Full Governing Body Meeting held at the school on Thursday 19th May 2016 at 4.30pm Meeting no. 77

Those present: Mr B Wilmot (Chair of GB), Mr S McQuillan (Head of School), Ms J Almeida, Mr D Burgess, Dr F Green, Rev. G Hovenden, Mr N Hunter, Mr R Thomas, Mr J Thomson and Mrs L Birchard (Clerk). The meeting was quorate. Also present was Mrs P Powell (Marketing and Fundraising Manager)

1. Mr B Wilmot said the Opening Prayer

2. Apologies for absence were received from Fr. C Keen, Mr S MacDonald, Mrs L Nicholls, Mrs P Rosser, Mrs C Stockmann, Fr. P Stodart, Mr D Volpato, Mrs K Wolfle and Mr J Dawkins (Deputy Headteacher). Also absent was Mr S Adamson (Executive HT)

3. Disclosure of conflicts of interest – there were none

4. Minutes of meeting held on 22nd March 2016 These were accepted as a true and accurate record of the meeting.

5. School Marketing Manager The Chairman welcomed Mrs Paula Powell, the new Marketing and Fundraising Manager to the meeting. Mrs Powell has worked in a similar position at Weald of for 9 years gaining experience in marketing, fundraising and lettings. Prior to that she spent 14 years at HSBC and has a degree in Psychology. She works 25 hours per week and finds St Gregory’s very welcoming. Since joining Paula has visited various areas of the school and said it’s a steep learning curve. She has good contacts with local media and has written a piece for The Courier re the very successful Starlight. Mr McQuillan has written an item about the school’s achievements for The Courier and Times at Tunbridge Wells. There is also an item on page 2 of The Courier about the 6th Form. Mrs Powell has been working with Kim Stanley to re-vamp the newsletter to reflect the Golden Jubilee year and to ensure the website is fresh with current news. She has joined the Golden Jubilee working group and has organised posters and displays for around the school to get the message out about the 50th anniversary of the school. An article is going into The Courier with an open invitation for people to attend the 50th Anniversary Mass on 30th June and to involve local families in providing old photographs and memorabilia. Mrs Powell is trying to forge community links and suggested the school join the West Kent Chamber of Commerce (fee c£450 p.a). She has put Mike King (Drama) in touch with Schools Liaison at Trinity. She has contacted Kent County Council to complain about the signpost for the school (it is half missing) and to request a signpost for the footpath leading to the school, so that people can find St Gregory’s more easily. She is updating the prospectus and looking at all the handouts which are produced in-house to get some professional input to school literature. This is particularly important for the open days where we are trying to ‘sell’ the school and shout about achievements. Mrs Powell spoke about admissions and how to convince parents of more able students to support St Gregory’s rather than sending their children to the grammar schools. Weald of Kent’s new Admissions Policy will impact admissions at St Gregory’s and the school will need to compete to keep up admissions in the future. There is still a lot of research to do. Mrs Powell will speak to the School Business Manager (SBM) to do a gap analysis of where the school is and where it is going. Governors asked which part of her role is priority – Mrs Powell said the dilemma is that there is a lot of marketing work to do, but this costs money. She did quite a bit of fundraising at Weald with professional fundraisers and worked on marketing alongside the SBM. The schools are different but there are similar practices which can be adopted. It is important to find out why parents send their children to single sex St Gregory’s Catholic School Governing Body, Reynolds Lane, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN4 9XL Page 1 of 10 grammar schools when an outstanding co-education is available to them. St Gregory’s also benefits from the faith / ethos aspect. Governors asked Mrs Powell where she envisages an income stream coming from – she intends to develop income generated from parents (currently c£30k each year) to improve the school in which their children are educated. The donations must be voluntary and affordable, but regular Gift-Aided income is very useful for long-term planning. Lettings are also a good income. Mrs Powell was also asked whether she would be applying for any funding from charitable organisations. She said that there are lots of grant making charities – the key is to decide what the funding is to be used for them match the organisations that can assist with it. Mr McQuillan said that Mrs Powell has had significant impact. She responded to the Weald admissions consultation and her working with the press is an important element to keep the momentum going. Mr McQuillan said he and the SLT are working to update the school Vision but would like Governors input and to get parental views via the forums. Mrs Powell can help move this forward. Mr Wilmot said the school has struggled to get articles published in The Courier and welcomed the new exposure. He said that all school communications should have a uniform format and asked Mrs Powell to work on forming a template to ‘brand’ them. Leaflets should be consolidated and have a strong brand that people immediately recognise as St Gregory’s. He agreed that the school should invest in membership of the West Kent Chamber of Commerce. There was a discussion regarding jute bags with the school logo that Mrs Powell proposed to sell during the 50th anniversary year. The Chairman thanked Mrs Powell and invited her to stay for the rest of the meeting.

6. Headteacher's Written Report (distributed with agenda) Admissions Mr McQuillan reported that 210 places had been offered in Year 7 for September 2016. There are currently 26 families on the waiting list and 10 appeals (which will be heard on 28th June). He said that independent appeals would result in some movement during the summer months but hoped that the year would be full in September. 6th form applications both internal and external are healthy and it is expected that c120 students will join Year 12. Mr Hunter said there have been a number of external applications and it is expected that 8, having the right qualifications, will be given places. The number of external applications has gone up significantly as Hayesbrook has reduced their 6th Form offer (no Art or Science). Governors asked whether the school had thought about expanding the 6th Form but Mr Hunter said it is a question of capacity (the building was designed to hold 220 students).

Academic Progress Mr McQuillan gave a summary of the progress data drawn from the most recent teacher progress reviews for GCSE, AS Level and A Level in 2016. GCSE - Year 11 A summary of the final progress review for Year 11 was discussed at the March Governing Body meeting. Earlier this term teachers of English and Maths only were asked to update the current progress of their students and the grades were combined with the students’ previous progress in all other subjects: Measure Target All (171) Pupil Premium (28) SEN (12) % English & Mathematics A*C 75 53 35 0 % Mathematics A*C 61 39 8 % English A*C 87 68 50 % EBacc 35 15 11 0 Attainment 8 Grade C+ C D D- Progress 8 Score +0.25 +0.27 -0.39 -0.38 Nb. No targets are set for %Mathematics and %English A*-C

Mathematics remains the key to success in the overall measures and the SLT think that the Maths teachers remain cautious in their predictions of final grade outcomes. This term another group in Maths

St Gregory’s Catholic School Governing Body, Reynolds Lane, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN4 9XL Page 2 of 10 has been created to target C/D borderline students, bringing the number of groups up to 9. In previous years, Maths has been taught in 7 sets but smaller class sizes should benefit student progress and intervention strategies. The school continues to invest in the 1:1 mentoring programme for targeted students. The intention is to roll this programme in to Year 10 when Year 11 have completed their Maths exams in early June. The first papers are being sat on Thursday. A reward scheme has also been implemented with £10 Westfield vouchers being awarded to students progressing with MyMaths (a Maths PixL app). There are staffing issues in the Maths Department currently and staffing (along with English) is a key priority as the subjects are double weighted in the measures. Governors queried a number of figures in the table. They asked if -0.39 Progress 8 for the 28 Pupil Premium students compared with +0.27 was expected and what was being done to close the gap. Mr McQuillan said they expected it to be higher and closing the gap remains an issue nationally. Governors asked whether there was a national Progress8 figure for Pupil Premium students – no, this is a new measure, colleagues are reliant on 4Matrix to provide the analysis. There will be a 3 year period while data is collected to form a basis. One strategy in place since the Autumn term (not just for Pupil Premium students) is fortnightly testing – the tests are marked within 24 hours to identify students who would benefit from 1:1 tutoring over the following fortnight. They are then re-tested to see what progress has been made. SLT propose to continue this strategy into Year 10 on the new Mathematics specification, which will be more challenging. 3 of the targets will be missed due to the significant impact of Mathematics and English on Progress8 and Attainment8. The targets come down from the Executive Headteacher, whose targets are set by the Kent Catholic Schools Partnership Improvement Advisor and the Governing Body. KCSP suggest what all schools should achieve this is then tweaked to suit the school, hence +0.25 Progress8 target. Governors queried why the ebacc target (35%) will be missed by over 50% as there were enough Year 10 students studying MFL at the time the target was set. Mr McQuillan said that going forward there will be more students studying MFL so the ebacc results will be higher. Robust aspirational targets are set. Governors said it would be helpful if there was a trend analysis but the old and new measures cannot be compared. The figures will be looked at in greater detail at the Learning and Teaching meeting in June.

AS Level - Year 12 Measure Target All (111) Pupil Premium (10) SEN (3) % grades A-B 30 31 38 55 % grades A-E 100 98 100 100 In Year 12 the number of AS courses offered has reduced in line with the Government introducing 2 year A level specifications. There is no AS RE or Psychology. Students will eventually drop the 4th AS course and concentrate on 3 A levels, so it will be crucial that they make the right choices.

A Level - Year 13 Measure Target All (107) Pupil Premium (6) SEN (6) % grades A-B 56 48 27 27 % grades A-E 100 100 100 100 The 6th Form leadership team have used previous progress data to identify 30 students who had fallen short of achieving their A and B target grades. These students have been divided into 11 teams with a leadership team mentor assigned to each group and visual displays are in use to show the progress of each team. The student teams have been meeting with their mentor every fortnight and using PiXL Student Impact Reports as an important part of the process. In these reports, students have their targets, areas to develop and the success criteria. The data shows that all but one team had made progress and analysis will identify the progress of individuals. A prize will be given to the team making the most progress. PixL6 is a new tool this year and a good associate comes in to help with new strategies for 6th Form improvement.

St Gregory’s Catholic School Governing Body, Reynolds Lane, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN4 9XL Page 3 of 10 Staffing Ms Kellie Maguire joined in late April as Receptionist to replace Francesca Hockley. Miss Adele Sharp has been appointed as the additional teacher of English for September. She is currently working in RE to cover the absence of Noel Malone for the remainder of this academic year. Ms Elizabeth Smith has been appointed as the additional teacher of Maths for September. She is currently completing her NQT year. Both Miss Sharp and Ms Smith’s appointments are part of the planning for the additional class in Year 7 from September, for the offer of 210 places. Ms Alexandra Vamplew-Swain has been appointed as Subject Leader for Art, Design and Technology from September, replacing Phil Teckkam who is retiring. She is currently Head of Art at Mayfield School, Gravesend, formerly Gravesend for Girls. She came in to assist with interviews for Mike Stott who is also retiring. Ms Zoe Baker will be teaching Art and Design, from September. The following staff resignations have been received or indicated since March:  Mary Tice, Deputy Catering Manager has worked 34 years for the school and retires at the end of August. It would be an understatement to say that her loss from the catering team will be significant.  Yolande Wilson-Christian (part-time Maths) resigned at the beginning of the month. She was on a short term contract and her teaching has been covered internally by Maths staff.  Carmel Semmens (part-time Maths) will leave this August, to take up a new teaching post in Malaysia.  Sally Howie (part-time Maths) will also leave this August, to take up a new teaching post at Mayfield School. Mrs Howie has great expertise in teaching Maths and has responsibility for leading the teaching of Statistics. She has worked for the school since September 1991.  Philip Maisey teacher of ICT and Computing has accepted a post in Canterbury and will leave in August. Due to family circumstances he has already moved to Canterbury and needed a teaching position close to home.  Natasha Charles, part-time teaching assistant in the Hearing Impaired resource base. Natasha recently joined the school in February.  Ian Claus, teacher of Science and Chemistry has indicated his intention to step down from his current teaching role from September, but is keen to continue working for the school by taking up one of the posts for Science technician, where two current post holders are retiring in August.  Kerren Garner has resigned this week as part-time teacher and Subject Leader for Drama and Theatre Studies. In order to address these resignations and earlier staffing needs, the schools is currently recruiting for:  Teachers of Maths – it was agreed at Audit & Finance to get full-time replacements  Teacher of Computing and ICT  AENCO (Jo Matthews resignation from August)  Administrative assistant for the school office, in response to the Governors’ report on office staffing  Catering assistant Governors expressed concern about the Mathematics Department. It is hoped to make 3 full-time appointments with pairing from experienced mathematics teachers to assist with A level and Statistics teaching. Mr McQuillan said he had received a call from about the staffing profile, experience, staff recruitment and retention. It is very difficult to recruit in some subjects (e.g. Mathematics). Mrs Garner’s part-time Drama teaching can be covered by Mr King and Mrs Miller. Governors queried Mrs Miller’s teaching load interfering with her Chaplaincy role – she has recently qualified and needs to do 0.25-0.3 FTE teaching Drama/RE for her NQT. Mrs Miller feels this complements her Chaplaincy role as it boosts relationships with the students and raises her profile in school. This will be raised at the next Catholicity, Care and Community Committee meeting GOV77/01 LB/Fr P

Staff References The Staff Reference Policy was adopted by the Full Governing Body following instructions from KCSP in March 2016. Mr McQuillan has been implementing the policy for references from April and this has caused some disquiet particularly amongst teaching staff. It is common for schools to receive reference requests seeking information on the quality of the applicant’s work etc. Furthermore it has been common practice for applicants to give a current colleague as their second referee in addition to the St Gregory’s Catholic School Governing Body, Reynolds Lane, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN4 9XL Page 4 of 10 Headteacher. A colleague having recently received negative verbal feedback on the quality of their Headteacher reference, according to Trust policy and the absence of a reference from a contemporary colleague, wrote to Mr Moffatt, KCSP, expressing concern that they were disadvantaged by the Trust’s policy. The response from KCSP has restated Trust policy with no plans for an early review. It is important that this policy is followed as the school can be liable even if a colleague writes a personal reference about a teacher’s abilities. Some staff feel that this policy puts them at a disadvantage - these concerns have been communicated to KCSP but the school must adhere to the policy. There was a discussion about staff turnover – overall the school churn is quite stable (Bennett have 26 vacancies for teaching staff).

Spiritual Life of the school Next week is the Year 10 retreat to the diocesan youth centre, St Vincent’s, in Whitstable. Sign up has been popular with a full 30 due to attend plus a waiting list. As part of ACE Year 7 have taken part in a pilgrimage around Tunbridge Wells visiting and learning about places of worship in the town. Each venue provided students with an insight into how their community worshipped God. The venues were: St Augustine’s Catholic Church, Christ Church with Holy Trinity, King Charles the Martyr, Islamic Cultural Centre Mosque and Tunbridge Wells United Reformed Church.

It was felt that the tabernacle was being somewhat over-looked in its current position behind the altar as the main chapel is a multi-purpose space. At the same time, the space that had previously been Our Lady’s chapel had been under-utilised in recent years and had become somewhat of a storage space for equipment and general clutter. Therefore students have been working with Luke Goymour, the Catholic Deanery youth worker, in the design and decoration of transforming this into a new Blessed Sacrament chapel. The majority of this was completed by the students who came in on a recent Saturday to paint the mural on the walls and it will be completed later this week. The chapel will be blessed by Archbishop Peter Smith when he comes to celebrate the Golden Jubilee Mass on 30th June. The school is very grateful to Corpus Christi Church for the donation of the new tabernacle for the chapel.

Students and Curriculum Students have a rich variety of opportunities to participate in extra-curricular events and Mr McQuillan said he is grateful to staff for their enthusiasm and hard work in making these opportunities possible.

The following are some examples: Music - Starlight 2016 the annual talent show in April was organised by Sixth Formers. 27 star performances were staged by 60 students across all age groups. The two shows were a great success for all the performing students and those providing vital support in staging, lighting and sound. “Ready, Steady, Sing!” with the National Youth Choirs was held at School last Sunday. Aimed at students in Years 5 to 7, three St Gregory’s students participated with Mr Trevaskis, Subject Leader for Music, accompanying them. There was governor participation too from Mrs Nicholls and Ms Almeida.

Football - Football Development Tour to FC Porto: This inaugural 5 day tour for Year 8 students took place from Friday 29th April, over the Bank holiday weekend. The tour was planned as part of the opportunity to extend the Football Academy into Year 8. Mr Bradbury the trip leader reports that the tour was extremely successful and met all of his expectations. The FC Porto coaching team ensured that St Gregory’s students had a wonderful experience, where all players were stretched and challenged and put through their paces. Planning is already underway for next year’s tour to Madrid.

West Kent Football Finals: For the second year in a row, St. Gregory's dominated the fixture list with 5 teams across both boys’ and girls’ teams. TWGGS, Hayesbrook and Hugh Christie had 2 teams in the finals and Bennett and TOGS one

St Gregory’s Catholic School Governing Body, Reynolds Lane, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN4 9XL Page 5 of 10 each. St Gregory's won the Year 9 trophy beating Hugh Christie 2-0. The Year 8 team defeated Bennett 4-3 and Year 7 boys beat Hayesbrook 4-3 which is the same winning total as last year. The year 7B team lost to Hugh Christie A team and the U15's girls lost by a single late goal to TWGGS in what was a very tight, close game. To put these results into perspective, in the last 3 years St Gregory’s have won 8 trophies. The 3 years prior to that, the school won just 1 trophy. St Gregory’s are now the School to beat in West Kent as we have strength in all our teams!

Kent County cup: The year 7A football team finished third losing 3-1 to overall winners The Howard boys School from Rainham. This competition involved 87 secondary schools across Kent. The year 7B team made it to the last 16 of the English Schools FA national cup losing to Dr Challoner Grammar School from Oxford. This competition had over 300 entries so to reach the last 16 is a notable achievement.

Years 8 and 9 PHSE and Citizenship Theme Days – The school held very successful theme days for Year 8 and Year 9 students in March and April, with visits from the fire service, magistrates, Samaritans, Crossways, Columbans and a theatre group called Covenant Players. The varying speakers helped the students to look at relationships, antisocial behaviour, how courts work, mental health issues, British Values and global citizenship from a Christian point of view. This year the school has started to use a new safety on line tool called 'Lottie' which helps students see what happens when they start revealing things on social media and how it can all spiral out of control and what to do if that does happen. The school’s anti-bullying ambassadors also prepared and delivered a very interactive and useful session to the other students. It is hoped to extend the anti-bullying input to cover all of Year 7 and 8 next year.

MFL Events - Mandarin lessons live from Bejing: Year 7 Luke had the opportunity to take part into a pilot to learn Mandarin over 5 weeks. The lessons were delivered via Skype, live from Beijing by a Chinese languages teacher. Each lesson lasted 25 minutes; students would learn basic conversation vocabulary, be taught about the Chinese characters and tones as well as learning something cultural such as The Great Wall of China, King Fu, and Beijing itself. The students picked up the language really well, with the lessons being delivered brilliantly and with enthusiasm, so that students thoroughly enjoyed them. This initiative was very successful and it is planned to extend the opportunity to learn Mandarin, through the Year 7 Language Academy in the ACE programme for Year 7 from September 2017.

French Exchange: A group of 17 Year 10 students were paired up with another Year 10 student and stayed at their house for one week at the end of March. The students experienced daily life in France, spent a day in school and discovered the local area by going to Marseilles and Avignon. The French students visited St Gregory’s at the end of April for one week. The students were very pleased to experience and discover the local area. As a result the students are more positive about their language skills and 'buzzing' about it. During the stay, four Y12 AS French girls came along for 4 days. Three of them were part of the Exchange 2 years ago and stayed with their former penpal. The girls taught English one day in a to 4 different classes. They also spent a day in a sixth form.

Forthcoming events: In June, five Spanish girls from Teresianas, which is one of the top schools in Barcelona, are coming over for 3 weeks and will be hosted by St Gregory’s students. The aim for the girls is to be fully immersed into the lifestyle of an English student. Two St Gregory’s students will be going over to Barcelona for ten days in October, for a reciprocal experience.

The Ardeche Year 8 Trip is coming up in June and as usual promises to be filled with outdoor activities and discovery of the local area.

St Gregory’s Catholic School Governing Body, Reynolds Lane, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN4 9XL Page 6 of 10 Next Academic year:  Barcelona exclusive exchange in October for 10 days  Y11 French Immersion trip to Lille in November  Y10 Spanish Immersion trip to Valencia in January  Y10 French Exchange in March

Capital Projects Mr Cumber, Subject Leader for PE, reports that the final touches are being made to the planning application for the 3G pitch and making sure everything is air tight before submitting to TWBC. The football foundation will be reviewing the bid in October, when a decision will be made about funding.

7. Approvals The Staff Discipline Policy has been updated using the Schools Personnel Services 2015 model policy. The Clerk has sent a copy of the proposed changes to KCSP and Mr Moffatt has confirmed that the policy can be used until the Trust have uniform staffing policies for all KCSP schools to adopt (this is likely to be the CES policies). The Staff Discipline Policy was approved.

8. Reports from Committees (minutes distributed with agenda) 8.1 Admissions Committee Mr Thomson gave an update on Year 7 admissions. This was mostly covered in the Headteacher’s report. The grammar school appeals start next week so it is difficult to predict final numbers for September.

8.2 Audit and Finance (18th May 2016) – see also Confidential Minutes Audit and Finance Governors agreed the 3 year budget and this has been posted to KCSP.

8.3 Buildings Working Group (18th May 2016) Governors heard an update on the MUGA/3G situation. The MUGA planning application has been deferred until after the 3G is agreed and sets a precedent. The 3G will be submitted for planning shortly. The Football Foundation will meet in October, once planning permission has been given and tenders completed, to discuss funding. Governors suggested a PR exercise to engage parental support of the 3G pitch and get them to lobby the TWBC planning to support the application. There are only 2 direct neighbours and it is important to assure them of minimal disruption. KCSP are supportive of the 3G development. Winkworth Sherwood will take on the legal work (for £1700 fee) regarding charge on the land. There are still some questions over lighting of the parking and footpath areas which have not been addressed by the plan. The Sound and Vision upgrade to the Chapel and Hall is complete and is being commissioned today. New screens mean that what is happening in the Chapel can be relayed to the Hall. A loop system for the HI still needs to be put in place. This can be done when the new carpet is laid during Half term. Governors approved expenditure for new curtains at the altar and some new curtains in the Hall (subject to 2 further quotes being obtained). FoSG will be donating £1k towards new voile curtains (and a pole) to screen the Blessed Sacrament Chapel. There was a discussion about colours, finishes etc.

A Tender Panel was held to consider quotes for a new telephone system. The current system is obsolete and no longer supported. The new system is Ethernet-based.

St Gregory’s Catholic School Governing Body, Reynolds Lane, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN4 9XL Page 7 of 10 Mr Volpato gave an update on the School Development Plan, which is being done by Ashley Consulting. The SLT have identified a list of priorities for school development and Ashley Consulting will draw up a modular plan based on this, so that as funds become available the school can be improved, and that any major expenditure on maintenance work is not wasted. The fee will be c£20k. This has been discussed with KCSP who are fully supportive.

8.4 Learning and Teaching (21st April 2016) Rev G Hovenden said that Learning and Teaching Governors had been given a presentation on Perspective and how it is used to monitor teaching standards. Classroom observations are loaded into Perspective and are summarised in a colour coded report so strengths and weaknesses are easily identified (by individual, subject area, AOL etc) and training needs are identified. Staff are reflective on their own performance as the system is based on self-assessment and observations. The weaker areas identified are marking and differentiation and Governors were given details of how these areas are being addressed. Mr McQuillan had given a useful update on Pupil premium and how it is used to benefit students. Numbers of students who attract pupils premium funding have risen from 48 to 130 since Ever6 was introduced (i.e. pupils who have had free school meals in the last 6 years), but the school is still in the lowest quartile. The Pupil Premium money often benefits a broader range of students (e.g an additional English teacher for literacy support). Progress is monitored through 4Matrix.

Rev G Hovenden is retiring in January 2017. Any Governor wishing to take on the Chair of Learning and Teaching Committee were asked to speak to him. GOV77/02 ALL

9. Actions arising from previous Governing Body meetings: 72/04 SLT to draft new Vision for discussion in May 2016 ongoing SMQ

75/06 All Governors should do the online Prevent training (20 minutes) ongoing ALL Clerk to send out another email to remind Governors GOV77/03 LB

75/08 SLT to suggest eligibility criteria for pay progression for SPPG closed 75/09 SLT to confirm Leadership pay scales for Pay & Reward Policy closed KCSP and St Simon Stock have produced an excellent document using teaching standards to set criteria for every payscale (M1-UPS3). This will be sent to all Headteachers and Chairs of Governors to review. The document will then go to the unions before final agreement by KCSP Board. Pay progression is no longer automatic. The policy needs to be transparent, consistent and fair across the Trust

75/11 Revised link day – date to be set for next term closed Individual link visits should be organised in addition to the Link day via Mr McQuillan and the AOL leader. The school is very busy this term. It was suggested that there are 2 link days – before Easter and Christmas.

76/01 SLT to do survey of new Year 7 students to see why they chose St Gregory’s ongoing JD

76/02 Clerk to get destination data from the 4 partner primary schools complete The Chair contacted local primary school Headteachers. Governors were shown a summary (see attached to minutes) which will be discussed at the Catholicity, Care and Community Committee. There was a discussion about how to get Catholic families to support Catholic education in favour of grammars.

St Gregory’s Catholic School Governing Body, Reynolds Lane, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN4 9XL Page 8 of 10 76/03 Mr Volpato to discuss the use of School House with Mike Baldwin ongoing DV

76/04 Fr Peter to pass notes from the promoting Catholicity WQ to Mrs Powell complete

10. Correspondence KCSP - Nick Cross the KCSP Secondary Schools Improvement Advisor is leaving to take up a new post.

Department for Education (DfE) and Church schools/academies Memorandum of Understanding Both the Catholic Education Service and KCSP have contacted Catholic schools regarding this important document and asked for academies with the MAT to read it carefully as its content will be an important basis for partnership working going forward.

KCC – White paper on ‘Educational, Excellence, Everywhere + briefing sessions were distributed. Recent Government u-turns on making all schools become academies have negated this document to some degree.

11. Any other business for which prior notice has been given The Golden Jubilee working group, together with FoSG, has planned a series of events from June 2016- July 2016 to celebrate the school’s 50th anniversary. Mrs Powell will include an article in the next newsletter to inform the community of what has been planned together with a timeline GOV77/04 PP Visually there will be posters, bunting and various memorabilia around the school to celebrate the 5 decades. Celebrations start on 30th June with the 50th Anniversary Mass, then the Jubilee Festival on 9th July (which is preceded by a sports event). Publicity must be energised with the message getting out through normal channels and social media (including Instagram to reach the younger Gregorians). The school has a new prayer and a hymn has been composed by two ex-pupils (Freddie Viner and Laurie Denman) and a current student (Tom Fish). There was a discussion about the logistics of 100 VIP guests at the Mass. All students will be receiving a traybake with the 50th anniversary logo on it on St Gregory’s Day. Festivities end on 8th July 2017 with the Golden Jubilee ball at Salomons. This is a perfect opportunity to set up an alumni organisation.

The Clerk reminded all Governors to re-register for the new e-GEL website – there are a number of new courses available.

The school has an expanding orchestra but the school organ, which was donated by St Augustine’s parish in 1984 (facilitated by Chris and Jo Storr), has not been played in recent years. Governors agreed to donate the organ to St Anselm’s in Pembury to make more room for the orchestra.

12. Confirmation of date of next meeting: Tuesday 28th June 2016 This will be followed by a meal at the Imperial Pub in Southborough.

13. Closing Prayer was said by Rev G Hovenden.

The meeting closed at 6.28pm

St Gregory’s Catholic School Governing Body, Reynolds Lane, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN4 9XL Page 9 of 10 Destinations of Year 6 (Catholic Partner Primaries)

St Augustine’s

There are 45 Year 6 children who chose St Gregory's 28 (62%) (the vast majority of these children are Catholic) Grammar schools 10 (22%) Other 7 (16%) e.g. Bennett, SKA, Hugh Christie, Beacon. Nb. 5 are intending to appeal for another school. St Augustine’s do not actively promote any school except St Gregory's.

St Margaret Clitherow There are 46 Year 6 children who chose St Gregory's 11 (24%) Weald of Kent 9 Tonbridge Grammar 2 Tunbridge Wells Girls 2 Tunbridge Wells Boys 2 Maidstone Grammar 1 (35% grammar) Bennett 4 Hillview 5 Other 10 (41%. Non selective inc Hugh Christie, Hadlow, Trinity, Uplands etc)

St Thomas’ Sevenoaks There are 30 Year 6 children of whom St Gregory’s: 4 (13%) Trinity: 11 Knole: 3 (47% non selective) Judd School: 5 Tunbridge Wells Boys: 3 Weald of Kent: 3 Skinners Grammar: 1 (40% grammar) Reasons for choices :- Grammar schools – status and the idea that children will have better options in the future especially with Universities. Trinity – distance; stories re coaches etc.. put off some parents; promise of a new building; having less pupils in the school at this point in time makes it sound safer for some parents; unfortunately Trinity are selling it as a Christian school and some parents are not making the distinction between Christian and Catholic.

St Mary’s Crowborough There are 25 Year 6 children who chose St Gregory’s: 1 4% (this child is Catholic and lives in Tunbridge Wells) Beacon: 24 96% Reasons for choices:- concerns are all around time and cost of travel along with ability to attend extra curricular activities. Beacon is also a well performing school and so parents often feel that this will meet their needs more locally. Beacon actively compare both attainment and progression in their results with other named local schools at parents events to prove that they are the better choice. Eight of the Year 6 children are Catholic.

St Gregory’s Catholic School Governing Body, Reynolds Lane, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN4 9XL Page 10 of 10