School News

S4/5/6 Prelims

These are now completed and young people are beginning to receive their marks back. The S5/6 Parents’ Evening takes place on Thursday 9 January and the S4 Parents’ Evening takes place on Wednesday 15 January and these evenings will provide an important opportunity to discuss your young person’s progress, next steps and presentation levels. I would encourage parent/carers to make attendance at these evenings a priority so we can work together to achieve the best outcomes for your young person.

Pupil News

The Big Sleep Out

It was great to have a number of our pupils taking part in the Big Sleep Out last weekend to support raising funds for the homeless.  Last Saturday night was extremely wet and cold for this event and their experience of sleeping out in these conditions demonstrated the need to continue to work together to reduce and ultimately eradicate this.

Parents/Carers Information

HMI continuing engagement

HMI have provided very positive feedback on the school’s progress in addressing areas for improvement identified in our original inspection in November 2016 and initial follow up in March 2018.  We will now look forward to receiving their final report in due course.

Diligence Certificates    

These will be issued next week. Diligence nominations, from subject teachers, are given to those pupils who demonstrate hard work and commitment, on a day to day basis throughout Term 1 (August – December).  The certificate will detail all subjects they have been nominated in. The ultimate aim is for pupils to be nominated in all of their subjects and if in term one they are not, to aim higher and achieve this in Term 2 (January – March/April). The idea behind these awards is to create ambition (one of our school values) and raise attainment and achievement through sustained effort and commitment to their studies.  More information on our diligence awards is available by clicking on this link Diligence Awards

Christmas Concert

It was a fantastic start to our festive celebrations on Wednesday evening with talented performances at our Christmas Concert from choirs, duets, pipes and drums, Goat’s Toes, Orchestra, Jazz and Rock bands. It was great to see so many parents/carers, family friends and school partners attending to support our young people. A huge thank you, in particular, to the music and instrumental teachers for their work throughout the year with our musicians which ensures they progress so well and are able to put on such a high quality performance. Thank you also to all the staff who came along to support and help with the running of the concert.

Christmas Dance

You will be aware from previous Head Teacher’s updates that this takes place this coming Tuesday, 17 December, from 7-9.30pm. This is an event organised by the school and the PTA.  Unfortunately we only had 300 tickets available for this event and this was decided by the school based on health and safety/fire regulations and the number of staff who were willing to come along and ‘staff’ the event to ensure an appropriate staff:pupil ratio.  We are aware that some young people did not get tickets and will be disappointed by this. In order to try and find a positive solution for next year we would intend for the school, PTA, pupils and parents to have a working group to look at the best way forward with dances/events and that the PTA and school could get more parents along to support the running and supervision of some of these events. If this was the case we may be able to consider running more dances across more evenings.  I do hope that the goodwill amongst our staff in supporting events across the year, at the school, is recognised as many go above and beyond to make these happen. A huge thank you also to the PTA for their role in this event and their support in the running of it on the night.

Dates for your diary (please also refer to the CALENDAR on the school website for all events across the year):

• 17 December – School Christmas Dance – 7-9.30pm
• 19 December – S6 Panto – 6pm (donations on the evening at the door)
• 20 December – end of term school closes at 12.15pm
• 7 January – staff resume after the festive break
• 8 January – pupils resume school following the festive break
• 9 January – S5/6 Parents’ Evening
• 15 January - S4 Parents’ Evening

Sue Cook