ElaineRees, have always been pleased that someone felt positively enough about 'that pale idiot rabbit' (as Nicola snootily thinks of her, even though she saves the play when Marie Dobson dries up!) to take her name! I should have called myself RowanIsAPITA or GilesIsSmug.
trying - I am a fan of the Chalet School books, while acknowledging that they are frequently formulaic, twee, snobbish and ideologically deeply dubious. You are of course entirely right about the fact that a bunch of nice, ordinary CS girls read a historical novel explicitly featuring KKK lynchings and nonetheless see nothing wrong with then using the KKK as moral justification for their feud with St Scholastika's! 
And not a word from the author to suggest that maybe this isn't the behaviour of nice school story heroines.
Some of the pottier/more unusual Chalet names - Loveday Perowne, Primose Trevoase, Jacynth Hardy, Samaris, Richenda, Ruhanna, Ottillie. The author also has a mania for giving girls male nicknames, so Helena becomes 'Len', Constance becomes 'Con', Cecily becomes 'Cecil', Lucinda Muriel becomes 'Tom', Gabrielle becomes 'Gay', Jacynth becomes 'Jack', Marya Cecilia becomes 'Robin' etc.
Also, no one christened Margaret can ever be called 'the whole thing' on a day to day basis, as it's apparently 'too long', so they're called Peggy, Margot, Madge, Daisy etc. But NOT Maggie, because 'no one likes that'.