12 October 2023
Dear Parents, Guardians and Students/Annwyl Rieni, Gwarchodwyr a Myfyrwyr
Preparing for university life….
In the last few weeks, our outgoing cohort of Year 13 students will have been filling their trollies with pots and pans and university starter kits and hopefully enjoying a very responsible freshers fortnight experience.
As one cohort moves on, our work begins again. On Friday 6th October, twelve sixth-form students visited Cardiff University as part of the Outreach Programme. Students were given a tour of the university by current students and took part in workshops which gave them a flavour of university life. They were able to quiz students and lecturers on their experiences and roles at the university. Once again, the university staff were impressed with the interest and enthusiasm shown by our students. We look forward to visiting with more students soon.
These lot have got serious skills….
Meanwhile, back in school, we have embraced week 6 of 8. This means that everyone is settled back in and the serious work and study is progressing well. In particular, we would like to commend our creative Year 10 students who have been putting their planning into practice to construct picture frames as part of their GCSE Product Design studies. The students designed the folding stands themselves. A particular shout out goes to Ali Al Jassem for his extremely accurate marking out and cutting.
Year 10 weren’t the only ones exercising creativity. Upstairs, Year 12 and 13 were learning to use Autodesk Inventor to great effect in their A-Level studies. Autodesk Inventor is a computer-aided design application for 3D mechanical design, simulation, visualisation, and documentation. It is used by mechanical engineers who need automated and specialised tools to design and prepare for manufacturing. Our future continues to rest in safe hands.
Learning Support ‘Star of the Week’
This weeks Learning Support SOTW goes to Aaron James-Dyer in Year 10 and is awarded for his excellent presentation in Asdan. It takes confidence and good communication skills to achieve this so well done, Aaron. Keep up the good work!
Still to come this half-term…
We still have two very busy weeks ahead before we break up for half-term.
We have an IMPACT Day planned for Years 9, 12 and 13 on Monday 16th October. Year 9 will be participating in a carousel of 5 different sessions led by our community partners. These include South Wales Police, Cardiff and the Vale drugs and alcohol service, Praesidio Safeguarding, Cardiff Youth Service and Resolve IT.
Year 9 will be looking at a range of issues including consent and keeping yourself safe in all aspect of life. Years 12 and 13 will be working with volunteers from Lloyds Bank and Year 12 will be benefiting from the work of a company called Bloom. Our Year 12 tutor team are being trained in the well-being platform that Bloom provide before rolling it out with their tutor groups.
Also next week, we are very excited to open our doors to prospective students on Wednesday 18th October and look forward to meeting Year 5 and Year 6. Come and meet our staff and students and explore the exciting opportunities that lie ahead!
The arrival of our Open Evening means it is time for me to have my annual ‘chat’ to Mr Jayne about how much I value my ceiling tiles….
We then have our 2nd INSET day of the year on Friday 20th October. We will miss the students on this day but the staff will be busy engaging in a range of professional learning to ensure that we continue to keep our school community safe, and continue to develop their cross curricular skills.
In the last week of this half-term I am then looking forward to meeting the School Council on Monday 23rd October. I have no doubt that they will keep me on my toes as we scrutinise our over-arching priorities and School Development Plan for the year ahead.
We break up for October half-term on Friday 27th October and return refreshed on Monday 6th November.
Thank you for reading/Diolch am ddarllen,
Mrs Sarah Parry, Headteacher