Parents’ Newsletter: Issue 2 2019-2020 Welcome to this, our second newsletter of the academic year. Mock Examinations Over the last few weeks, our Y11s have suspended their end of term festive celebrations to focus on their ‘mock’ GCSE examinations. With the number of examinations now numbering over 30 for most students, the mock examinations form an ever more important part of our overall preparation. I am always impressed by how seriously students take their exams and how much they want to succeed. Our ‘mock’ results day will be on Tuesday January 7th 2020 when all of Year 11 will receive their results, just as they will in August. I would like to thank all staff, on behalf of Year 11, for preparing their students to face the exams with such confidence and to everyone at home who has supported with revision. I would also like to thank our younger students for their consideration during the exam season in respecting those taking examinations and enabling a calm and peaceful atmosphere to prevail! As I write this, our Year 10 students are taking their mock examination for the short course RE exam after which, we can truly look forward to the Christmas break. I would like to take this opportunity to wish everyone in the Thomas Keble Community, a very happy Christmas and I look forward to seeing all of our students back in school, on Monday January 6th 2020. Communication with staff It has become noticeable in recent months, that the number of parents who prefer to use email to communicate with staff has grown hugely. Whilst we will always try to respond to these emails in a timely manner, it is increasingly difficult to do so within the same day. This is due to the other commitments that tutors and pastoral leads have with regards their teaching. From January, all emails received will be logged and the sender will receive an automatic response stating that their email has been received and we will endeavour to respond within 3 – 4 working days. The automatic receipt will also list the telephone number that should be used to contact our pastoral hub for urgent matters. As a reminder: Our reception is open between 8:00am and 4:30pm every day. Our contact number is 01452 770301 / Option 2 for the Pastoral Hub. This will enable one of our pastoral team to speak with you and arrange for a response from the most suitable staff member. If you wish to see a member of staff, please telephone to book an appointment by using the number above. Please note, same day appointments are not always possible. 1 Year 11 Parents: Keep Saturday 25th January free! Following the very successful Family Revision Morning last year, we will be repeating the event on Saturday 25th January from 9:00am until noon, by which time Year 11 students will have received their mock exam results. There will be a series of workshops aimed at kick-starting the revision process in preparation for the summer exams with a focus on: preparing a revision timetable; active revision approaches; managing stress. Letters will be issued in the early part of term 3 and we hope to see as many families as possible at the event. Keeping Children Safe Online With Christmas holidays fast approaching, we have a few websites that parents may find helpful in supporting their children’s safety online. Use the hyperlinks below to access. The first is from the Think You Know organisation that has some good advice on the INTERNET and its use in our homes and to support many of the toys and games that our young people enjoy. The second is by the Parent Zone: Seasonal Netiquette: 5 new parenting rules for screen time and tech when families gather Student Support When a professional, family member or member of the public is concerned about a child or young person’s welfare or safety, they may report a “safeguarding concern” and this information will come to the MASH (Multi-Agency Safeguarding Hub) so it can be looked at. For early help and advice on a range of child and family issues, contact the Family Information Service on 0800 5420202 / www.glosfamiliesdirectory.org. Or if you are concerned about a child or young person and want to speak to someone, contact the Children’s Helpdesk on 01452 426565, and give as much information as you can. The school nurse, Vicky Stephens, also runs a drop-in service on Tuesdays at Thomas Keble School. Students can be referred, or request an appointment; to call or text the school nurse, please ring 07507 333 351. There are many sources of advice and information on our website. Please click here to view the Student Support page. 2 Staffing updates At Christmas, we bid farewell to Mr Burn, who has been a member of our Science faculty for over 16 years. As well as Science, Mr Burn has been a strong supporter of our extra- curricular PE clubs, coaching numerous teams in football and supporting various activities outside of school time, not to mention his work on House Competitions and the wonderful ‘Egg Bungee’ races! We wish Mr Burn our very best wishes in his retirement. We will be sorry to bid farewell this term to Ms Kerslake, who has been a member of staff at Thomas Keble for over 5 years. Ms Kerslake has been a member of the Maths Department, serving as the 2nd in Faculty and has also taught computing. We wish her well in her new adventures. Thomas Keble Trust Board The Board of Trustees has been augmented by the appointment of three new Trustees this term; Miss Kim Marney, Parent Trustee, and two new Co-Opted Trustees, Mrs Susan Brobyn and Mr Colin Mander. The Board is delighted to welcome them to Thomas Keble and looks forward to working with them and drawing on their expertise. We’d like to thank all the Members and Trustees who give so generously of their own time to support the school to help our students to aspire to achieve more than they ever thought possible. The Thomas Keble GRIT Awards If you have visited the school reception recently, you will have noticed our GRIT awards display in the foyer. Each time we report to parents, students are given an effort grade 1-4 for each subject and those with the best and most improved average effort scores are recognised in the display. On a day-to-day basis, students will have their excellent effort and achievement recognised by the awarding of House Points which are recorded on their ‘Be More Yeti’ cards. Excellent Effort at TK means being committed to getting the most out of all learning opportunities available. It is what all Thomas Keble students should aim for. A student making excellent effort: Actively participates in the lesson at all times, and is fully engaged Actively seeks feedback on how to improve the quality of their work Shows great resilience and perseveres with all challenges, even when they are difficult Manages their time and work efficiently and is highly self-disciplined Students who have completed one or more Yeti cards have been entered for a prize draw – well done to all those have completed cards so far. I would also like to congratulate the following students who are among the first to appear on our GRIT Awards roll of honour display this year. Exceptional Effort Most Improved Effort Year 11 Annabel Brodersen / Rosie Lightfoot Owen Taylor-Leach / Archie Greenway Year 10 Tabitha Milne / Toby Henderson George Hurst / Mollie Marsh Year 7, Year 8 and Year 9 GRIT Award winners will be announced shortly after Christmas and I look forward to celebrating these achievements with you in our next edition. 3 Parental Donations Parents will be aware that education funding is under ever-increasing pressure. Whilst we have been notified that some additional funding will be forthcoming, we will not receive this until September 2020 at the earliest and it seems increasingly likely that the increases will not be sufficient to afford the things that enhance the educational provision for your children. Once again, we need to ask parents to support us with some of the activities that make Thomas Keble the high achieving and successful school that it is. This includes the extensive PE programmes we currently support at County, District and National level and the arts programmes we offer via our productions and concerts. We are also looking to replace some of the more expensive items of equipment that ensure our students can learn in the most effective way. Donations received last year have already made a significant difference. We have been able to buy visualisers that enable teachers and students to easily share work and discuss its merits so others can learn from the process; we have ordered 2 new cookers; 2 new sewing machines and a number of other items. However, as always, we could easily use more funding for such purposes. Parents can make a donation online. The school’s banks details are as follows: Visualisers Bank: HSBC help with Sort code: 40-34-01 sharing good work! Account No: 01419242 Account name: Thomas Keble School Please include a reference ‘Parental Donation’ and email [email protected] to advise who the donation is from. In addition, parents can opt to make a donation via the school parent gateway app. Details of how to use this are in our first newsletter of the year, available as a download from our website: www.thomaskeble.gloucs.sch.uk Whilst we are very reluctant to ask for such donations, they will be used to ensure we continue to compete at the highest levels nationally.