At a ceremony held at the Broadway Theatre on Thursday 21st October five of our highest achieving students, Leena Kanhye, Maksymilian Kolis, Beloved Olofinsao, Jordan Tavares, Humayra Jannat Miah were presented with their Colin Pond Scholarship Awards. These Awards specifically recognise the achievements of our top GCSE students that choose to continue to study in-borough at post-16.
This a wonderful and well-deserved award for these hard working students who each received a £300 scholarship.
In his speech, the Headteacher Mr Frith, spoke with pride, recognising the hard work, dedication and resilience of these students and also of the impact of the Colin Pond Scholarship Awards on previous recipients. How in addition to the financial reward, students valued the recognition and encouragement to achieve their highest aspirations, as exemplified by one of our previous Scholarship Award winners , Alfie Tucker, who having completed his Year 13 at Eastbrook School is now at Oxford University study French and Arabic.
When he received the Award in Year 12, Alfie was asked to write a piece for the evening programme about What the Colin Pond Scholarship has meant to me?
“Being a recipient of the Colin Pond Scholarship has improve my confidence massively. I am immensely grateful for such recognition and am a firm believer that this fund is helping to combat the Dagenham factor, or the idea that kids from this area do not succeed. Moreover, this fund has not only helped me but also a number of my peers to realise that regardless of postcode or London borough, our goals and aspirations are more than achievable.
Ultimately, the Colin Pond truly helps the dreams of our boroughs youth to come to fruition and can be the landslide in influencing a young person’s life for the better. It is for this reason that I thank them hugely for helping me to achieve my dream and giving me that inspiration.”
We wish Leena, Maksymilian, Beloved, Jordan, Humayra and Alfie continued success and look forward to seeing the next stage of their journeys.