Newsletters

Read below a sample of our 2024 January Term school newsletters:

Spirit of the Banda – Week 01

Happy New Year and a very warm welcome back to school to everyone. My highlight of this first week back was viewing the Art and DT portfolios of the Year 8 potential scholars. Not only has each and every one of them produced some absolutely fantastic work, but they were able to speak maturely and knowledgeably about it. We wish them all the very best of luck, along with those pupils sitting for academic, music, drama and sports awards at Hillcrest and Peponi over the coming few days.

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Spirit of the Banda – Week 02

It may only have been the second week of term but things are already in full swing, from the first hockey matches of the season to the Year 8 Geography field trip to multiple photoshoots. In short, pupils and staff alike have been busy – exactly how a thriving prep school should be.

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Spirit of the Banda – Week 03

It was great to be able to welcome Ali Allport from the Taylor Ashe Antivenom Foundation into school on Monday morning and present her with a cheque for over KSh 71,000 to support the great work done at the Watamu Snake Farm and around Kenya. This sum was raised during our charity day last term.
We are hosting a Future Schools’ Talk for parents on Thursday 8th February from 3.40pm – I very much encourage you to come along if you would like to find out more about senior schools, both here in Kenya and overseas.

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Spirit of the Banda – Week 04

A number of our Year 8 pupils have completed scholarship assessments in the past few weeks andit’s fantastic to be able to announce the following awards:
Olivia Birech and Maya Kamiri (All Rounder Scholarships), Maiyan Douglas-Hamilton Pope (Art Scholarship), Serena Lakhani (Sports Exhibition) and Chanel McKenzie (Academic Exhibition) to Peponi; Netty Childs (Sports Scholarship) to King’s Taunton. Many congratulations to them all!

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Spirit of the Banda – Week 05

Following last week’s scholarship news from Peponi, it was great to hear that Amanda Manduku has also been awarded a Sports Exhibition there. We then heard this week that ten pupils have received scholarships to Hillcrest. Many congratulations to Maya Kamiri and Sofia Keiser (all rounder); Mayian Douglas-Hamilton Pope, Ivy Fusco-Roberts and Zuwena Lee (art); Serena Lakhani, Tatiana Lawrence, Jake McRae and Kayleigh Nann (sport); and Zahra Darker (drama).
The first half of term has seemingly passed in a flash and I wish you all a fun and restful Half Term before a further six busy weeks take us towards the Easter break.
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Spirit of the Banda – Week 07

Our value for the half term is Teamwork and this ties in well with the numerous tournaments, galas and house events coming up, as well as the South African Hockey Tour. But it’s also important that the pupils recognise all the other teams that they are a part of – class, year group, friends and family to name but a few – and play their full part in each of them.

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Spirit of the Banda – Week 08

I have taken a break from the Nairobi heat this week to attend a Heads’ conference in the UK and visit several senior schools. The temperature has been a shock to my system, having not experienced a British winter for a few years now; reports of spring being on its way could be greatly exaggerated! What it has confirmed with me though is how incredibly lucky our children are to grow up in the climate that they do and the opportunities that this affords to lead such an outdoor lifestyle the year round.

It is certainly something that helps create the character amongst Banda pupils that UK senior schools really value about them and it has been great for me to reinforce our relationship with a number of them in the past few days, as well as catching up with some former Banda pupils and to see how they are thriving – their experiences here undoubtedly playing a huge part in this.

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Spirit of the Banda – Week 09

It’s definitely been a week of fancy outfits with some fantastic imagination on show from Years 1 and 2 as they celebrated one hundred days of school on Thursday. This was then ramped up a notch today as the whole school celebrated Banda Book Day; very many thanks to Ms Thwaites for coordinating a great day of activities to promote reading. I’m sure that those parents attending the Banda Party this evening won’t disappoint with their costumes either!

I would like to extend a huge thank you to everyone for embracing our ‘Let them play’ initiative in its first week, having been pitchside myself. We feel good being on the front foot with this and will be sharing it with other schools on our circuit.

And finally…. the very best of luck to our Under 13 and Under 11 girls’ hockey teams at tomorrow’s IAPS tournament, and wishing our Under 13 teams a lekker time in Cape Town next week.

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Spirit of the Banda – Week 10

It’s reached that point in the term where there seems to be a big event on a daily basis and we very much look forward to a number of these in the closing weeks of term, including the House Shout, swimming galas, Boats finals and triathlons, the General Knowledge final and a Year 7 trip to the Aberdares, to name but a few.

All of these opportunities and experiences, plus many more besides, are what help to shape our pupils into the wonderful individuals that they are. Indeed, I received a great endorsement of this via e-mail this week from someone who ‘had the privilege of being seated in the middle of your touring hockey team’ on their flight to Cape Town. He, ‘sat amongst the most beautifully behaved, joyful young boys and girls. Not only was their laughter infectious, but their manners were superb. You know you have a great school when the kids are both polite, happy and have the ability to speak to adults with consummate ease.’

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Spirit of the Banda – Week 11

More great Year 8 scholarship news has arrived in the past week from the UK with Maya Kamiri being awarded The Thomas Sanders Kenyan Scholarship and a Sports Scholarship by Blundell’s School, and Isabella Sorensen gaining a Headmaster’s Award for Art at Sedbergh School. This now brings the total number of awards for Year 8 to twenty-eight – an absolutely phenomenal achievement by this group of pupils and, indeed, a Banda record!

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