This story is sponsored by Queen Ethelburga’s Collegiate.

The autumn term is in full swing at Queen Ethelburga’s Collegiate, and new pupils are already enjoying all the activities that make it a unique place to learn. 

Chapter House, which accepts children from three months old up to Year 5, is set within a campus offering over 100 enrichment activities on site, ensuring the engagement and enthusiasm of every child. 

Two days a week before school, the school’s Sport Curriculum leader runs Wake Up, Get Up, Move Up, an energetic activity to develop physical and mental wellbeing. 

There’s also a dedicated 45-minute slot each lunchtime for a wide range of activities, including football, swimming and gym and dance, as well as the science club, the art club and the Blue Peter badge club. 

Two of the more popular activities are Digital Leaders and Mindful Moments. The KS2 Digital Leader Jedis help deliver a digital wellbeing message to their peers through assemblies and focus weeks, and the KS1 Digital Leader Padawans start their computing journeys by learning to build, program and play with robots and other hardware. 

A teacher and pupils enjoy an outdoor lesson at Queen Ethelburga’s Chapter House school.

Mindful Moments focuses on mindfulness, which can boost concentration, lower stress and improve emotional regulation skills. Pupils take part in lots of child-friendly activities, such as guided meditation, simple massage and different breathing techniques. 

With a trained specialist in Chapter House, all ages participate in Forest School sessions during the school year. Each class spends two hours a week over a half-term period learning through play, exploration, and discovery in a natural outdoor environment, including cooking on the fire pit! 

After school, children can join Homework Club to have support from academic staff with their prep and every Wednesday there is a sporting activity linked to the main focus sports for the term. 

Even more opportunities for enrichment are provided as part of the curriculum. The Accelerated Literacy and Mathematics activities have in the past included participation in the Quiz Club National Mathematics Championships and creating a school newspaper. 

There are also frequent visits and presentations from professionals working across a range of scientific and related fields. 

Girls singing in the choir at Queen Ethelburga’s Chapter House school.

Karen Kilkenny, Head of Chapter House, says that the wealth of extra activities is part of a deliberate strategy to provide a broad, dynamic and engaging educational experience for all of Queen Ethelburga’s pupils. She said:  

“As every parent knows, there’s far more to children’s development than just formal education. Our traditional curriculum is of course excellent – our pupils do well academically – but we also do everything we can to ensure that their horizons are broadened well beyond the confines of the classroom. 

“We want every one of our pupils to leave Chapter House and Queen Ethelburga’s with the best academic qualifications they can attain, but also with rounded personalities, enriched by the skills and abilities learnt during the many extra-curricular activities we provide.” 

Queen Ethelburga’s Collegiate was founded in 1912 and in 1991 moved to the Thorpe Underwood estate, between Harrogate and York, where it has what are widely regarded as some of the best educational facilities in the country. It welcomes children from three months old and supports them through its four schools: Chapter House (3 months to Year 5), King’s Magna (Years 6 to 9), The College and Faculty (both Years 10 to 13). 

Find out more: 

Queen Ethelburga’s will be holding a Whole School Open Morning on Saturday, September 30. One-hour tours begin at 9.30am and run every half-hour till 11am. After the tour, the academic and admissions staff will be available to answer any questions in The Atrium, where visitors can also enjoy a light lunch.

To book a place, go to the Queen Ethelburga’s website.  

More open days will be held on November 18, January 27, March 9 and April 27.

Ripon Races is under starter’s orders for its first fixture of the new season tomorrow.

Yorkshire’s garden racecourse, as the venue is known, will be hoping for a smooth year after two years of covid restrictions severely curtailed activities.

Gates open at 11am for the first of 17 days racing this year.

Jonathan Mullin, hoping for an uninterrupted season at Ripon Races

Tomorrow’s Easter family day’s first race at 1pm will feature new sponsor Queen Ethelburga’s Collegiate.

Jonathan Mullin, operations and marketing manager at the Boroughbridge Road racecourse, told the Stray Ferret:

“After two years of covid restrictions, we are looking forward to what we hope will be an uninterrupted season and plenty of racegoers through the gates.

“At a time when there is a squeeze on family budgets, we are offering reduced price entry to the paddock and club enclosures at all of our evening meetings The reduction will be 23% and 12% respectively.”

William Hill is maintaining its long-term sponsorship at Ripon.

This season’s running of the valuable William Hill Great St Wilfrid Handicap,  on Saturday August 13, has added significance, with 2022 marking the 1,350th anniversary of Ripon’s patron saint founding the city’s cathedral.

New this season is a Stables Championship run in partnership with organic plant-based grooming products manufacturer, Goodbye Flys.

The stable staff of the yard that accrues the highest points total across the 2022 season will be crowned champions and receive a £5,000 cash prize, with £2,000 going to the runners-up and £1,000 to the third placed team.

Titanium Racing Club and Grantley Hall Hotel are both returning race sponsors and NE-Bet is continuing its sponsorship of the owners and trainers enclosure.

The covid vaccination programme

Ripon Races has been a key site in the covid vaccination programme.

Mr Mullin said:

“The racecourse management and course staff were proud to support the NHS and many volunteers involved in setting up and operating the covid vaccination centre here.

“Thousands of people received their jabs and boosters in the Wakeman Bar and we will continue to help the NHS when our facilities are required for the vaccination programme.”

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A Knaresborough man and the owner of Queen Ethelburga’s School near York will go to prison for more than three years for two incidents of non-recent child sexual abuse.

Brian Richard Martin, 71, from Ferrensby near Knaresborough, was sentenced at Leeds Crown Court today following a retrial.

He was originally on trial in 2018 for sexually assaulting of a boy in the late 2000s. This trial also acquitted him of six other child sexual abuse offences.

At another retrial in 2019, he was found guilty of indecent assault on a girl in the early-to-mid-1990s.

Martin has been jailed for three years and three months and placed on the Sex Offenders’ Register.

Detective Sergeant Graeme Bevington, who led the North Yorkshire Police investigation, said:

“Despite significant investment being made in the school, all this served to do was to create an environment that Martin could exploit for his own sinister gains.

“He preyed on the vulnerability of the students and was able to manipulate circumstances which allowed him to sexually abuse two children who were boarding students.”

The police said his success in business meant he could buy the school and move it from Harrogate to the Thorpe Underwood Estate, where he living with his family.

DS Bevington added the school was supposed to be safe for young students but instead they were “harmed so significantly by someone in a position of trust”.

He praised the bravery of the victims who spoke out:

“They have had to give evidence in open court about the most vulnerable and traumatic experiences of their lives and re-live the dreadful abuse that was forced upon them many years ago when they were just children.

“The courage and conviction behind their evidence has led to Brian Martin being publicly exposed as the predatory paedophile that he really is.

“They have finally had justice for what they have had to endure for so long.”

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To seek advice and further support, or report child abuse, you can contact one of these organisations:

• North Yorkshire Police on 101. If you are in immediate danger, always dial 999 for an emergency response
• Victims who would prefer not to go direct to the police, and are not in immediate danger, can contact Bridge House, North Yorkshire’s Sexual Assault Referral Centre (SARC), on 0330 223 0362, email sarc@nhs.net or go to www.bridgehousesarc.org/
• Supporting Victims at supportingvictims.org or call 01609 643100
• NSPCC Helplines: Adults concerned about a child should call 0808 800 5000; Children and young people should call Childline on 0800 1111. Or go to www.nspcc.org.uk/preventing-abuse

A teacher at an independent school in the Harrogate district has been jailed for using a spy camera to take covert video footage of a pupil taking a shower. The court heard how he had tried to pin the blame on other staff members

Thomas David Ball, 30, who was senior house master at Queen Ethelburga’s, near Boroughbridge, also downloaded images of young children being raped, bound and tortured.

York Crown Court heard that Ball became “infatuated” with the teenage boy who cannot be named for legal reasons.

Ball hunted for social-media snaps of the victim and made “29 separate (Google) searches” for the boy about a month before the spycam incident, said prosecutor Paul Newcombe.

He said Ball had installed the camera in a bathroom at the school.

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The boy had just returned from registration when Ball asked him to take a shower. While showering, the boy noticed wires beneath the sink which were connected to a spy camera whose lights were on to show it was active.

The boy, who was suspicious, informed his mother and Ball – who had just been promoted to a role overseeing pupils’ wellbeing – later admitted to the school’s deputy safeguarding leader that he had made a “stupid mistake”.

Ball ultimately admitted three counts of making indecent images of children and downloading prohibited images but initially denied taking covert video footage of the boy, installing the camera and voyeurism at the school.

He only changed his pleas to guilty about a month before a trial was due to take place. The offences occurred in the summer of 2018.

Judge Simon Hickey told Ball his offences against the “vulnerable” boy were a “gross breach of trust”, adding: “Parents expect their children to be looked after and not spied upon and filmed.”

North Yorkshire Police Detective Constable, Adam Fenwick, said:

“He is a cold and calculating individual who carefully planned and premeditated his actions. He clearly poses a risk to young people and we hope his sentencing will give some closure to the victim and their family.”

A spokesperson from Queen Ethelburga’s Collegiate said:

“In accordance with our robust safeguarding policies and procedures, Mr Ball was reported to the Police and immediately suspended; his employment was terminated shortly thereafter. The Collegiate has supported the police throughout their investigation.”

Ball was jailed for 20 months, of which he will serve half behind bars before being released on licence. He was also placed on the sex-offenders’ register for 10 years and made subject to a sexual-harm prevention order to curb his internet activities and limit his contact with children.