On 12 January 1995, more than 25 years ago, the first ever edition of St Bartholomew’s School Newsletter, BartholoNews, was published which means that last week the school published their 1000th edition.
Mr Robinson, the Head Teacher of the time, launched the newsletter at the start of his second term at St Bart’s to distribute “valuable information about the school”. In those days around 1700 copies were printed every week and sent home on a Thursday.
Production of the circular could be a lengthy process. Staff would have to wait for camera films to be developed before they could cut out and stick on any images to be included. Now the newsletter is published on the this website and the link is emailed to around 4,700 parents, students and staff each week.
BartholoNews continues to provide information about forthcoming events and activities as well as celebrating a wide range of student achievements and collaborative successes. As part of this milestone and in recognition that the way in which we receive information is changing the school has redesigned the layout to make it easier to read online.
St Bart’s celebrated with a special anniversary edition in which they revisited the first edition of BartholoNews and explored the careers of some of the students mentioned. Ben Vanstone was one of the U15 boys awarded ‘Sportsman of the Season’. Ben is now a TV script writer responsible for the new series of “All Creatures Great and Small” (on which he is also executive producer), “The English Game” in 2020, “Merlin” in 2008 and he has written episodes for “Eastenders” and “Holby”. Sally Anne Warren, (mentioned as selected for the County senior lacrosse team) went on to roles in health policy and delivery and is now the Director of Policy at the Kings Fund, advising and commenting on government policy and she is regularly interviewed on Radio 4.
Other features included On This Day (a look at what we happening in the world when key BartholoNewses were published), a competition to design a new header for the newsletter and a special St Bart’s facts crossword.
We’re really pleased with this anniversary issue and the way it captures our history. It’s also important to us to continually improve our communications with the school community and we feel that the new layout reflects this. We hope that all students, parents and staff enjoy reading this and many issues to come.
