HT Weekly Update: Week-ending Friday 23rd February 2024

Friday 23rd February 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 each Monday on the school website link.   

Key messages from this week  

Calendar:  Events next week include:  on Monday we’ll do First Aid ‘catch-up’ sessions with some S5/6 students;  on Wednesday we’ll hold a Industry Insights-Investments workshop for senior students;   on Thursday we have our Balmoral Employer Visit and that evening it’s our S1 Parents’ Evening, via our video platform.

Staffing:   Congratulations to Fraser Sands who was successful at interview for our Principal Teacher (PT) Mathematics position. Fraser succeeds Maria Edmond who is retiring after many years of service at Lasswade HS.  We thank Maria for her time in our school and the work she has done within Maths and other areas of the school.  Next week we welcome Rebecca McCann to the School Office Team and Victoria Hunter to the Nursery Team. 

School day Consultation:  A reminder that our Midlothian wide consultation on aligning the school day across all 6 secondary schools remains live.  Details are available via our website, click here.  This week our students had the opportunity to respond through their Personal and Social Education (PSEd) classes.   I am recommending that you support the proposal and am asking for as many parent’s carers to respond, click here, as possible. There are only 5 questions to respond to in the feedback/survey.  The main changes for us are minimal and the benefits of aligning the secondary school day across all schools are significant and highlighted in the Consultation Paper. 

Parent Council 5:  Just a reminder of the change of date for our next Parent Council Meeting.  It was Tuesday 19th March,  we’ve had to move it to the following Tuesday, 26th March.  The meeting will be in-person, beginning at 7.00pm.  

Midlothian Council:  Please click here for information on the proposal to relocate Beeslack Community High School and realign the associated catchment areas.  This does affect Lasswade High School.  The consultation opened on Monday 19th February and closes on Tuesday 16th April.  Midlothian Council are seeking your views.   

Senior Phase Coursing: Coursing for session 24/25 is now live and will run until Monday 18th March. Wherever possible staff will meet with students during core classes to minimise disruption to Learning, Teaching and Assessment at this busy time.

Young Musician of the Year Competition:  Congratulations to Maggie Goodall who performed admirably in the South of Scotland Final last Sunday at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland in Glasgow. Maggie is a phenomenal singer and was ably accompanied by Mr Brown on piano. 

AV Refresh: Over Easter all of our current SMARTboards will be replaced with SMART MX Panels. This is good news as it supports the school to ensure we use digital approaches in the classroom in a way that helps engage our students

School Photographs.  Coldwells have asked us to share the following click here.  ‘Unwanted’ S6 Leavers Sets should have been returned by today with a payment due if they’ve not been.  There is also delivery information for those making orders.

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

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