Historians hit the heights of DC and New York

In February half-term the History department embarked on its annual overseas adventure — this time with a party of 20 A level History and Politics students, to explore the sights of Washington and New York. For most of us, this was a first trip to the two cities and there was a palpable excitement as we gained our first glimpses of the White House and Capitol on arrival.


Our two days in Washington were spent seeing all the iconic sights that are so familiar from the TV and films. Highlights included a tour of the Capitol itself, circumnavigating the White House (we almost saw Obama — we were assured at least that it was his motorcade!) and viewing the Mall from the top of the Washington monument.



A coach journey brought us to New York, where we were awed by the impact of the night-time Manhattan skyline. If our spirits were briefly dampened by our somewhat basic accommodation, they were rapidly lifted by our proximity to Central Park, stunningly beautiful after a recent snowfall. The sights of Wall Street, the Ellis Island ferry and the Statue of Liberty continued to excite us and we enjoyed a full immersion in American culture in the form of an evening at Madison Square Garden and the New York Knicks basketball!


A more serious tour of the United Nations HQ followed, along with a sobering visit to Ground Zero and a touch of culture for some in visiting the Metropolitan or Guggenheim art museums. All this, with an exhilarating ‘sky ride’ to the top of the Rockefeller Centre, night-time walks down Broadway, evening meal in Planet Hollywood in Times Square and a good dose of Manhattan shopping completed a wonderful week of tourism, fun and, who knows, maybe even a little education!

— by Alastair Barnett, Head of History

View a slideshow of photos from the USA trip

How to manage your money...

As part of their ongoing enrichment programme, Lower Sixth students listened to a talk by financial adviser Charles Cozens.

Charles covered a variety of topics, including methods of protecting your online bank accounts, defending yourself against identity theft and the delights of taxation and credit cards — dispensing indespensible expert advice at every stage.

So now perhaps more of us will take to checking for video cameras when we're at a cashpoint. As to whether anyone's been converted from a spender to a saver — well, I'm not totally sure!

— by Kate Palmer, Enrichment Coordinator

Basketball team reaches League semi-final

Congratulations to the Sixth Form basketball team for reaching the semi-final of the Oxfordshire U19 Schools Basketball League — an impressive achievement. Their next match, against Oxford & Cherwell Valley College, will be later this term.

Below are match reports from the team's two most recent league games, written by the basketball team captain, Rhys Tong-Jones.

d’Overbroeck’s vs Bicester (Home)
d’Overbroeck’s 41
Bicester 24

In the first game following their defeat to Henry Box, and dealing with new positions for a number of key players, d’Overbroeck’s managed to pull off its 5th victory of the season to lift the team into a tie for second place in the league. Now only needing to only beat Woodgreen to guarantee a place in the Oxfordshire U19 league playoffs, the team will need to stay focused over the half-term break in order to be the first d’Overbroeck’s side to make the play-off’s.


d’Overbroeck’s vs Woodgreen (Away)
Woodgreen 25
d’Overbroeck’s 42

With a place in the semi final to play for, d’Overbroeck’s turned in its best performance of the season so far. Although only leading by only 4 points at the end of the first quarter, d’Overbroeck’s slowly but surely continued to put points on the board to edge further in front.

That was up until halfway through the fourth quarter, at which point the game became a blowout.

With foul trouble hampering Woodgreen, they couldn't be as aggressive as they wanted. d’Overbroeck’s took advantage, displaying some excellent offensive play and converting their chances in style to comfortably win the match.

The first half was all about d’Overbroeck’s excellent defensive work, optimised by the newly starting centre Peace Aphichutniran. Substitutes Roman Sokolov and Matthew Anderson continued this good form and added some fancy scoring of their own.

An outstanding performance from a maturing team, lead expertly by their point guard Justin Aphichutniran. League statistics so far: 6 Wins, 1 Defeat. Next stop: Playoffs.

Man of the Match: Rhys Tong-Jones