NSCG Students Lead Poignant Armistice Day Services

Today, hundreds of staff and students from Newcastle and Stafford Colleges Group (NSCG) gathered to honour the anniversary marking the end of the First World War.

Students and staff from both campuses gathered alongside military veterans, active service members, and emergency responders on Monday, November 11, to commemorate Armistice Day and honour those who have lost their lives serving the country.

In Newcastle, Level 3 Musical Theatre students performed two heartfelt songs; a group rendition of The Rose followed by Navaeh Dawid’s solo performance of Vera Lynn’s We’ll Meet Again.

Air cadets Katelyn O’Reilly Smith and Ellie Breeze introduced the service, before a reading of Laurence Binyon’s powerful poem For the Fallen by A Level student Cian McDermott.

The Last Post was then played, with a two minute silence commencing at the end of the piece, with students from the Uniformed Protective Services course releasing red confetti from the balconies to symbolise the bloodshed of war.

At the Stafford campus, the ceremony was held in the Skills and Innovation Centre with musical performances of The Long and Winding Road by Level 3 Music Performance student Murphy McGrath and We’ll Meet Again from Betty Holden, who also studies Level 3 Music Performance.

This was followed by an introduction to the service from cadets Faye Willis, Keeley Wright and Jenna Nixon.

The poignant reading of For the Fallen was delivered by Uniformed Protective Services students Alex Thorn and Theo Eccleston.

Both services were concluded with the laying of wreaths at local cenotaphs, with Newcastle College students leading a procession to the High Street and Stafford College learners paying their respects at Staffordshire County War Memorial in Victoria Park.

People across the country gathered at war memorials, churches and community centres to honour the fallen and to commemorate the day when the allies signed a ceasefire agreement with Germany at Compiégne, France, at 11am on November 11, 1918, bringing the war now known as World War I to a close.