St. James' School (India)

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The main school building
The main school building
St. James' School
Motto: Pro Ecclesia Et Pro Patria
Established: 1864
Type: Private
Principal: Terence Hamilton Ireland
Staff: Varies
Students: Varies
Location: Kolkata, West Bengal, India
Campus: Urban
Nickname: Jacobeans
Website: www.sjslive.wetpaint.com

Other meanings, see Saint James School

St James' School, Kolkata, India, is a well known CNI school, and one of the oldest and most prestigous private schools in India. It is associated with the ICSE board of education. It was established in 1864 by Bishop Cotton.

The current principal is T.H Ireland; past principals have included the well-known educators John Mason and D.L. Bloud. The school, with its adjoining unique, double steepled church, is well known in eastern India not only for its curricular prowess but also for the extracurricular merit shown by its students. At present the school is equipped with a basketball court, a huge athletics field, unique in a bustling, urban city like Kolkata.The school also has a state of the art computer lab and three science labs.

The school motto is "Pro Ecclesia Et Pro Patria", which may be rendered as "For Church and for Country".

Contents

[edit] Houses

The students are divided into four houses, each named after one of the school's founding members. They are Copleston (yellow) their motto is "Duty Before Self" , Westcott (red) their motto is "Work Is Worship" , Cotton (green) their's is "Never Despair" and Lefroy (blue) has their motto as "Love Conquers All" . They are named for bishops of the Anglican Church in India. Competition between the houses takes place in the form of interhouse activities like quizzing, debating, athletics, drama, and elocution, as also the Monday morning uniform inspection. Meritorious houses are awarded house points and the house with the most points at the end of the year wins the prestigious Cock House cup, which was instituted following a gift from the RAF after the school buildings were used as barracks during World War II.

[edit] Athletics

  • Field Hockey
  • Soccer
  • Basketball
  • Cricket
  • Rugby
  • Athletics
  • Squash


[edit] Activities and awards

Interschool activities are stressed at St James', the school having won The Telegraph School of the Year award (given by a local English daily) a number of times for its prowess at interschool activities. Recently, in the year 2005, the school,after having won the award for a record sixth time was inducted into The Telegraph Hall of Fame. This meant that the school would not be eligible for this award again in the future so as to give other schools a fair chance. Non-competition activities take place in the form of various clubs like Interact Club, drama, nature, eastern Cultural, quiz, SPICMACAY and various other clubs, each hosting a number of public events throughout the year, ranging from the annual photography contest of the photography club to the annual interschool quiz organised by the quiz club, known as 'Jaco-Iz'. The Interact Club, which is involved in innumerable community service activities of large magnitude in collaboration with The Rotary Club of Calcutta Victoria, had been awarded best Interact Club in town in the academic year 2006-07.One of the most sought after fests, Jaco-synthesis is hosted by this school. The students call themselves Jacobeans, as does the annual school magazine.

In 1900, St. James' School won the Beighton Cup and has till date been the only school to ever win the oldest hockey tournament in the world. [1]

[edit] The school day

School is open on week days from Monday to Friday. The timings are, as follows:

Start - 7:45 a.m.
Assembly - 7:50
Periods 1 to 4 - 8:15 to 10:45
Break - 10:45 to 11:05
Periods 5 to 8 - 11:15 to 1:30p.m.
Dismissal - 1:30.p.m

Apart from these standard timings, many extra-curricular activities are held after school (e.g. inter-class football, cricket etc matches). School is also open on Saturdays for Cubbing, Scouting , the chess club, school cricket team practice and school basketball team practice.

[edit] References

  1. ^ O’Brien, Barry. All hail hockey on history high. Eye on Calcutta. The Telegraph, 4 December 2004. Retrieved on 2007-04-13.

[edit] External links