Good News from Duke’s – 28th Feb 2025

This week’s Good News round up comes courtesy of the PE department at Duke’s who wanted to share in a number of their exciting events so far this term. 

The Indoor Athletics started in January and Year 7 and 8 have been competing in the Indoor Sports Hall Athletics at St Thomas More School. Following on from these events, we took a small group of our strongest athletes to compete in the Haringey Athletics Championships at Lee Valley Stadium yesterday and there were a number of successes. Cavalli in Year 9 won the 200m for the second year in a row, John in Year 10 won the 800m for a second year in a row and Kamarion also in Year 10 made it 3 years in a row in the 200m for his age group. All these boys will now have the opportunity to represent Haringey in the Middlesex Championships later in the Year. There were also second place finishes for Darius in the 60m, Michael Year 8, Cavalli Year 9 and John Year 10 in the Long Jump. Khyroe finished 3rd for Year 8 in the 200m and a special mention for Kimorae in Year 8 who was the only female athlete to take part and finished a respectable 5th in the 60m. Please congratulate the students when you see them as this event is attended by all 10 schools in the borough.

The PE department has an excellent relationship with the Tottenham Hotspur Foundation. With the foundation we are able to offer our year 7 pupils a chance to participate in a Sports Leadership course during curriculum time and help them build important social skills that will support their learning at Dukes. We were recently fortunate enough to have the match of The Day team come in and look at this course and speak to our students. You can see some of this at 50 mins and 20 seconds on the link below.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m00284c1/match-of-the-day-202425-15022025

In the penultimate week before half term we also hosted all schools in the local area for the Haringey borough Badminton Tournament and were represented by two male teams at key Stage 3 and key Stage 4. 

In Football Mr Durrant has been taking a number of fixtures for both our Year 8 and 9 Football teams. Our Year 9 boys are the reigning district champions and need a win in their final group game against heartlands to qualify for the finals day. They narrowly beat the team they beat in last year’s final Alexandra Park School, 2-1 in the final week of term to keep them in with a chance of qualifying.

Well done to the PE department – a great round up of their ongoing events and activities!

Good News from Duke’s – 7th February 2025

Jack Petchey Speak out Challenge

On Tuesday 5th February Roj in year 10 competed in the borough wide finals of the Jack Petchey Speak Out Challenge. Roj took to the stage alongside a number of other students from Haringey schools to perform his speech. Roj spoke with clarity and enthusiasm and really represented Duke’s well. We’re all massively proud of him for braving the stage and showing real grit and determination. Well done also to Mr Avevor and the English team for their running of the Speak Out Challenge! 

 

Hardwick Hall History Trip

This week our year 11 History students got to visit the fantastic Hardwick Hall in Derbyshire. The visit was a rousing success with students able to see Elizabethan England brought to life in the surroundings of one of the country’s finest prodigy houses. Well done to Mr Broadbent and the History team for organising such a great trip. 

 

Sporting Success

It’s been a busy week for the PE team. Duke’s hosted two of the borough finals for Badminton as well as beating Alexandra Park school 2-1 at football. This is a great success and paves the way for more in the coming weeks! Will be good to see a Duke’s team in the final.. Fingers crossed. Well done to Mr Green and the whole PE team for their work this week. 

Good News from Duke’s – 31st January 2025

Poetry Live!

On Thursday 30th January the English department took 30 students to attend the prestigious ‘Poetry Live’ Workshop at the Victoria Apollo Theatre. 

Students were provided with key exam insights from GCSE examiners and enriched through live poetry performances from some of the nations best poets – Carol-Ann Duffy, Simon Armitage and John Agard. 

Thank you to everyone involved in supporting this trip and a big thank you to Mr Avevor and Ms Rodney for attending. 

 

Sports Leaders

The PE department in conjunction with Tottenham Hotspur have been running a sports leaders programme for our Year 7s for the past two years. On Tuesday 28th January our current year 7s completed their award and took part in the final session. 

A TV crew from Match of the Day as well as a Spurs Player visited the school to film our Sports Leaders delivering a Football session to draw attention and raise awareness of the power sport has to develop confidence, resilience and interpersonal skills. 

It was a fantastic experience for all involved. Well done to Mr Green and the PE department for making it happen. 

 

Linklaters Careers Insight Day – Year 9 

On Friday 24th February our year 9s got to experience their Careers Insight Day at Linklaters Law. The whole year group got to visit Linklaters offices in the City of London and took part in a range of exciting and interesting careers focused activities. 

Students also got to meet a number of employees of Linklaters and talk to them about their routes into their chosen professions. It was just about law – students found out about a number of other professions as well as being treated to a fantastic lunch! Thanks to Linklaters yet again for a great day.

Good News from Duke’s – 24th January 2025

Staying Safe Assemblies 

Insight Platform, a Haringey based organisation, were at Duke’s this week delivering assemblies to all students on the subject of staying safe. Students received information on the dangers of substance abuse as well as being taught about where they could go to get help. We always value working with local community organisations at Duke’s and the team from Insight Platform are no expectation. We are looking forward to our partnership growing in future months. 

 

Eastside Employability from Linklaters

Our partnership with Linklaters Law has continued this week with our newest cohort of year 10 students beginning the Eastside employability programme. The series of workshops and activities are aimed at driving up our students’ employability and look at future careers. The students have made a smashing start and the workshops have been very gratefully received.