The Warriner School, Bloxham – Headteacher Newsletter – Dec. 2011
The theme for this term has been charity fundraising, kicking off with a wonderful Christmas fair run by the Friends of the Warriner School to get us all in the festive mood, Children in Need day had staff performing quite beautifully to YMCA, Student Council ran a talent night in aid of the swimming pool and male staff used November as an excuse to grow some extraordinary facial hair. On November 11th our cadets invited their commanding officers into school for a formal march past and I was very proud to be asked to receive their salute. We also attended the memorial service in Bloxham where our Head Boy and Head Girl laid a wreath on behalf of the staff and students.
Informal consultation around our hopes to extend our age range to include Sixth Form students has now closed and I am delighted with the huge amount of positive support we have received from students, parents and our community. If you did take the time to comment then I would like to take this opportunity to thank you. We now move onto the second phase of a four week statutory consultation before a final decision is made in May. I am also delighted that a growing number of our current Year 11 students are planning to take us up on our offer of A level teaching in partnership with OCVC and plans are underway to provide them with their own common room, kitchen area and ICT suite, which was the meetings room and part of A Area.
This term also saw my first parent forum at which we discussed a diverse range of topics around the theme of Grow (things we could do more of), Keep (things we do well) and Change (things that have either had their day or we do not do well). We reflected upon Behaviour for Learning, improvements to the school website (which are being implemented as I write this), language options, consolidating group call, curriculum developments and homework club. The next parent forum takes place on 19th March at 6pm in the Hall. Please feel free to join us.
Every term my colleagues in the PE department run an array of sporting events for our Partner Primary School students under the leadership of Mr Halsall, our Schools Sport Co-ordinator, and this term was no exception. On 1st December we hosted the North Oxfordshire Cross Country Finals. This was a first combined Primary and Secondary event where the Partnership Primary Schools from all over the North run their races and then get through to our finals day. There were over 400 Year 1&2, 3&4 and 5 &6 pupils representing over 14 of the North Partnerships Schools, and 60 Year 7-11 students from 3 secondary schools. The event was supported by 25 of our brilliant Sports Leaders from Year 10, many of whom have given up time to plan and train before the event and acted as hares for each race.
The penultimate week of term saw the return of our students in Year 11 last year to collect their GCSE certificates. Although I did not get to know them well before they left, it was lovely for all of us to catch up with them and share in their numerous successes. We are all very proud of them and every one of them is a reason why we should have a Sixth Form.
Dr A Kay, Headteacher