HT Update Week Ending 17th March 2023

Friday 17th March 2023

This concise weekly HT Update is generally published every Friday.  It’s a simple opportunity for you to also feedback/ask questions via the link at the bottom of each Update.  Feedback received, where appropriate, will be responded to and published by Monday afternoon on the school website link. 

Key messages from this week

Calendar: Key events in school next week: on Monday through Thursday there are a series of Student Voice Year Group meetings, on Monday there are S1/S2 Media Competition/SPOTY Assemblies; our S4 DofE Curricular Silver Qualifier Expedition takes place Tuesday through Thursday; S4/5 DofE Silver Training Expedition is on Tuesday; on Wednesday we have S3 DofE Bronze Training Expedition, there is also a S3 Media Competition/SPOTY Assembly as well as S4/S5/S6 SPOTY Assemblies; on Thursday we have our in-person Parent Council beginning at 7.00pm;  by Friday we expect to have completed our Senior Phase coursing. 

Staffing Update: This week we offer our congratulations to Laura Robb who was successful at interview this week for the permanent position as School Office Team Leader. We also made two other Administration appointments this week to take that team back to full capacity. We will update you when those staff start with us.  This week we welcomed our new Science Laboratory Technician, Lara  El Khazen-Reid.   Finally, congratulations to Robyn Taylor who was appointed as Acting PT Science BGEd to cover for Wendy Easterbrook’s maternity leave.

Easter School:  Our Easter School preparation is well underway and our thanks to those staff who are offering sessions. The finalised timetable has been shared with all students. S4 students currently ‘off track’ will get early sign up access via Google Classroom from today. The rest of S4 along with S5 and S6 learners will be able to sign-up from Wednesday 22nd March.  We’ll publish details on our website early next week.

Parent Council Meeting: Our in-person Parent Council Meeting on Thursday 23rd March, with a 7.00pm start will have two main items of discussion.  The recommended format of Parents’ Evenings next session and secondly proposed discussion on possible changes to school dress code requirements.  We’ll add some specific website posts over the weekend on both issues to allow some pre-meeting thinking.

Review of Qualifications and Assessment:  This important national review has moved to a new phase with the recent publication of an Interim Review by Professor Hayward.  We are offering an on-line session for parents/carers on Wednesday 29th March.  Click here  for more information.

Online Safety:  We are grateful to colleagues at Penicuik High School for alerting us to a website called Omegle click here.  Omegle is an online chat room that appears to encourage young people to chat with random strangers. Access is through personal devices and reassuringly is not possible through Midlothian issued Chromebooks which automatically block this and other similar sites.  Any platform that encourages young people to make contact with strangers in this way poses a potential risk to their safety. We are sharing this information to allow parents/carers the opportunity to discuss this and any potential safety concerns with your child. 

If you have any feedback/questions relating to this update please submit them via the link below

Feedback here

Take Care and Happy St Patrick’s Day

Campbell Hornell and Ali Mitchell,  Head Teachers

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