The Syd Aldridge Award

Syd Aldridge attended William Ellis from 1951-56 and held many fond memories of teachers and students that he carried with him for over seventy years. His experiences of learning Physics and Chemistry within the school were particularly formative and helped inspire a life-long love of the sciences and a highly successful career working within scientific industries.

Having left school at 16 at the behest of his father, Syd completed his A-Levels at evening school and qualified in metallurgy from Sir John Cass College, which later became the London Metropolitan University. Syd emigrated to Canada in 1963 where he spent fourteen years in research at Chalk River. He then worked in research for Atomic Energy of Canada before becoming the General Manager of a company that manufactured zirconium alloy fuel channels for the CANDU nuclear reactors. Syd eventually rose to be President and CEO for the final twelve years of his career.

Syd became a great friend to the Trust and a generous donation led to the establishment of this award as well as being used to;

• Redevelop one of our science classrooms entirely and replace seating across all science classrooms. 

• Provide an IT suite within Room 8

• Allow the Trust to make its £200,000 pledge towards the playground redevelopment.

• Fund the initial salary of our Director and increase our general funding to the school