Thornbank - Girls

In 1979, girls were first admitted to Strathallan School, into an organisation known as Thorneyshades.  You could not really call it a House as such, as it consisted of the three bungalows at the top of the hill by the DT Department.  Two years later, Woodlands House was built - East Wing first, then followed in rapid succession by West Wing, now part of Thornbank, and then North Wing.  At this point, there were about 112 girls in Woodlands, and in 1989 the house was split in two, a new South wing being built on the end of West Wing, and thus Thornbank came into existence.

House Report 2007-2008
As our eighth year as Housemasters dawned we welcomed yet another extension to Thornbank House ready to accommodate our ever expanding numbers. They Sixth Form moved into their new Cubby and Morag moved back into her old room.

The Flemings' kitchen returned to its alter ego as a centre of serious debate as Lucy and Ailsa led the Upper VI in their first prefect meeting of the year. Over a glass of wine and tuck shop crisps (oh the glamour!) weighty and yet predictable matters were discussed: "How can I get the Third Form to bed on time?" "The Fourth Form are not signing in to meals." "Is it true that we get brew box?"

The prefects quickly established firm friendships with their new Third and Fourth Form buddies and buddy night was its usual heady mix of pizza, fizzy drink and silly games. Some of these relationships remained very strong throughout the year, the Third Form corridor becoming a haven of childishness "When I get stressed I just go down and muck about with the Third Form" said our Head of School (that's Rachel - not Tom!) Eila and Annabel also took it as part of their duties to entertain the Third Form, but usually after lights out. So that's all right then. The Third Form were having a ball.

Claire did a brilliant job preparing the House for House Music with our version of Mamma Mia. This is always a major undertaking, but although we didn’t win any prizes this year the performances were up to their usual extremely high standards. Alice took charge of the debating competition with great competence although no medals came our way in this either.

Inter-House sports play a major part in the year and under the guidance of our sports rep, Claire, we made a clean sweep of all the competitions in the winter term. We did particularly well in the swimming standards where all the races were filled with no need for catch-up. Vicky, Stef, Lizz and Rachel were great role models and organizers.
Thanks to Finola and Heather one of our greatest achievements of the year was the return of the interhouse Clay Pigeon Shooting prize. Well, it must have been our greatest moment because Mr Fleming sent everyone a text to let them know that Peter the pigeon had returned.

As I write this report late in the day and over overdue, some of the things that come to mind about the year are the small things that make Thornbank more like being at home than being at School. Ailsa sleeping in, the Sex in the City tutor outing and Finola and Kirsty ending up in a scary pub because they needed the toilet, no really, they did need the toilet.

Abbey's camel costume and DT nights with Miss Morrison; Rita making toast and coffee at 5am and setting off the alarm, Summer BBQs in the rain; Mr Fleming's weather reports; Sunday pole-vaulting and "wonky tumour fish" who is sadly no longer with us; the Thornbank word search and my "placenta" key ring, both provided by the generosity of the DT department; all the horse riding that Emily, Katie, Corrie, Alice, Flora, Lucy, Sarah, Jemma, Heather and Steph manage to fit into their spare time.

As someone on the telly once said "Who could live in a place like this?" Well, we do, all of us, and we've had an excellent time. With thanks to all the prefects, particularly Lucy and Ailsa who did a great job of running the House and also to Rachel who always came for a chat, I will miss that. Thanks to all our tutors and to Morag and her team. We are sorry to say goodbye to Mrs Hanks, Danielle, Natalie, Bronwyn and Natasha and we wish them all good luck in their new ventures. A special thanks to Steph H for building our brand new Pool table.

I hope that next year is as much fun as this one has been, and if the last eight year are anything to go by I feel sure that it will be.

SF & JRF (by proxy)

House Ethos
To develop a caring and tolerant community: 

• where each pupil’s endeavours are encouraged and supported  by others in the House.
• where a sense of duty and service towards others is encouraged valued and recognised.
• where a high level of participation and co-operation in the lifeof the House and the life of the School is encouraged and recognised.

 For further details about Thornbank House please refer to the Thornbank House Handbook.