comments received
Charles Hughes
An excellent evening – well organised and maintaining pace throughout.
Thank you for the invitation.
Hosting was a great idea. Beverley and I enjoyed having a direct interest and the school staff seemed genuine with their thanks.
My school, Brize Norton, were impressed and will certainly enter next time.
Well done to you and all the team.
Best regards,
Charles
Mike Rodd
Just a very quick word of sincere appreciation for all you and your colleagues did to make yesterday's event and the overall competition so very succour (successful? – Ed). I was absolutely bowled over by the standard of the submissions and by the sheer enthusiasm of all. Thank you for inviting me please convey my appreciation to all.
I thoroughly enjoyed my little bit of hosting and, as you know, quickly developed a valuable contact with the Head Teacher. Also thoroughly enjoyed meeting the kids.
A great idea – very happy to do it in the future.
With every best wish
Mike
Alan Pollard
I thought that the hosting was an excellent idea and I feel sure that the schools welcomed it.
The whole evening was a great success and Oxfordshire branch deserve the highest commendation for their work.
The location was ideal.
The quick tour of the different web sites was well handled and smoothly paced.
Probably the only area for comment was the timekeeping.
Perhaps next time we should allow a little longer for arrival and sorting ourselves out before the event.
Can a hyperlink list of the contestants websites be made available?
[yes – see the
results page ]
Jennifer Moss, Cranfield
Adrian,
We enjoyed yesterday very much; as you say, it was lovely to see the kids' enjoyment (and delight with their various goodies and prizes).
I'm aware of the tremendous amount of hard work that you and Sheila also put into the event, and congratulations on such a successful outcome.
Thanks also to you and Sheila for your patience with our questions as we went through this process for the first time; next time will be easier!!
Did I just say 'next time'??? :-)
Best wishes,
Jennifer
Kuldeep Kaur
Dear Adrian,
Thank you for inviting me to yesterdays Prize giving, I had a lovely time and was very impressed with the organisation of the event.
Please see below for further comments x
Kuldeep Kaur
- How did this hosting experiment go and is it something we should do again?
The hosting experiment went very well and I would definitely recommend you do it again.
- Any feedback you picked up from your school?
John Blandy Primary School had a brilliant time and were very excited by the whole experience. They even went to great lengths to tell me about how they went about designing their website and who did what. They were very impressed by the goodies they received.
They are also keen to take part again and are already thinking about what they could do for the next competition.
The great thing about having a host for the primary group was it allowed the teachers and parents to sit back and enjoy the event.!
- Any feedback of your own – what went well and what could be improved, just in case we do it again?
I think the speakers need to be on more of a child level. Some of the terminology used would have been difficult for them to understand and ..[we have to avoid giving the impression that it's a] sales pitch.
The primary school hosts were a great idea and I would be more than happy to be one of them again.
Thanks again for helping to make the evening a success.
Let me know if you would like any more feedback.
Simon Adams re Hosting
Very successful experiment, allows you to manage the whole thing not the small aspects. Schools enjoyed it, I made a possible PR case study contact. Very personable for the schools, makes the BCS people mingle a bit more which is very good or it can become them and us.
I know Kuldeep's school thought she was great, I enjoyed it too and it's a good opportunity for us to plug BCS as we speak to them.
Definitely an idea to take forward.
Simon Adams
BCS Corporate Marketing Executive
Victoria Reinthal, Deputy PR Manager & Press Officer and PC Mouse
Thanks for your email Adrian.
I had a great time, so it was my pleasure. The whole event was brilliant, so well done to you!
Best wishes
Sue Guy
Just a quick email to thank you all for your endeavours in making last night's event such a huge success – it was good to see so many of you there and also 2 Vice Presidents, our Deputy President and the BCS President!
I thought the awards evening was slick and very professionally run – a thoroughly enjoyable evening for all. I appreciate just how much work goes into organising this sort of event, especially when you managed to obtain such good sponsorship deals and exciting prizes, without requiring a great deal of funding from the MSB Designated Fund.
The idea of individuals hosting the schools was also a good idea and I enjoyed the interaction with the pupils from my school. The feedback I received from them was very positive and I hope you will now be able to get some local publicity with the help of our PR team.
Mike Callahan, Head of ICT, St. Hugh's School
Dear Adrian and team,
A big thank you from St. Hugh's for the prize giving on June 23rd.
I thought it was organised superbly and I loved the way everybody was involved and the fact that all the pupils had some kind of recognition.
The speakers and the presentation was slick and professonal as well as holding everybody's attention.
The best praise I can give must be the comments from the pupils themselves – they described it as one of the best 'trips' they had been on.
They all had such a good time and found it very useful to see other schools' work.
...[Ali] was lovely and very bubbly and did well.
Adrian, your team and yourself obviously worked hard on this major project and we are indebted to you. Many thanks to all concerned.
Warm regards,
Nicola Roddis, The Cooper School
Thank you for a lovely evening.
I was particularly impressed with the way that we had someone assigned to meet us who knew something about the site the girls had made and who told them which aspects he liked.
This was a particularly thoughtful touch.
I look forward to seeing you again next year.
NIK
I wonder if in future there is scope for a prize/category for entrants that received no help from staff? (part of my drive towards independent learning)
Anna Duckworth, BCS Corporate Marketing Manager
Just to say thank you for inviting me to the event last week; I really enjoyed it.
I was so impressed with the way the committee ran the show – and your presentation was absolutely right for the occasion.
Im sure the children (and parents and teachers) enjoyed it as much as I did.
Chris Huggins, Rye St Antony
Dear Adrian
As promised, the
Renaissance Team web site link.
Thank you for all the hard work you put into the organisation of the competition. The girls really enjoyed the Prizegiving on Thursday. It was the first time we had entered the competition, so I was delighted that Helena and Anna got Highly Commended.
Best wishes Chris Huggins
Irene Glendinning, BCS Coventry Branch
All,
I agree with Alan. It was extremely well organised and a very happy occasion. The hosting worked well because it provided a reason to communicate directly with some of the competitors and see their entry before the event.
As some of you know Dave Filer and I were attending from the Coventry Branch so we could get some ideas for running our own schools competition. Oxfordshire Branch has provided an excellent model on which to base our own competition and the associated awards event. You have a great deal to be proud of.
I hope this will be featured in one of the BCS publications? Pehaps it deserves wider publicity and acclaim?
Congratulations to all those involved!
Best wishes
David Haworth, Abingdon School
...
The boys are delighted!
I'm so sorry I couldn't be there to see them receive their prizes, but they obviously had an excellent evening.
We look forward to next year!
David
Coasters
Dear Adrian,
Just wanted to say thank you for the Oxfordshire Web Comp coaster, it really did 'make my day'.
Best wishes.
Elaine (Boyes)
Dear Adrian
Thank you for your letter of thanks and coaster. This is a lovely gesture and I have already put it to good use!
...
Sue Guy
Dear Adrian
Just a very quick thank you for the web competition coaster very thoughtful!!
All the very best
Mike (Rodd)
Adrian,
Have today received the commemorative coaster which is already gracing my desk. Many thanks. I greatly enjoyed the evening and it restored my faith in (some of) the youth of today. A heartening evening all round.
Best wishes
Alan (Pollard)