On Thursday 15 December nearly 60 students from across the Federation joined together to stage our first live IWEF Christmas Concert since 2019 at St. John’s Church in Newport.

The concert began with a tinkling rendition of ‘Jingle Bells’ performed on the hand bells by members of the Carisbrooke College breaktime Music Hub. This was followed by the humorous ‘I want a Hippopotamus for Christmas’, performed by students from all 3 sites with a special guest appearance from our Brass teacher Mr. Stroud on the tuba – dressed as a hippopotamus!

Evie and Sherine, from Medina College, then took the stage with a mature performance of Fiona Apple’s ‘Paper Bag’, performing again later with the Medina College Band in a ska performance of Duke Ellington’s ‘Caravan’ with other students from the school.

Ensembles from the Carisbrooke College School of Rock group performed an eclectic mix of songs including Green Day’s ‘Brain Stew’, Chris Rea’s ‘Driving Home for Christmas’ and year 9 student Lucy’s own song ‘My Christmas Wish’. Some of our Carisbrooke College Year 7 students then joined the final School of Rock ensemble to perform the Makaton sign language alongside their rendition of ‘Rockin’ around the Christmas Tree’.

Our federated IWEF choir performed the well loved Christmas carol ‘O Holy Night’ and then ‘You will be found’ from the musical Dear Evan Hansen. While the Carisbrooke College Ukulele Club performed the folk number ‘Santa never brings me a banjo’, joined by local musician JC Grimshaw playing on the banjo.

Our Island VI Form ensemble got the crowd singing along with their lively cover of Slade’s ‘Merry Xmas Everybody’ and our stage band from the recent IWEF production of ‘Wendy and Peter Pan’ performed a popular item from the show, Emeli Sande’s ‘Sparrow’.

The concert ended with all of the evening’s musicians joining together for a massed grand finale performance of Kelly Clarkson’s ‘Underneath the Tree’. The concert was very well attended and raised over £220 was raised for our Creative Arts Faculty to put towards new sound equipment for future events.

On Saturday 10 December a group of Carisbrooke College and Medina College students from years 9 to 11 had the opportunity to take part in a mock court trial at Newport Crown Court.

The students were split into different roles, defence, prosecution, witnesses and jury. There were 9 island schools including sixth forms and colleges participating on the day.

Our students gave us the following feedback:

“I think it was a great opportunity that allowed people, who would normally be worried about their future and unsure of post-16 life, to spend a day exploring law as an option. Even though I don’t see myself doing law, It was still very worth it.”

“The day was spent having discussions with lifelong professionals, debating, and having fun with friends. Overall, it looks great on a CV and was lots of fun”.

Our students showed great resilience and teamwork and received some fantastic feedback from the judge. It was an amazing experience and we are really proud of all that took part.

On Monday 5 December, 36 Year 9 students from Carisbrooke College and Medina College travelled to London to visit the Natural History Museum.

The purpose of this trip was to enhance our stduents understanding in up and coming geography topics, looking at the structure of the earth and volcanoes as well as consolidate learning in history.

Despite the extremely early start (5:15am!), the pupils had an amazing time on the trip, learning a huge amount and for some, experiencing museums and London for the first time.

The behaviour of our students was impeccable, they were an absolute credit to the federation.

Last week students from across Carisbrooke College, Medina College and The Island VI Form came together and treated us to two amazing performances of RSC’s Wendy & Peter Pan. 

To ensure students had the opportunity to take on different roles, the cast were split into two groups. The crocodile cast took on the lead roles during Wednesday’s performance with tiger cast supporting, this was reversed for Thursday’s show when the tiger cast played lead roles, with crocodile cast supporting.

Wednesday night saw our amazing Crocodile Cast take the stage at Medina Theatre! The play opened with a touching scene in the home of the Darling family, with the children playing ‘battles’ in the Nursery before tragedy strikes the family. Evie gave a powerful performance as Wendy, shining as a strong-willed independent young woman keen to spread her wings whilst bearing her heavy sense of responsibility as big sister to her three younger brothers, John, Michael and Tom (played masterfully by Megan, Freddie and Zach). Isabella and Eleanor were exceptional as Mr and Mrs Darling, delivering a mature portrayal of a marriage in turmoil following the loss of a child. Ellie burst confidently into the story as a mischievous and somewhat clumsy Peter Pan, accompanied by Tink, a fairy big on attitude and played with sass-a-plenty by Akifa. We were then transported to Neverland where we meet the motley crew of Lost Boys: Flynn entertained the audience with his character of Tootles, a Lost Boy desperate to be brave, yet looked down on by the other Lost Boys (including the hilarious Lilly, Preslava and Chloe as Curly, Nibs and Slightly). Adventures ensue and the action is soon ramped up with the introduction of Captain Hook, played with fiendishly menacing charm by Bethany, and flanked by Alfie as Hook’s adoring, long-suffering Smee. Louis was uproarious as the cheerful yet useless pirate Martin, joined on stage with the other Pirates Murt, Jones and Doc Swain, played by Destiny, Kiera and River. Maisie also mastered an excellently gory death as pirate Skylights! The hero of the hour was Lucy’s Tiger Lily, the effortlessly cool and tough Picin Princess, uniting with Wendy and Tink to form a Girl Power trio determined to end Hook’s reign of terror.

Thursday night saw our incredible Tiger cast take the stage! Evie reprised her role as Wendy, this time joined by Lily, August and Brooke as her three brothers John, Michael and Tom, with Luca and Daisy starring as Mr. and Mrs. Darling. The magic of Neverland was brought alive when Peter and Tink crashed on to the stage, with a confident performance from Hadley (Peter) and ‘the role of a lifetime’ for Megan as the brash fairy: a favourite with the audience! Joley, Lily-Rose, Amelia and Ella delivered great performances as Lost Boys Tootles, Curly, Nibs and Slightly, putting up a good right against the nasty pirates Murt, Jones and Doc Swain (played by Lewis, Evie and Mia). Sam charmed the audience with his performance as the hopeless Pirate-turned-Lost Boy, Martin, and Annelise took on the role of the fated pirate Skylights, dying a bloody death before changing out of costume to join our musicians on stage as singer. Carys wreaked brilliant terror on stage as the villainous Captain Hook, stalked by another favourite with our audiences – the crocodile himself! Cormac gave a committed performance as the slimy crocodile, who – in a plot twist – was also the Doctor who came to visit the youngest Darling boy, Tom, at the start of the play. Izzy played Hook’s long-suffering sidekick Smee, and Eloise saved the day as Tiger Lily, uniting with Wendy and Tink to storm Hook’s ship ‘The Jolly Roger’ and free the Lost Boys and Darling children from impending peril.

Throughout both performances our fantastic chorus worked hard alongside our principal characters as Lost Boys and Pirates, and our skilled team of Shadows (led by Mrs. Shorrock) enabled our characters to FLY! Miss. Elkin worked tirelessly with our students to choreograph some impressive sword fight scenes and stage combat, and our fabulous student band (led by Mrs. Peckham) accompanied the story beautifully with their eclectic mix of folk and popular songs.

Our student stage crew oversaw a number of set changes and transitions, during the shows, with seamless professionalism, and lighting was expertly provided by the Medina Theatre technicians. A huge thank-you to Mr. Lyle for directing this impressive production and bringing Neverland to life!

On Tuesday our ‘SING’ groups from Carisbrooke College, Medina College and The Island IV Form came together to perform at Osborne House as part of a ‘Christmas at Osborne ’ event. The event was organised by the IOW Music Hub in partnership with English Heritage.

The performance took place in the historic Durbar Room, the very room used by Queen Victoria and her family for their own Christmas performances  – a truly unique performance opportunity for everyone involved!

Students performed ‘You will be found’, a song they have been preparing for our upcoming performance of ‘Wendy and Peter Pan’, along with the quirky ‘I want a hippopotamus for Christmas’ and Adolphe Adam’s classic ‘O Holy Night’.’

We have included a photo from a book located in the Durbar Room which has an extract of an interview with Dorothy Blake, who was born in 1866 and was the daughter of Queen Victoria’s land agent. Here Dorothy describes her memories of Christmas time at Osborne.  

Our students performed beautifully. Mrs Brear and Miss Peckham are very proud of them all.

Year 8 students have recently been looking at composite materials and their uses in real world applications.

They were set a challenge to build the strongest bricks using nothing but flour, water, and different types of pasta/cereal. They then tested their designs by hanging weights from their bricks. The designs were incredible and some were so strong Mr Spence had to go on the hunt for extra weights!

The students were very engaged and had a lot of fun designing, building, and testing their own composite materials!

We are pleased to announce the implementation of the Mentors in Violence Prevention (MVP) programme at Medina College. The MVP project is an exciting peer-led leadership and bystander programme. MVP trains students as mentors and equips them with the confidence, knowledge and skills to identify and speak out against bullying, abusive behaviour and violence. It aims to tackle the beliefs, attitudes and culture which can give the message that some violence is acceptable.

We share a vision for Medina College to be a place where all students can attend school free from violence and the fear of violence in all its forms. The MVP mission is to achieve ‘prevention through connection’. Our team of mentors are focused on driving the change required within our community to successfully tackle the acceptance and consequences of violence.

The Year 10 mentors successfully completed their training and, last week, delivered their first MVP session to the Year 7 cohort. The mentors did a fantastic job and the Year 7 tutor groups engaged well with the mentors and the lesson themes. The mentors will deliver further sessions across the year, passionately driving the MVP message to support the safe and healthy environment that enables our community to thrive. Well done mentors.