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One of QE’s leading sixth-formers enjoyed a day of a lifetime rubbing shoulders with members of the Royal Family and celebrities within the walls of Windsor Castle.

Binu Perera, who is a Senior Vice-Captain at QE, was just a few metres from the carriage of the newly-weds as it left the castle.

He was one of 1,200 members of the public invited to the castle for the day by Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, based on nominations from the nine regional Lord Lieutenant offices. Binu was selected by the School for the honour, with the recommendation then passed on to Martin Russell, who is Deputy Lieutenant for the Borough of Barnet and a former QE parent.

Since he is under 18, Binu, of Year 12, was accompanied by his mother as a chaperone. “It was an absolute honour, truly a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” he said afterwards. “The wedding was absolutely amazing. Windsor Castle was beautiful, and I had such a great time with my mum. We were so close to the carriage, the rest of the royals – and so many other celebrities. The atmosphere was buzzing!” The picture above was taken by Binu.

“The service itself was wonderful, and there was such a warm and summery atmosphere: it sounds really clichéd, but in many ways, it truly was a perfect wedding,” he adds. “I never imagined that I would be among such a small number of people chosen to attend such an iconic and symbolic event.”

Thanking the School for the opportunity, Binu added: “This royal wedding was a symbolic one: representative of the modern, changing image of Britain – a country of acceptance, variety and multiculturalism. The service itself was unique in terms of the mix of gospel and traditional music and the readings given, embodying the couple’s contemporary approach to the Monarchy.”

Assistant Head David Ryan’s nomination to the Deputy Lieutenant described Binu as “an excellent role model” who set up his own online blog for young people tackling topics as diverse as medical ethics, depression and identity.

“Within the School he has been appointed as senior Vice Captain to the School Captain on account of his excellent record of involvement, in peer-mentoring, in music and a range of other school-based activities. Modest yet charming, witty and effervescent, it is hard not to be impressed by him.

“In many ways he embodies modern Britain; he is hard-working, marrying his innate talents with industry and determination, which underlies his desire to enter the field of medicine when he moves on to undergraduate studies. We recommend him wholeheartedly,” Mr Ryan wrote.

QE Headmaster Neil Enright has announced the prefect team for 2018, including the new School Captain and the other Senior Officials.

Aashish Khimasia will take over at the head of the team of Senior Vice-Captains, Vice-Captains, House Captains, Deputy House Captains and Prefects, all drawn from Year 12.

The Headmaster said: “My thanks go to the outgoing School Captain, Oliver Robinson, for the excellent way in which he has conducted himself and handled his responsibilities. I congratulate Aashish and his team on their appointment: these are positions of significant responsibility, critical to the smooth running of the School, to the success of major events and to the culture of QE.

“Being awarded one of these roles is rightly seen as a great honour and reward, and it reflects the sustained commitment the successful candidates have already shown to the School and to their peers. I am convinced that the new team will do a sterling job in upholding our fine traditions.”

In addition to the duties he will undertake as School Captain, Aashish will continue to play a significant role in the extra-curricular life of the School. “I play rugby for the School and am currently in training for water polo,” he said. “I’m also part of the Concert Band, Symphony Orchestra, Barbershop Group and Flute Ensemble, I’m a member of the QE Model United Nations debating team and am involved in leading the Medical Society, as well as assisting at Friday Biology Booster sessions. I am a peer mentor and I plan to take part in voluntary work to help the homeless in the Christmas holidays.

“I try to keep an open mind to different ways of life, and to ways of personal mental and emotional development outside of an academic context,” added Aaashish, who is described by this tutor as an “excellent all-rounder” who is “calm and methodical”.

His Senior Vice-Captains are Binu Perera – “driven, passionate and creative” according to his tutor – and Aditya Ravindrakumar, who is “organised, methodical, precise and charming”.

Both are musicians, while Binu’s extra-curricular interests include membership of the Combined Cadet Force and Aditya enjoys judo and rugby, as well as helping to mentor the élite mathematicians in Years 10 and 11.

“I think I am quite an approachable person that people can trust to listen to them…Also, I am quite passionate about the things that I do, and if I do something, I like to do it properly,” said Binu.

For his part, Aditya said: ““I think that one of my core values is honesty; I try to be considerate and respectful to everyone, regardless of who they are and where they come from.”

Under this trio is a ten-strong team of Vice-Captains, together with a Captain and Deputy Captain for each of the six Houses. A slight expansion of the prefects team to 90 reflects the fact that the Sixth Form is the largest in the School’s 444-year history.

Leke Abolade is helping to inspire future generations of black Oxford University students through a new graduate alumni network.

The Oxford Black Alumni Network, which numbers more than 200 members, aims to connect black Oxford graduates from across the generations as well as inspiring current and future alumni “to fight for their causes and achieve common goals”, as its website puts it.

Leke (OE 2004–2011) was among a small group of members who were pictured at its launch – an image reproduced by major media outlets, including the Evening Standard and The Voice.

“The photoshoot was organised by members of the network, myself included, which has been created to highlight the inspiring and varied endeavours of Oxford alumni of black African and Caribbean heritage across fields including entrepreneurship, academia, and careers in the City, Law, media, tech, the arts and sports,” he says.

Naomi Kellman, the network’s co-chair, who took a PPE degree in 2011, told the Evening Standard: “There is still a concern among black students that if they apply, they might be the only one — they might think Oxford is not for ‘people like me’. But we want to show that’s not true. There is a long history of black students at Oxford doing well and being happy.”

After leaving QE, where he had enjoyed rugby with the Second XV, as well as singing in the Chamber Choir and playing with the Senior Strings, Leke went up to St Catherine’s College to read Engineering. In his four years in Oxford, he threw himself fully into student life, belonging to the university’s Amateur Boxing Club as well as its African Caribbean Society, Energy Society and Engineers Without Borders. He was also involved in St Catherine’s rugby, in the college choir and in a musical production, Chutney and Chips.

“Oxford was a fantastic educational experience and I want to ensure that prospective black students can believe this will be true for them as well,” he said.

Since graduating in 2015, he has worked in various roles, including a spell in the Osney Thermo-Fluids Laboratory within Oxford’s engineering faculty. Leke has spent most of 2017 working as a software developer with LexisNexis – a US company that works especially with law firms and other organisations operating in the legal sphere.

He is now carrying the objectives that inspired the formation of the new network into his professional life as well.  “Last year I began a career as a software developer and found myself in an industry that, like Oxford, has problems of under-representation,” he said. His response has been to volunteer as a coach in his spare time for Codebar – a non-profit initiative that runs programming workshops in a safe and collaborative environment to improve career opportunities for under-represented communities in technology.

Hemang Hirani has been offered a job with an investment bank – but is keeping his options open after a period that has seen him involved in volunteering ventures ranging from mentoring pupils at under-performing London schools to supporting poor cancer patients in Mumbai.

Hemang (OE 2008–2015), who was Senior Vice Captain at QE, is currently in the third year of his Geography degree at the LSE.

He spent the summer of 2017 as an intern in UBS’s Collateral and Margin Management Team, performing so well that he has been offered a place to return to the team on the bank’s 2018 Graduate Training Programme (GTP) in London. Hemang says: “I am still keeping my options open and considering undertaking further study, particularly in urban geography/spatial economics – two areas I have come to gain a strong interest in over the course of my undergraduate degree.”

His spell at UBS represents quite a contrast to the time he spent the previous summer with Impact Guru. This newly-founded organisation, akin to the UK’s JustGiving, describes itself as a “donation-based crowdfunding platform for Indians across the world to give back to their country”. Hemang spent just under two months in Mumbai as an intern for Impact Guru, during which his focus was on raising awareness about the plight of cancer sufferers and on actively running fu ndraising campaigns for patients, many of whom came from poor backgrounds. It involved him meeting several businesses to present them with proposals for sponsorship.

In a blog post for Impact Guru, Hemang recounted his experience of meeting cancer patients at the Tata Memorial Hospital in the Parel district of the city. There he found the families of poor patients struggling to cope with bureaucratic requirements (“Although I was able to understand what they were trying to say, my limited Hindi could not do them justice,”) and met cancer victims from outlying areas who automatically lose their right to accommodation after four to six weeks, regardless of the severity of their condition. “…Rather than helping, this exacerbates the state of many of the patients who are prone to so many other diseases from their poor living conditions – which only adds to the vicious cycle of deteriorating health.

“The reality of the situation was shocking. Coming from London, it was something I’d never experienced before in my life… these patients shouldn’t have to undergo such pain and suffering whilst tackling a life-threatening disease!”

On the positive side, Hemang’s visit did allow him to meet and network with a range of people and interns from all over the world, including the US, China, Philippines and the UAE.

Over the past two years, Hemang has also been consistently involved wi th the LSE’s Widening Participation team. “We are a chosen group of around 30 voluntary mentors who take out 2-3 hours weekly to meet students at various under-performing secondary schools in London. It has been really interesting, particularly as QE was quite the opposite, where we all tended to perform very well and had a clear drive to go to university and study further – something I noticed is very different for many of these students.”

Separately from this, Hemang has been assiduous in giving his time to help QE’s Sixth-Form geographers prepare for university entrance since he left the School himself.

Most recently, after his summer internship at UBS, he enjoyed a backpacking trip to Japan with a few friends, taking in Tokyo, Osaka, Kobe, Nara and Arashiyama.

And he adds: “I am still in touch with various OEs and we make a great effort to meet, particularly when the others are back in London. Despite us wanting to plan a trip together last summer, given various commitments and internships undertaken by a lot of us, we have decided to postpone this till the coming summer. Initial ideas have included a South America trekking trip and a rail trip across Northern India and Nepal.”

Pupils and staff honoured those who lost their lives in conflict in remembrance events held both at the School and in the centre of Barnet.

With 11th November falling on a Saturday this year, the School held its 2017 remembrance event on the preceding Friday, while on Remembrance Sunday, 19 cadets from QE’s Combined Cadet Force turned out for the church parade, which started from the Barnet Army Reserve Centre.

The Headmaster said: “As a School, we continue to cleave to the importance of remembering Old Elizabethans and others in our local community who made the ultimate sacrifice. Such ceremonies are important not only because they honour the past, but also because they inculcate values of service in the pupils of today that will strengthen the School for the future –  a sentiment reflected in the petition of our School prayer that “even as we are being helped by the remembrance of the loyal lives of those who came before us, so our faithfulness in Thy service may aid those who shall take our places”.

At the end of a week in which poppies had been sold in School, the QE event began when a party of CCF cadets marched to the World War I memorial in the Crush Hall (the boys’ time-honoured name for the main entrance area). The short act of remembrance that took place there included the playing of the Last Post by Year 11 pupil Tristan Boldy and a two-minute silence at 11am.

The ceremony also included a reading about Old Elizabethan Allastair McReady-Diarmid, which featured the Account of the Deed – the summary of the events which led to him being awarded the Victoria Cross. On two consecutive days in late 1917, Acting Captain McReady-Diarmid led soldiers through a heavy barrage on the Western Front, engaging the enemy and regaining ground which had been lost. The Account states: “It was entirely due to his marvellous throwing of bombs that the ground was regained, but he was eventually killed by a bomb.” On next month’s 100th anniversary of his death, a memorial paving stone is being dedicated to his memory in New Southgate, where he was born. The School will be sending representatives, including members of the CCF, to the event.

For the Remembrance Day Parade, QE’s cadets gathered in the cold at the Army Reserve Centre, where they were led by the Contingent Commander, Major Mev Armon, who is a Biology teacher, together with Charlie Maud-Munro, a Schools Direct trainee teacher in the Technology department, who is also part of the CCF.

“We met at 9.30 and stepped off at 10.15, marching with two Army reserve units, Army veterans, the Army Cadet Force, the Air Cadet Corps and others, including the St John Ambulance and the scouts and guides,” said Major Armon. They marched to the accompaniment of the Corps of Drums of Mill Hill School.

“When we arrived at St John the Baptist Parish Church, our wreath was laid on the memorial by Cadet Sergeant Major Shyam Gadhvi, of Year 13. A service was held at the church and we all marched back to the Army Reserve Centre. Many parents were in attendance.”