Wow! We are celebrating a new year and the terrific news of Sally Hawkins’ triumph at the Golden Globe awards:

Best Actress in a Film, Comedy or Musical, for her performance in Mike Leigh’s ‘Happy-Go-Lucky’. That’s seriously impressive, especially when you consider the competition. Ex-JAGS pupil Sally has another 11 awards to her name, including a Silver Berlin Bear Award, and a TV award for ‘Persuasion’. Congratulations Sally! We’ll keep watching.

Other lucky JAGS pupils have also experienced exciting professional work with well-known actors; Lucy Boynton played Beatrix Potter, the young version of Renee Zellweger  in ‘Miss Potter’; and Millie Findlay won a role in the star-studded ‘The Last of the Blonde Bombshells’. It can’t be bad when all your dialogue is in scenes with Judi Dench! Daisy Haggard came back to talk to us about her role as Gwendolen in ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’, to give a few examples.

But this is co-incidental to the experience of drama that every girl enjoys here. JAGS has an inspirational Drama department. Specialist teaching for a weekly double lesson in Key Stage 3 develops core skills, which are polished in the highly popular GCSE and A level options. Valuable skills are acquired, no matter what pupils go on to do. Outstanding staff-directed productions in our purpose-built theatre and opportunities for extra curricular drama in clubs and Speech and Drama lessons satisfy even the hungriest theatrical appetite.