‘CARPEDIEM’
“For me there are two main things which I feel have helped me to achieve what I have during my time at Dulwich; two pieces of advice I’d like to share with you and particularly to the Year 6s who are about to move on to the Lower School Firstly, take advantage of every opportunity that comes your way for as long as you can. It was a slightly bittersweet feeling to hear that the Year 6, 100 metre freestyle record, which had been untouched since 2010, had been broken by the Dulwich team who travelled to Sheffield to compete at the English School’s Swimming Championships a few weeks ago, and had consequently knocked my name off the coveted records board in the Sports Centre. My second piece of advice to you is, for me, the most important aspect of a successful school career, and that is that it doesn’t matter if you aren’t sure about what you want to do in the future as long as you enjoy that which you are doing now. Since I was about eleven years old I had always wanted to study medicine and be a doctor. It’s what my grandfather had done, what several of my cousins were doing and, to me, it seemed like a job with the perfect mixture of academia and genuine human connection with patients. Unlike many of the talented medics in my year however, I struggled with the medical subjects and realised that this was not what I wanted to be doing after all and I found myself yearning for the languages I had foregone to make way for the sciences. The College was completely supportive and after several meetings I had changed set and joined the Spanish and Latin classes. If you had told me in Year 6 that I would be going to university to study Classics, a degree based in Latin and Ancient Greek, I might have laughed at you and so, when in my Oxford interview, the Classics Don asked me where I saw myself in ten years, I answered honestly that I had no clue whatsoever, nor would I spend time trying to see into the future. So, as the Latin poet Horace says ‘carpe diem’ – seize the day! Just remember that if you’re worried or scared about what the future holds, take a deep breath, count to three and remember that you are all Alleynians, ‘pueri’, the recipients of an elite training at one of the best schools in the country. So hold your head up, be confident in yourself and do what makes you happy.” Cameron Forbes, Vice-Captain
‘Take advantage of every opportunity that comes your way for as long as you can’ John Pedersen performing on the violin
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