Beyond King’s

We are back for the start of a new term and a new year and we are delighted to feature OV and King’s parent, Steve Perera (Cr 86-93) as our first OV of the week for 2020. At King’s, Steve was involved with CCF as well as playing for the 1st XV. He was also fully involved in house activities during his time at school, representing Creighton House in most sports including football, basketball and tug of war. Steve then went to Swansea University to study Economics and Politics.

Steve worked for a number of large companies in corporate pensions including Aon and PwC before becoming a Lifestyle Financial Planner in 2004. In 2006 Steve set up his own company, ‘Britannic Place’ and he qualified as a Chartered Financial Planner in 2007. Steve has gone on to provide financial advice to other OVs, King’s parents and even a couple of ex-King’s school teachers since he set up his business.

Steve’s business had a good 2019, having been shortlisted for the Retirement Planner awards and the Money Age awards. This success has continued with a great start to 2020, as he has just qualified for VouchedFor’s guide as one of the UK’s Top Rated Financial Advisers.

We are looking forward to the 10 Year Reunion on Saturday 14^th December and we are delighted to feature as our OV of the week, 10-year leaver Hayley Weaver (W 07-09). At King’s, Hayley was a mentor and was involved in Duke of Edinburgh, swimming and netball.

Hayley went to the University of Birmingham to study Sport and Exercise Sciences and then started her career in the healthcare industry at Spire Healthcare before also completing a Masters in Paediatric Exercise and Health at the University of Exeter.

Hayley now works for Nuffield Health where she is a Health and Wellbeing Physiologist as well as an Executive Healthcare Programme Physiologist. Hayley provides health assessments for clients and ensures the smooth running of a busy Medical Centre. Hayley is also Regional Clinical Lead Physiologist and manages a team of clinicians, ensuring they are adhering to the highest clinical standards, as well as driving the overall clinical quality for the company.

Sixth Form is a very important time for King’s pupils and this week our OV of the week is Lizzy Bennett (Ch 08-10) who attended King’s for Sixth Form and studied Maths, Biology and Design Technology. As Lizzy discovered, choosing the right career path can take some time…and travelling around! Following the completion of a Child Psychology degree at Birmingham and a Masters in teaching, Lizzy spent 2 years as an international Early Year’s teacher at The British School of Amsterdam in The Netherlands.

Lizzy then jumped into international management consultancy for 2 years, working on projects based in the United Arab Emirates and The Philippines. With an increasing interest in the finance industry and developing coding skills, Lizzy won a scholarship to return back to the UK to complete an MSc in Investment Risk and Finance.

Graduating with distinction, Lizzy was hired by the US investment giant, Vanguard, who currently have $5.3 trillion in assets under management. She has a front office role on the London trade floor as an Operational Risk Analyst. Lizzy works directly with traders and portfolio managers globally to enhance and develop internal processes through machine learning, forensic analysis, and automation. This year, her global risk team won the Risk.net ‘2020 buy-side risk managers of the year’ award.

With all the exciting racing news recently for both OVs and pupils we are delighted to feature F1 Trackside Control Systems Engineer Chris Nelson (Cr 89-96) as our former pupil this week. Chris was involved with D of E, Drama and Music whilst at King’s and went on to study at the University of Southampton where he achieved a Masters in Mechanical Engineering.

Following University, Chris went straight into the automotive engineering industry working for Ricardo, followed by a move into motorsport with MoTeC Europe working on electronic systems. He realised a childhood dream 10 years ago by securing a role in Formula 1 with McLaren Applied Technologies, attending all races to support the F1 standard electronics. Chris was there for 8 years starting as an F1 Track Support Engineer and working his way up to Senior Track Support Engineer before moving to the Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team in 2018.

His current role is that of Trackside Control Systems Engineer, which involves working on one of the cars to ensure all of the chassis-related control systems are correctly configured for the requirements of the event, and monitoring their performance over a race weekend. This weekend Chris will be in Abu Dhabi for the last race of the F1 season. The Mercedes team have had an incredibly successful year and have already secured their sixth consecutive Constructors Championship and 1st and 2nd place in the Drivers Championship.

This week our former pupil is horticulturist Roger Savage (Ch 72-77). At King’s, Roger was Head of Choir House, school prefect and 1st XI cricket captain and hockey captain. After undertaking work experience in offices, Roger decided it was not for him and studied for a degree in Horticulture at Wye College, London University.

After graduating, Roger worked for a progressive top fruit grower in Suffolk where he learnt practical fruit growing skills. From there he joined the Ministry of Agriculture as a horticultural advisor and spent three years at the National Fruit Trails at Brogdale where he was part of a team researching aspects of fruit growing and new fruit varieties. Roger moved into commerce and secured a job with ICI as a sales representative selling garden products. Although he enjoyed the work, Roger wanted to work for himself and so he started a plant nursery that specialised in hanging baskets. Within three years he was producing over 15,000 mossed summer baskets and today he has a very successful retail nursery that also has an ice cream parlour, cafe, craft centre and a pottery.

Roger says, “Horticulture is a wonderful profession, it is very technical, full of applied science, there are horticulturists employed in many industries that include, banking, insurance, crop production, agrochemical, pharmaceutical, government, supermarkets, distribution, you name it … a horticulturist is never far away!”

This week we had a very poignant Remembrance Day Service in Worcester Cathedral and we were honoured to welcome back OV Lt Col Rob Poole (H93-98) as our speaker. Rob was one of the last boarders and loved his time at King’s. He was in the CCF, played rugby and was constantly involved in the numerous activities that King’s offered.

Rob was sponsored by the army through St George’s Hospital Medical School, London, qualifying in 2003. Following a year of house jobs, he became a Regimental Medical Officer to 1PWRR and deployed to Iraq. In 2009 he completed his GP training and since then has been a front-line medical officer. He has served with the Welsh Guards whilst on ceremonial duties in London.

He has been a Senior Medical Officer of a large garrison and medical centre. His most recent assignment is working in the Ministry of Defence as part of the team in charge of medical operations and plans.

We are back after half-term and this week our former pupil is Operations Manager and Creative Designer, Melanie Thorn (Ch 96-03).

As a student at King’s, Melanie was an active member of the school community taking part in activities including Rowing, Theatre and Dance, Orchestra, group ski trips and was later Head of House. Melanie went to the University of Gloucestershire where she studied Fine Art and then went to complete a Masters degree in Urban Design at Birmingham City University.

Melanie was a gallery assistant at John Noott Galleries in Broadway for several years whilst also developing her own creative design business offering graphic design and wedding styling. Continuing in her artistic endeavours Melanie assumed the role of Wedding and Events Co-ordinator at Compton Verney before moving into the position of Operations Manager at Dovecote Events where she manages the logistics of the business development, including the organisation of corporate events and weddings and is in charge of creative design for marketing, publications and business branding.

This week we are delighted to feature Product Designer Mike Soper (S 06-13) as our former pupil. At King’s, Mike was part of the Cathedral Voluntary Choir and was involved in the CCF. Mike went to study Product Design Technology at the University of the West of England.

While studying, he also competed in the RSA (Royal Society of Arts) Student Design Awards, winning the ‘Wearing Intelligence’ brief. The prize for this award was a three-month placement at Kinneir Dufort which was extended to 6 months. Following this, Mike spent a short time freelancing before joining Arno GB, a German owned retail design firm based in Bristol, where he worked with brands such as W H Smiths, Electrolux and Dyson.

Mike is now a Product Development Engineer at Limbs & Things, a company designing anatomically and clinically accurate products which aid medical students in their education and training. Mike also mentors pupils in secondary schools in the Pupil Design Awards and has offered his support to the King’s Careers department if any prospective design students need advice on getting into the design industry.

This week we were delighted to welcome Rupert Monkhouse (Ch 05-12) back to school to talk to pupils at King’s St Alban’s about his job as a dentist. Rupert attended King’s St Alban’s himself before moving up the senior school where he took part in D of E, Young Enterprise and eventually became Head of House.

Following King’s, Rupert went to King’s College London to study Dental Surgery. Alongside dentistry, Rupert is passionate about swimming and was a swimming coach for the British Swimming and European Junior teams.

Rupert is now an NHS general dentist and enjoys being a Hub lead for Teeth Team, a children’s education initiative which helps educate children about looking after their teeth.