HT Update: Week ending 7th October 2022

Friday 7th October 2022

This concise weekly HT Update will be published every Friday afternoon with 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 on Monday afternoons on the school website link. 

Key messages from this week

Calendar: Upcoming significant events next week include our second Parent Council Meeting on Monday (additional details below),  our first video based Parents Evening this session for the parent/carers of S2 on Tuesday,  Junior Active Girls Day (periods 1 & 2 for BGEd students) and our S6 Trip to Blackpool both on Wednesday. 

Quality Assurance Visit: On Monday of this week we were visited by three colleagues from Midlothian Council.  The visit is part of a programme the council puts in place to support and challenge all schools.  Last week I visited, with others, Kings Park PS.   Our visitors had a school tour led by Ms Mitchell and two S6 students.  This allowed us to share school information in context from a staff and student perspective.  Our discussion themes focussed on how we approach the leadership of change and improvement as well as the associated impact of our work.   This discussion involved a significant input from two of our School Captains who outlined their role in the review and refresh of our school values undertaken last session.  

SQA Appeals 2022:  Within the next few weeks, SQA will have concluded all appeal review activity.  Today we have been informed by SQA that the outcome of appeals will be issued to schools on Monday 31 October 2022. Staff will share that with students as soon as possible thereafter. Updated certificates will be posted to students from Friday 11 November 2022.

Additional Holiday:  Just in case you missed our communication on Thursday!  At Wednesday’s Midlothian Council meeting it was agreed that all Midlothian schools will remain closed on Monday 24 October as a replacement for Monday 19 September 2022; the staff only In-service day will now take place on Tuesday 25 October instead of Monday 24 October; and students should return to school on Wednesday 26 October. It is recognised that the additional school closure day may have childcare implications for some families, therefore we have communicated this decision at the soonest opportunity with reminders as appropriate.   

Parent Council:  As highlighted above our next meeting will be held on Monday 10th October from 7.00pm.  This is an in-person meeting.  Details of the agenda are on our website  click here.  You’ll see we’ll share the outcomes from SQA 2022 and the process of reflection we’ve gone through.  We’ll also share an updated draft on our communication practices with parents/carers.  To remind you of our communication strategy please see our website click here   As always we’ll seek the support and advice from our Parent Council on both issues to inform our next steps.  

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

Feedback here

Take Care

Campbell Hornell and Ali Mitchell,  Head Teachers

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