EXPERIENCED classics teacher Victoria Mee has been appointed as the Schools’ new Head of Latin with plans to grow the department, as the subject is added into the curriculum for students in Years 7 and 8.

Latin is now being taught in the new Jubilee Building and all pupils coming into the Boys’ and Girls’ Schools will take fortnightly Latin classes during their first two years, before being offered it as a GCSE option in Year 9.

Classicist Mrs Mee hopes to inspire more pupils to develop a love of Latin. She said: “This is an excellent opportunity to provide all pupils with a better understanding of the importance of Latin. Studying how any language works always makes understanding new languages, and indeed our own, easier.

“They’ll learn to make connections between English words and their Latin roots, which will help expand their vocabulary and naturally bring benefits across the curriculum.

“They’ll also see connections with the modern foreign languages they study at Dame Allan’s; French and Spanish are Romance languages that have their roots in Latin, while German works grammatically in a very similar way.”

Mrs Mee, who lives in Newcastle with her family, hopes the addition of Latin into the curriculum in Years 7 and 8 will increase the numbers choosing to study it at GCSE. In time, she would like to see pupils taking Latin at A Level, with aspirations of studying Classics at university.

She said: “Studying Latin involves a range of skills – analytical, literary and logical – which are all transferable. It is a rigorous language, certainly, hence it is held in high regard by universities and employers. Yet it has many other things to offer, too, such as the study of Roman history and civilisation, from which many modern parallels can be drawn.”

An environmentalist who likes to walk and cycle, Mrs Mee plans to get involved with the climbing clubs on the co-curricular timetable. Reflecting on her first few weeks at Dame Allan’s, she added: “My initial impressions were not wrong – staff and students alike have been warm and welcoming. It’s a busy school, but the atmosphere is positive and encouraging.”