The British Physics Olympiad has run national competitions in UK schools for 25 years to reward and challenge the best physicists. The exam papers stretch lateral thinking and encourage students to apply fundamental principles in novel situations. Of our pupils who took part in the GCSE Challenge paper, Mazin Karem achieved a silver award, placing him in the top 10% of students nationally. Bronze awards were achieved by Adam Weston, Raymond Win, Rahul Panikker, Abhinav Rajendron and Joe Saffer. Congratulations to all the boys who took part!

Merchant Taylors’ Boys’ School was delighted to welcome an outside speaker, Mr James Shone, to Crosby to speak to pupils, staff and parents on one of the biggest issues facing young people today – mental ill health.

James feels that ‘mental ill health is the new cancer of our young people today’ and believes passionately that it is very important for young people to learn how to make wise choices; “we can all learn so much from our mistakes and how to develop robust and wise decision making”.

James was a school teacher and house master, forced to quit teaching in 2013 following a brain tumour that left him without sight and his body partially disabled. Motivated by his desire to see children fulfil their potential, James set up the charity ‘I Can And I Am‘ and has spent three years visiting hundreds of schools to speak about his journey and the importance of inflating the balloon of self-belief.

James joins an eminent list of outside speakers who have visited the school as part of the Merchant Taylors’ Speaker Series.   General Paul Nanson, CBE visited in September last year to address the school and local community on ‘Preparing the Leaders of Tomorrow,’ and Professor Sarah-Jayne Blakemore had visited six months earlier to deliver a presentation on ‘The Adolescent Brain’ where she mounted a strong defence for every teenager in Britain who has ever slammed a door, smoked a cigarette or driven a car too fast!

‘It is always a privilege to welcome specialists to our school to share their knowledge with our pupils, staff, parents and local community and James Shone is a truly remarkable man with an inspirational message’ said David Cook, Headmaster.