ORIGINAL MESSAGE

NAME: James (Jas) Cowen    Then & Now

DATE: 21 January 2014

CONNECTION WITH QE: pupil 56-63

I note that Barrie Martin, the chairman of the school governors and an honorary member of the OE Association, has been awarded an MBE for services to education in the latest New Year Honours list. Over the years he has put in a lot of effort in this and other positions and I enjoyed talking with him at the last two Annual Dinners. I recall he was mentioned elsewhere on the site.

1st REPLY

NAME: James (Jas) Cowen    Then & Now

DATE: 14 August 2014

I enjoyed reading the article in this year's Founders Day Fete brochure on Mr Barrie Martin MBE (A trip to the Palace). Once again, this time at Founders Day, I enjoyed talking with him and he is a very approachable person as is Neil Enright the Headmaster and one of his deputies, Mr Ryan. Whilst watching the school v OEs cricket match with my wife and brother I asked him if he had any cricketing prowess in his youth. He said not and talked briefly of his poor health when young. He was very proud that both his sons at QEs played water polo and were picked for English teams. He said that one of the factors for the then new swimming pool (named after him) was to provide water polo facilities and school members have certainly excelled in the sport. There is a good photo of Barrie with his MBE included inside the article.

2nd REPLY

NAME: James (Jas) Cowen    Then & Now

DATE: 16 September 2014

One of the topics of conversation I had with Barrie Martin MBE was the consistency of QE's A Level results in recent years. He said he hoped that this would make boys proud of the school and besides the benefits for university applications, it would serve them well with employers when they put it on their CVs. I am glad to see that in line with this QEs top the Daily Telegraph list of state schools again for % of passes at A*/A/B grades with 95.97% from 471 entries. This also beats the top school in the independent schools list, which is 94.71% from 112 entries and so QEs top the combined list of state and independent schools. Congratulations to the headmaster, teachers, governors, pupils and maybe also parents. In regard to my friendly rivalry with my wife her old school came 89th in the independents list with 101 entries and 57.14%. Shame about that!