Year 7 student Matthew C recently went on a humanitarian aid trip to Moldova with Island-based charity, MAD-Aid, which his parents work with. 

Matthew told us this about his trip, “I liked helping to deliver food, medical aid, children’s clothes and even toys to people at some of the many projects that MAD-Aid supports.

We visited the Mother and Child Institute – a hospital in Chisinau – where MAD-Aid has pledged to raise money to renovate two neonatal wards which haven’t been upgraded since 1986 and are in a bad state. At the hospital, I met British ambassador for Moldova, Steven Fisher, as well as Gabriel Nebunu, a famous Moldovan pop star who was born at the hospital. My mum and dad were interviewed by a television crew too!

One of the things MAD-Aid does is collect medical equipment which is no longer needed from across the UK and deliver it to those in need in Moldova – this includes wheelchairs, mobility scooters and much more.  We delivered a mobility scooter to a young man in a village who had never had one before – he was so excited, and it means he can leave his home and go to the local shop!

We also did two food shopping trips and delivered the food to families in need, as well as to a Ukrainian refugee centre in Mihaileni in northern Moldova.  Here I met two Ukrainian children, and I offered them a choice of toys and other items. The little boy gave me the biggest smile as he ran off with a packet of sweets and the girl chose colouring pens – when we went to leave, she gave us each a drawing she had done.

I visited MAD-Aid’s Phoenix Centre in Riscani, which includes a day centre for children with special needs. I enjoyed a concert and a craft workshop with the children. I was also able to have a swimming lesson with some of the children who have disabilities.

The trip has made me appreciate how lucky I am and how different life is in Moldova, which is one of the poorest countries in Europe.”

Matthew did some sight-seeing too – he visited the National Theatre in Balti, as well as the monastery and caves of Orhei Vechi and several orthodox churches.

During the last school holiday, Matthew joined Ukrainian families on a visit to Cineworld in Newport, as part of MAD-Aid’s work to help Ukrainian refugees living on the Isle of Wight.

Well done Matthew!  Hard work for a very worthy cause.

Following training, a group of Year 10 students recently took on the role of Peer Educators for year 7, which saw them deliver six lessons focusing on mental health and wellbeing as part of The Peer Education Project, a programme devised by The Mental Health Foundation. This secondary school-based educational programme aims to give young people the skills and knowledge they need to safeguard their mental health and that of their peers.

The programme supports the Five Ways to Wellbeing framework adopted by the federation which promotes and encourages a healthy mindset for students and staff. It is the first time that the federation has taken part in the programme and it was a big success, with the Peer Educators and year 7 students gaining an understanding of how to protect and improve their mental health in order to lead fulfilling and happy lives.

Some of our Year 10 Peer Educators gave us an overview of the project and told us what they had learnt from it. “Last year, in June, a selection of students volunteered in a project to help younger students with their mental health, this was the Mental Health Peer Educator Project. We did training at The Island VI Form with Medina College, and from this training we planned out the lessons we would present to our given year 7 tutor groups. This project not only allowed us to help students, it also allowed us to view learning from a teacher’s perspective. Through this experience we learnt a lot about mental health ourselves and are extremely grateful to have the opportunity to engage with a class about such an important topic in our lives”.

We are already looking ahead to next year and are asking current year 9 students to consider becoming Peer Educators for our new year 7’s. All interested students should see Mrs Peckham.

Our Peer Educators are pictured below with the certificates that they received for completing their training and undertaking the role of Mental Health Peer Educators for year 7.

On Tuesday 16 May 15 students from Carisbrooke College and Medina College came together to sing as a federated choir at a Royal Coronation Prom at Osborne House. The federated choir performed alongside various other schools from across the Island.

The sun shone on what was a lovely celebration of local musical talent and community spirit. Our choir performed at the very end of the concert, closing the evening with 3 ‘Royal’ themed pieces, Lorde’s ‘Royals’, Taylor Swift’s ‘Love Story’ and the ‘Circle of Life’ from the Lion King.

We received many positive comments from the concert organisers and various audience members about the high standard of our students’ performance and also their overall behaviour and conduct throughout the event. Well done to all who took part!

If you would like to join our school choirs and take part in other amazing performance opportunities like this come along to our lunchtime clubs. Please speak to your Music teacher for further information.

On Wednesday, Medina College hosted this year’s Federation Games event. This is an annual event within the federation where all of the year 7 students from Carisbrooke take on all of the year 7’s from Medina in 5 different sports. This year’s sports were Basketball, Cricket, Boys Football, Girls Football and Handball.

The day started with an opening ceremony in the theatre, where we discussed good teamwork and sportsmanship. After moving to their sports areas, the competition got started with a bang. It was amazing, yet again, to see so many young people getting fully involved and working hard. Many of the students have never experienced a full sized sports event and it was great to see them get fully stuck into their events! With the lunch break approaching, it was clear that students were still willing to work hard and some teams had started to show themselves as potential winners of their sports.

After the lunch it was the finals, where the winning teams in each sport would be crowned. The closest two sports were the Football events, where, in both the boys and girls finals, there was a team from each school. The top place rested on these games.They would prove to be spectacular, with all of the teams involved showing great skills and endurance after a long day.

The final results:
Basketball – Winner Medina College.
Cricket – Winner Medina College.
Boys Football – Winner Medina College.
Girls Football – Winner Medina College.
Handball – Winner Medina College.

Therefore the overall winner of the 2023 Federation Games was Medina College.

Congratulations to all of the students from year 7 who took part, you were fantastic representatives for the federation! A special thank you to the year 9-10 leaders from both schools, who officiated the event – you are a huge credit to the federation. A final thanks to all of the PE team for their hard work and to the members of teaching and support staff, who came out to support the event!

A great day had by all. Roll on next year’s event where Carisbrooke will be looking to take the top spot!

There was success for Carisbrooke students at the Inter Schools Show Jumping last Friday. Carisbrooke A placed 2nd in the team standings and Carisbrooke B finished 3rd.

Lucy got the team off to a brilliant start with two clear rounds on Djocovic, progressing through to the jump off to win third place in section A with Jess also having a good round, placing 5th on Crunchie.

In Section B Amelia went clear in her first round on Monty but just got four faults in round two to take 5th place.

Lastly, in Section C Freya was able to replicate her performance from last year’s competition on the very same horse – Captain, by going clear to secure her place in the jump off, where she achieved the fastest time to take 1st place.

Well done to all of the students taking part, it was a great team performance with lots of fantastic individual achievements!

A special thank you to Jess and Amelia who have consistently represented Carisbrooke at both dressage and show jumping over the years. Jess and Amelia will be leaving us at the end of the year to continue their agricultural studies at Hartpury College – good luck girls.