Newstead Walk 2013 kicks off on 12 January

Newstead Girls’ College Negombo gears up to celebrate 200 years of existence in 2016

Newstead Girls’ College Negombo, which is 196 years old, is gearing up to celebrate 200 years of existence in Sri Lanka in 2016.

The ‘Newstead Walk 2013’ is the initial project that the Past Pupils Association, is organising to raise funds to refurbish the existing hostel building in the school, which is now in a dilapidated condition, and also to construct a new building to accommodate new classrooms.

The walk will be held on 12 January and a meeting will also be held on 5 January by the Past Pupils Association to inform all past pupils about the walk at 8:30 a.m. at the Main Hall of Newstead Girls’ College Negombo. The walk will wrap up with a musical show at 6:00 p.m. on 12 January.

Situated in quiet and peaceful surrounding, ideal for a place of learning and comforted by the gentle and cool breeze that blows over the Indian Ocean along one of the school’s boundaries, Newstead College during the past 196 years has risen to great height and stature.

From 1815-1962, a period of 147 years, is a long time in the history of Newstead, during which the school was run by the Wesleyan Methodist missionary society.

The school from its humble beginnings as a vernacular boys’ school was transformed into a Wesleyan girls’ English high school at the turn of the century; and became a leading senior secondary school bearing the name Newstead after one of the founders of the school, Rev. Robert Newstead.

Much was accomplished during this era mainly because of the dedicated services of the missionaries, missionary principals and devoted staff.

Newstead, with able guidance, managed to sail through and establish her place proudly in the mainstream of education in Sri Lanka as a national school the first of its kind in the Gampaha District.

Newstead ever sounds the clarion call in her assertion of the unity of humanity at Newstead there is one family community, with Sinhala, Muslim, Tamil and Burgher children from Christian, Catholic, Buddhist, and Hindu backgrounds, living together in the abiding reality that they are one human family. Although the school aims at high achievement in its varied fields of activity, it still tries to pass on from generation to generation the values of its founders simplicity and dedication in all they undertake.

Newstead was and will always be a productive fruitful and fertile ground to build women, and by their influence, men who will find happiness in simple things, who will be balanced and capable, who will be anxious to give friendship and service, who will be answerable, accountable, and responsible to the world.

Seated on the veranda of the mission house, where all the missionaries stayed, one sees the picturesque view of the fishing boats sailing out to the sea until they become mere specks against the red sky, and finally vanish beyond the horizon to the more beyond.

This view most probably would have reminded Rev. H.S. Beaty, the then Manager of the school, of the journey by Columbus to the unknown when he discovered there was land far beyond the horizon.

The then Principal Dixon, the teachers, and the pupils with one voice selected the words ‘More Beyond’ as the motto of the school.

No motto would be more apt than ‘More Beyond,’ that speaks of adventure, of unknown thrills waiting in the wilder life that lies before us. Newstead students are outside in that world of more beyond from that school by the sea, not floundering but being strengthened by every storm, sailing gaily onward over perilous seas, seas of life, with a thought, a hope, a faith in ‘More Beyond’.

The school crest was designed by late Nanda Pieris (nee Jayamaha) and is a circular design with a boat sailing out to sea.

In the design she incorporated the school colour red for the sky, Ward House green for the sea, Hartley House yellow for the boat, Dixon House orange for the beach, and Lawrence House black for the bordering circle.

Tracing its roots back to 1815, with almost two centuries of service, this is justly a proud record, for a school which has given herself, selflessly to all who have entered her portals.