HT Update: Week-ending Friday 13th December 2024

Friday 13th December 2024

This concise weekly HT Update is generally published every Friday afternoon. 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 on Monday afternoon on the school website.  

Key messages from this week  

Calendar:  Significant events week beginning 16/12/24;  on Wednesday and Thursday we’ll hold our Christmas Panto, ‘Over the Rainbow’, see below;  on Thursday we’ll issue our S2 Report;  on Friday we’ll hold a series of Christmas Assemblies, have an extended interval to allow all staff to meet and the Christmas Holiday begins for students and staff at 12.15pm.   Please note the school reopens for students on Tuesday 7th January 2025.    

Staffing:  Today we say thank you, farewell and best wishes to Callan Scade, Teacher of Biology.  Callan joined the school in August 2019 and has worked within Science but also played a significant role in our Duke of Edinburgh Awards programme.  Callan is taking up a post in Drumchapel HS Glasgow from Monday. 

Young Carers:  We have worked hard to identify Young Carers in our school through assemblies and our Student Support system.  We are now looking for your help in identifying students who have not identified themselves. We know that family circumstances can change quickly and that our knowledge of Young Carers may not be entirely accurate.  A student can be a Young Carer if they offer physical and/or emotional support to anyone in the family home. If you think your child may be a Young Carer, and the school doesn’t already know, please tell us by contacting the relevant House Team, click here. This may allow us to provide additional support for these young people.

Christmas Concert:   Congratulations and thank you to all students and staff involved in last night’s Christmas Concert.  A fabulous night of entertainment to get us all into the Christmas Spirit.

Christmas Food Drive and Mission Christmas. Thank you to everyone who donated to both collections and particularly the efforts bringing items in over the past few days, your generosity is very much appreciated. We will be making up the food hampers at the start of next week before delivering them to LHS families.    

Scottish Parliament Performance:  Congratulations to Luke Teasdale, S6 Student, who on Tuesday night performed at the EIS sponsored ‘Stand Up for ASN’ event at Holyrood.   Luke played keyboard as the delegates arrived and formally opened the event through playing a piece to them.  

Senior Phase Chromebook Clinic:  The Digital Learning team have been in school today running a Chromebook Clinic for S5/6 students. Appointments will also be available on Monday 16th and Tuesday 17th of December. Learning Technologists will work 1:1 with students for a 25 minute slot to make small repairs to Chromebooks and ‘powerwash’ older devices, improving their efficacy. Appointments last 25 minutes and students will also be given some tips and tools for managing common device issues. Students can still sign up for an appointment slot via their year group Google Classroom.

Google Guardian: Thank you for your feedback on the roll out of Google Guardian for S4 students.  We have been able to gather some key learning around the communication of Google Guardian, and how we might better organise classrooms to support at home learning. We will continue rolling out this application in January to our other year groups, starting with S5/6, and then each of the BGEd (S1/2/3) year groups. We will communicate more about this after the Christmas break.

SQA’s Your Coursework: SQA have produced an SQA’s Your Qualifications document to support the successful completion of coursework, e.g. projects and assignments. It is important that all students read this document. Key issues, such as the prohibited use of AI are covered. Staff will reference this as they work on assignment work, but students should keep themselves right by not using technology inappropriately. The document has been shared on year group Google Classrooms.

School Uniform:  BE Uniforms are opening a discount period on selected lines from Monday 16th December until midnight on Sunday 5th January 2025.  This is their 20% off ordering window for over the festive period.  Click here  for further details.  

RZSS Science Summer School Opportunity:  This is a free, week-long course hosted at Edinburgh Zoo and Highland Wildlife Park targeting young people between 16-18 years of age. Hosted annually by the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland (RZSS) this course runs during the school summer holidays and has benefitted over 1000 young people since it began in 2006. Successful applicants will gain experience in the fields of conservation, behavioural research, veterinary work and more!  Applications must be submitted before the deadline on Monday 3rd February 2025.  Details have been posted on relevant year group classrooms. Students wishing to apply should complete the online application form, click here.

School Panto:  Over the Rainbow tickets for this year’s school panto, on Wednesday 18th and Thursday 19th December  are live on ParentPay.  I’m afraid there are only a few tickets left and both dates will sell out.   Thanks for your support for what is sure to be a great end to the school ‘calendar’ year.  

Lasswade High School Childcare Service:  Reminder.  In consultation with Midlothian we are consulting on a proposal to close the service.  The consultation opened on, Friday 29 November 2024 and closes on Friday 24 January 2025 and Midlothian Council are seeking your views.  You can find more information, such as the consultation proposal document and online survey, at https://midlothiancouncil.citizenspace.com/education/lasswade-hscs-consultation

 

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

Feedback here

Take Care

Campbell Hornell,  Head Teacher

Share on Facebook