Newsletters

Happy New Year from everyone in the Year 9 Pastoral Team! It has been lovely to welcome back all our Year 9 students this term looking smart in their uniforms and up keeping their positive attitude towards their learning. Parents/Carers, thank you for ensuring students were well rested over the break and prepared to make the most of 2022. This term we have introduced our new behaviour expectations and we are proud of the way Year 9 have stepped up to show us once again what polite, diligent and capable young people they are.

A massive well done to all students who took part in our Whitbread Winter Challenge 2021. Mrs Linehan and I have had great fun looking through all the entries last week. Look out for some exciting awards and prizes very soon.

As always, we are looking forward to a busy term and ask that you support our Year 9 students by ensuring they are well equipped and ready to learn. In particular, please continue speaking with your child about the Options process. There is a wealth of information available on our website. Options booklets will be available on our website, please click here. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us.

I am pleased to report our Year 10 students are quickly getting back into the swing of things following the Christmas break. Their response to the new behaviour system as a whole has been very positive. We can see that the majority of students are not receiving negative behaviour points, the majority of those who do receive negative behaviour points review and change their behaviour so it is not escalated. However, the number of praise points and positive comments are far outweighing the negative points. Well done, Year 10.

Thank you to parents/carers for ensuring your child is in full uniform and with correct equipment each day – we have had only minimal sanctions for these issues and the year group are looking smart and ready to work.

Tomorrow during form time I will be delivering an online assembly about Internet safety. As young people use the Internet and social media more and more, along with the many benefits of a presence online come responsibilities and inevitably risks. It is one of the biggest factors affecting mental health in students we see, as well as having adverse effects on sleep. We also educate and warn of areas such as fake news, sexting and grooming. I encourage you to have constructive conversations with your children around their social media usage. If you have any concerns or questions around support in this area, please see our website page here for links and information: https://www.samuelwhitbread.org.uk/page/?title=Parental+Support&pid=39

Wishing you a happy new year.

Welcome back Year 11! We hope that you have had a restful and enjoyable break. Year 11 have received their mock results on Friday (14^th January) and this is the perfect opportunity to take stock of where they are and what they need to do for their next round of mock exams in February.

Year 11 have had a good start to the year, with the addition of the behaviour system at SWA. They have responded well to the change and adapted to the policy and system with ease. We are at that time of the year when Year 11 should be considering and completing their applications to their chosen Sixth Forms and/or colleges. Should help be required, please either arrange a careers appointment directly through the school website [click here] or contact your tutor to help arrange an appointment for you. 

We are now a few weeks away from the work experience placement deadline, 28^th January. We are aware that Covid is still causing issues and delays for students. In the event that a student is waiting on a desired place, the advice is to try and sort a more achievable placement for just in case. Perhaps looking to close friends or family members who can help organise these. There could then be a possibility to change this in the months to come. We will be offering an opportunity within the school too, as this may suit many of our students. More details will be shared on this with students in registration.

We have had our first session with Att10tive, who are running a Youth Ambassador programme for our Year 12s. We have had 15 places taken by students, who are first learning what the programme is before embarking on planning and delivering a workshop on equality, diversity and inclusion to our Year 9s and 10s. We will share more updates as the weeks go on.

Last week, we have sent over 100 UCAS applications. Each of these applications represents hours of input from parents, the student, and form tutors. We are enormously grateful for all the support from staff and parents. Good luck to all our university applicants with their offers – they will now have several months to decide which to accept or decline. The national deadline for applications is the 26^th January and students must contact a member of the Sixth Form team immediately if they have not been sent a confirmation email from UCAS. 

Our focus moves to supporting apprenticeship applications over the next few months. Careers appointments are available please email jmcmillan@bestacademies.org.uk. We advise all students seeking apprenticeships at all levels to register on the national site https://www.gov.uk/apply-apprenticeship which allows students to filter for particular career areas and locations.

An attendance reminder, students have to attend at least six morning registrations per fortnight – we cover important PSHE and career-based topics in registration, alongside reference and application writing with tutors. Dr Haigh, 13K’s tutor, has singled out Emily for praise this week- “Well done Emily for being such a great tutee and using form time really effectively”.

Many of our students have been involved in supporting younger students through peer mentoring and we have had individual praise recently for Steven who mentored a Year 10 student and made a real difference to their school experience. Thank you to all students involved in the peer mentoring schemes.