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Parental Update 20/04/20

Dear Parents, I hope you have managed to have an enjoyable break during Easter and that you are continuing to make the best of this current situation. We have been working away in the background, considering how we will support students and parents over the weeks that lie ahead.

We are imminently about to begin communicating out to students the courses they have been allocated to them for starting new S3 and upwards. We will do that over the coming week, preparing for an earlier change to our school timetable than what we normally do. Once we get a date for the new timetable, I will let you know.

It’s been a real challenge to get all the data into various systems we use in order to be able to assign courses for next year but, we are managing this regardless of those challenges. There are small number of cases where students have not been able to be allocated all their 5 or 6 subjects choices in S4-6 (due to some clashes within columns) and therefore we have had to use their reserve subjects, in some circumstances. Our Pupil Support Leaders (Guidance teachers) will be in touch with students in the weeks ahead to work on this and to check with those in that position, if they would like to change any of their choices, where that might be possible. The communication required for this will be through email and phone calls, where necessary.

Moving our timetable forward will allow students and teachers to get set up for their new courses and therefore in particular, students in our new S3-6 year groups will be able to make a sensible start to their new courses. This will present us with a real opportunity to get ‘ahead of the game’ for next year, and it will mean that students in the senior years will have a relevant focus for as long as the current restrictions are in place. We will provide some general work for senior students in the meantime so they too can be engaged in learning.

S1 students will be able to continue with their Broad General Education and teachers will continue to post work relating to that on Show My Homework and Microsoft Teams. Once we get a date for the change of timetable, they too will move forward to S2 at the same time, in an online sense.

I will of course update you on the date for the start of the new timetable and any other updates as and when I can confirm them. Meanwhile, please continue to keep up to date with our communications via the school website, school app, school twitter account and our GroupCall messages I know not everyone uses twitter but if you can find the time to set up an account, this is an excellent way to keep up to date with short messages and links to support all our community as we move forward.

Please note that we will ask staff to allocate work as per the timetable we sent out previously for those in S1-3 and hopefully this will mean that work will be manageable for all. Please remember that we know you will all have different circumstances at home and therefore not everyone will be able to complete all of the work, so do only what you can. It’s important for young people to try to have some structure around their day where possible, so this is why I have asked staff to work roughly to the outline below.

Lastly, I hope you found the Spring Newsletter helpful and informative. If you have not managed to read that yet, please do take a look on our website, school app or our twitter feed.

Warmest regards

Martin Ennis

Acting Head Teacher