Clubs and Activities

Monmouth School for Boys offers a wide and varied extra-curricular programme. All boys are encouraged to take full advantage of lunchtime and after school activities and clubs. They develop confidence and make friends through chess, karate, reading, choir and many other activities.

Some of the activities our pupils take part in are:

Art Club History Discussion Group Sedgwick Society
Art GCSE & A Level Studio Time House Football Senior Art Club
Astronomy Society (MARS) J15 Rowing* Senior Rowing*
Bach Orchestra Jazz Orchestra Senior Strings
Brass Band Junior Drama Club Softball
Canoeing Club Junior Rowing Club* Squash
Ceramics Club Junior Science Club String Quartet
Chapel Choir Junior Winds Swimming
Chapel Choir Lower Voices Languages Olympiad Symphonic Winds
Chapel Choir Trebles Latin Scrabble Time U12 Rugby Training
Chess Club Literary Society U14 Rugby Training
Choral Society Literati U16 Rugby Training
Creative Writing Music Theory Club Water Polo
Cricket one-to-one Musical Theatre Choir Wind Chamber Music
Fencing* Percussion Ensemble Word Play
Football Quiz Club
GCSE Music Clinic Rowing Circuits
Golf Science Club

* Please note that this activity is chargeable

Building character through travel

Monmouth pupils have many opportunities to travel during their school career. There are regular language exchange visits to France, Spain and Germany and a long-standing cultural exchange with the Seifu Schools in Osaka, Japan. A party from the school was the first to visit the base camp of K2, the world’s second highest mountain, and recently groups have travelled to Madagascar and Borneo on challenge expeditions.

Closer to home, there are frequent historical and cultural visits to other European countries, and trips to sites within Britain. There is also a tradition of musical tours to various locations in Europe and North America, and of regular sports tours – most recently to Rome, Madrid and Canada.

Service and leadership

An ambitious programme of Community Service involves boys in many valuable activities. Amongst these are Raven House Trust, a Newport-based charity which supports needy local families with a food bank and the local talking newspaper, which is edited and recorded by boys, for the benefit of local people with visual impairment. The school participates in the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award Scheme at Silver and Bronze levels. In so doing they enjoy new experiences and develop skills of leadership and self reliance. A voluntary, but highly popular, Combined Cadet Force develops similar skills in a military context. There are close links with both the Army and RAF and boys benefit from opportunities to train and fly with regular soldiers and airmen.

Adventure Training Trips

Every year, Year 9 pupils take part in an adventure training trip at the start of the academic year. This is always a great opportunity for new boys to meet others, for new friendships to be built, and for boys and staff to challenge themselves with some exciting activities.

Past trips include visiting Pembrokeshire, with nearly 80 boys and 7 staff staying in bunkhouse accommodation at Celtic Camping near St David’s. Activities (provided by TYF) included raft building, an educational farm walk, a talent show around a bonfire, team-building challenges, surfing, and the overall favourite, coasteering. Please take a look at the video below to see what the boys got up to:

white-large-chiclet More photos available on our FlickR account

Astronomy Club

Monmouth Astronomical Research Society (MARS)

MARS is a joint venture between pupils at Monmouth School for Boys and members of the public drawn from a radius of 30 miles. The society membership is from 10 to 80 years of age and includes amateur astronomers, professionals and students following GCSE, A level and Open University courses.

The society meets the first Tuesday of each month, at 7:30pm in the Science Department, with other meetings at irregular intervals. The Society also runs trips to astronomical centres e.g. the Herschel Museum, National Space Centre etc. There are also observing events (called star parties) several times a year. Monthly meetings involve lectures from experts, practical activities and observation work.

There are two specialist groups within the society. The Observatory Team consists of pupils in Monmouth School for Boys and Boys’ Prep. It is led by a year 10 pupils, Harry Baynham. The Observatory team maintain the school’s/society’s ten telescopes, the observatory building and imaging equipment. They also make improvements and modifications to them. The Faulkes Telescope Team operate the Faulkes Robotic Telescope in Hawaii, making observations of their own and carrying out research work for third party astronomers. Recent sessions have included the collection of stellar evolution images, calculating the rotation of asteroids and tracking Near Earth Objects (NEO’s) which present a potential threat in that they could collide with Earth.

The MARS membership exceeds 50 people and, until recently, was chaired by Keith Moseley with Colin Harris as Secretary and Felicity Taylor as Treasurer. Future plans include setting up Monmouth School for Boys and MARS as joint operators of a Faulkes Regional Centre. Our role will be to disseminate astronomy to other schools via a talks service, telescope loans, training to use the Faulkes Telescope and teamwork between the satellite schools in the carrying out off research work.

View the new MARS website here…

Drama

Monmouth School for Boys offer a range of extra curricular Drama opportunities to all year groups. These range from junior and senior plays, joint school productions and the opportunity to gain LAMDA certificates for acting.

Junior History Society

The Junior History Society re-enacted the Battle of Roslin – an English-Scottish encounter of the “Braveheart” era – on the school playing fields just before half-term. The battle was preceded by the issuing of challenges but carefully laid plans of battle were soon abandoned in the chaos of conflict. History was not rewritten as the Scots (Wye and St James Houses) massacred the English army (Dean House).


Simon Jarvis from the The Sealed Knot demonstrates firing a Civil War era musket for Monmouth School for Boys Junior History Society.

Junior Science Club

Monmouth School for Boys’ Junior Science Club meets during Thursday lunch hours in order to investigate the wonders of science and carry out experiments which extend beyond the scope of the normal curriculum.

So far this year, students have carefully blown up custard, made ginger beer, built their own dragsters and had some fun with the Van de Graaff!

Music

Music is central to the development of the boys of Monmouth School for Boys.  Around half of pupils take lessons on a musical instrument in School (around 320 individual lessons are taught in each week) and a significant number take lessons out of school.  Many boys study to an advanced level – each year a number of boys achieve grade eight by the time they are 14 years of age.

Instrumental lessons are taught by a team of nationally renowned players and are timetabled on a rota basis, although many boys at the top of the school make arrangements for a fixed lesson.  The Music Department is housed in the Glover Music School which is generously resourced, and includes an auditorium, ICT suite and numerous class and teaching rooms.  There are five full time and twenty-three part time staff members.

Instrumental and Choral concerts are presented each year, with smaller scale recitals and workshops happening throughout the year.  International artists often give workshops and masterclasses in the school (players from BBC NOW, 2007, Band of the Welsh Guards 2009, Harpham Quartet 2011, Boomtown Rat Garry Roberts in 2012).  School groups have been finalists in the National Association of Youth Brass Bands Competition, National Concert Band Festival and National Chamber Music Competition in recent years.  The School maintains a strong choral tradition, both in and out of the Chapel.  The choral society presents a major choral work every year (2007 Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms, 2008 Rutter’s Gloria, 2009 Vaughan Williams’ Five Mystical Songs, 2012 Carmina Burana, 2013 Chichester Psalms).  The Chapel Choir makes regular visits and concerts out of school and has sung at St. Paul’s Cathedral, St. George’s Windsor, Lichfield Cathedral and Westminster Cathedral in the last five years.

Tours occur on a regular basis (Barcelona in 2008, Paris in 2009, Prague and Bohemia in 2011, Italy in 2012, Spain and Morocco in 2013).  Pupils regularly go on to study music in Higher Education, frequently winning choral and organ awards and scholarships (King’s College, Gonville and Caius College and Jesus Colleges at Cambridge, Merton College, Oxford and The Royal Academy of Music recently).

Ensembles

Monmouth School Boys’ Prep

  • Wind Band
  • String Orchestra
  • Class String Orchestras
  • Grange Choir
  • Rock Band

Monmouth School for Boys

  • Junior Wind Band
  • Bach Orchestra (junior string orchestra)
  • Senior Strings (joint with Monmouth School for Girls)
  • Symphonic Winds (joint with Monmouth School for Girls)
  • Monmouth School Jazz Orchestra
  • Chapel Choir
  • Choral Society
  • Junior String Quartet
  • Ten Piece Brass Ensemble
  • Senior String Quartet
  • Wind Chamber Music Groups

Music Scholarships (of up to half the full fee) and minor Exhibitions are made at 11+, 13+ and 16.  An Organ Scholarship is available at 13+ and 16+.  Holders of Music Awards are expected to set a strong example of commitment and organisation to their peers throughout their time in the school.  They would be expected to play in an appropriate instrumental ensemble, sing in a choir and take part in chamber music, as well as studying Music at GCSE level when the time comes.  Many award holders do much more than this.

The Director of Music and Organist, David Lawson, is happy to speak with parents at any time.  Appointments to meet prospective pupils and scholars can be made through the Admissions Office on 01600 710433.