, unlucky to miss out on a split tie. 

A breathless finale 

In the semi-finals, our A team met St. Paul’s, who had beaten them in the Surrey Schools Cup. Yet the boys were to have their revenge, winning by 16 to reach the final. The final itself was a re-match of last year’s against Loughborough, which was won on extra boards after the tie finished in a draw.  

This year, Habs fell nine and then 10 behind, before levelling the contest. They then went 10 ahead, only to be pegged back to level once more. 

With just one board to go and the prospect of extra boards looming again, our champions made an extra trick on the last board to win by a single point. 

Well done to all who competed. It was a thrilling finale indeed. 

This year, 3,137 students from 482  UK schools took part in the British Physics Olympiad. Proving ever-popular, the event has nearly doubled in the size from 1,616 students and 270 schools in 2020. 

Alongside a handful of overseas schools and a further 3,500 students from China, our Habs entrants yet again embraced the competition. 
 

About the Olympiad 

The Physics Olympiad challenges students’ knowledge, preparation and ability, allowing access for good students, while also providing stretch for the top young physicists in the country. 

Each question demands a different perspective, with fluency in recognising topics and linking ideas being key to developing students’ confidence and mastery. 
 

Students put to the test 

Lasting close to three hours, the British Olympiad Round 1 paper put our budding physicists through their paces, with both Habs Boys and Habs Girls sitting the exam.  

Once again, our students excelled, especially considering our physics cohort is smaller than usual this year, meaning fewer entries than before. Coupled with a 10% increase in national participants, it was an outstanding display.  

Medal winners aplenty 

Our students picked up medals across both our schools. For the boys, Aaryan (U6S1), James (U6C2) and Oliver (L6M2) all won Gold, with Silver awarded to Pranav (U6M2), Shivank (U6M2), Matthew (U6H1), Nadav (U6H2), Rohan (U6C1) and Sahrid (U6R1). 

For Habs Girls,  Amarleen (U6 TD) claimed Gold, while Ananya (U6 TD) and Taisia (U6 KXO) claimed Silver, and Aaliyah (U6 JHB) scooped Bronze. 

Well done to all who took part and good luck in the next round. 

On Saturday 10 February, no fewer than 47 students from Years 10, 11, 12 and 13 flew out to Alpe d’Huez in France. 

Six days of mostly sunny conditions meant the students were out all day, every day, improving their skiing. In fact, no time was wasted, with lessons each day building their confidence and technique. 
 

Kings of the slopes 

With the standard of skiing across all groups highly impressive, the Most Improved Skier award went to Aryaveer (10R2). 

In the advanced group, the Ski King award was handed to Alex (L6C1) by the instructor. Two further awards were presented at the end of the week. The Skier of the Tour was voted for by students and went to Reece (10R2), while a second Skier of the Tour voted for by staff went to Krish (11S1). 
 

A great credit to Habs 

Throughout the week, the students coped with the physical demands incredibly well, conducting themselves superbly.  

Indeed, the hotel staff were delighted with the good manners and general behaviour of the group, with many students ranking it as one of the best school trips they had been on.  

Needless to say, a big thank you to all Habs staff who made the adventure happen, namely Mr Andrew Simm, Mr Hardman, Dr Hobbs, Miss Barron and Ms Willows. 

 

On Sunday 4 February, two teams from Habs Boys and Habs Girls competed in a National Safe Cracking competition. 

Hosted by Dulwich College, the event was organised and led by passionate academics from the worlds of Physics and Engineering, with added support from the Weizmann Institute. 

Both teams from Year 12 worked tremendously hard leading up to the competition, so it was unsurprising they performed so well on the day. 

Hard work pays off 

There were 31 teams from a total of 17 different schools competing, with the Habs team, Fission Chips, securing second place.

Fission Chips comprised Oscar (L6R1), Ray (L6M1), Ibrahim (L6S2), Bibi (L6JJM) and Amber (L6JJM). Our other team, We Need a Vacuum, consisted of Alex G (L6C1), Alex R (L6C1), Neeam (L6S2), Evan (L6M2) and Felix (L6R2). 

Accompanied by Mrs Selouk and Miss Hooker, the contest was the culmination of months of hard work from the students. Each team needed to construct their own safe using two physics-based puzzles of their own design to secure it.  

The teams then attempted to crack their competitors’ safes, all while defending their own. A further challenge was explaining the physics at play to the judging panel.   

A cracking day all-round 

We Need a Vacuum ran into early technical difficulties, yet managed to fix them on the spot, giving them a well-functioning safe for the day. This ensured a high points score for the team in both the Judges and Peer Review categories. The boys also did well in cracking the other teams’ safes, leading to a very respectable 10th place finish.  

Overall, it was an enjoyable day of science and engineering. Both teams would like to thank Mrs Selouk, Miss Hooker and Mr Roncarati for their help in building the safes and their support on the day of the contest.  

Bringing 10 students together from 10 different Habs schools across England and Wales, our Joint Musicians’ Finals were the perfect platform for showcasing talent. 

The evening event saw students play to an incredible standard, all while mixing socially and enjoying each others performances. 

While we did not win on the night, our talented young musicians certainly did themselves proud. Representing Habs Boys was Aarav (10H2), with Sedona (M5 Aesc) appearing on behalf of Habs Girls.

10 schools, one winner 

The 10 Habs schools represented as well as Habs Girls and Habs Boys were Monmouth School, Academies Trust South, Hatcham College, Knights Academy, Borough Academy, Abraham Darby and Adams. Last but not least, were the final’s ultimate winners, Crayford Academy. 

Congratulations to all students for making it to the finals and creating an unforgettable evening of music. 

On Wednesday 6 March, the Boys’ School and Girls’ School hosted the Habs Dragons’ Den Grand Final. Taking place during an extended morning assembly, the event was attended by a glittering array of special guests. With TV and radio presenter, Sonali Shah acting as host, our panel of Dragons featured Lord Alan Sugar’s adviser, Tim Cambell MBE, along with 2022’s The Apprentice winner, Harpreet Kaur, and Khilan Dodhia from competition sponsors, Encore Capital. 

In a thrilling finale, five student teams took turns to present. After a hotly contested round of pitches, it was VitalGuard Innovations who came out on top. 

In a unanimous verdict, each Dragon on the panel chose VitalGuard Innovations as their winners, stating they would love to see a working prototype of the concept. 

The winning team featured an all-girl line-up of Ishana, Amaya and Hiira, all from M5 Alpha. The four other teams in the den were: 

Nanohealers: 
Rian (10C1),
Vivaan (10C2),
Moksh (10H1) and
Keshav (10C1) 

 

 

 

 

 

 

UniPloy: 

Vivaan (10M2) and

Aaarav (10H2) 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

VetiGrow:
Amar (11R2)
Ishan (11H2),
Rian (11M1) and
Laksh (11M1) 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Waiting Room:
Amayah (M5 Ansuz),
Yanxl (M5 A) and
Jessie (M5Aesc) 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The road to the den 

Before the Grand Final could take place, a large and excellent field of teams had to be whittled down.  Meaning the competition was just as fierce in the semi-finals.   

All boys and girls across Years 10 and 11 delivered outstanding pitches, responding impressively to some very challenging questions. It was an agonising choice for the judges, with the panel made up of our 2022 Dragons’ Den finalists, now part of the Sixth Form committee. 

Contestants had to answer detailed questions from our judges about their business plans. With 43 students pitching over a two-week period leading up to the semi-finals, it was an incredibly popular event and quite the achievement to make it to the final. 

 

The heats were on 

Even before the semi-finals, earlier heats saw students across both schools pouring the effort in to ready their pitches. Having undergone pitching preparation workshops with experienced entrepreneurs earlier this term, the teams delivered highly polished three-minute pitches to our panel of external judges.  

In the process, they received valuable feedback on all aspects of their business ideas. With three heats in total during February,  it little wonder our finalists stood up so well to the scrutiny of our visiting Dragons. 

We are extremely grateful to Laura Rudoe and Emma Harvey for delivering the pitching workshops, not to mention Khilan Dodhia, Rajesh Shah and Gemma Lyons for their time, support and invaluable feedback during the contest.  

 

More amazing teams 

Finally, thank you to all our Dragons and everyone who took part.  Not least the other teams who competed so brilliantly.  The other contestants were: 

From Habs Boys: 
Air Reformers: Joshua (10R1), Kian (10H1) 
Aztech Solutions: Shiv (11M2), Mike (11C1), Jamie (11J1) 
EcoPrint: Hari (10C2), Shay (10C2), Richard (10R1), Lucas (10C2) 
SecondLife Threads: Ben (11M2), Sahil (11C2), Jeet (11R2) 
Kai and Dan: Kai (11M2), Dan (11S2) 

From Habs Girls: 
DR. M: Mia (M5 Aesc), Diya (M5 Alpha), River (M5A) 
AbleChefs: Ameila, Karis and Jesse (all M5 Alpha) 
Why Waste It?: Sajini (U5 Aib), Larissa (U5 Aesc), Kheya (U5 Ansuz) 

From both schools: 
SpikeStop: Eva (U5 Alpha), Deveshu (11H2), Nathan (11R2) 

 

On the morning of 28 February, we welcomed Parents, Governors and External Examiners, along with our Lower Sixth and Upper Sixth, to the Habs Diploma Extended Research Project celebration.  

The Extended Research Project aims to give all students across Habs Girls and Habs Boys the chance to explore their own interests and passions in an academic format.  

Extended Research Projects are completed in the Lower Sixth, with the top projects marked by external experts in their chosen field.  

The event celebrated the 15 best projects in the faculties of Creatives, STEM and , Humanities and Social Sciences and Creatives. During the ceremony, the winners of each faculty presented their fascinating pieces.  

The Creatives faculty presented ‘The Artist Parable’. STEM students asked ‘Is carbon mineralisation the key to tackling climate change?’ Humanities and Social Sciences, meanwhile, shared their project, ‘Reflections on a wine-dark sea; investigating ancient colour perception.’ 

The event was a wonderful celebration of our Upper Sixth students, giving them a chance to reflect on the skills the Habs Diploma has given them. It also serves as a rallying call to their Lower Sixth counterparts to embrace the opportunity, one that will see them delve beyond the constraints of their A Level courses and pursue research in their chosen field. 

We look forward to June and to seeing what fascinating research the Lower Sixth will produce. 

You can read all the projects below