As noted before the February break, we have been working hard on recruiting a significant number of middle leaders in the last couple of weeks. My thanks go to ELC colleagues who have been an important part of this piece of work, whether providing admin support, sitting on panels, or offering input into the process itself.
Our preferred candidates are as follows, and we are working towards them joining us just after Easter:
- Mr. Paddy Cuthbertson will join us from Turnbull High School in East Dunbartonshire. Mr Cuthbertson will be our Curriculum Leader for Health and Wellbeing.
- Miss Millie Mitchell will join us from Craigmount High School in Edinburgh. Miss Mitchell will be our Curriculum Leader for the Expressive Arts faculty.
- Mrs. Jade Woodhead will join us from North Berwick High School. Mrs Woodhead will be our Curriculum Leader for Maths and Numeracy.
- Mrs. Catherine Lock will join us from Musselburgh Grammar School. Mrs Lock will be our Curriculum Leader in Support for Learning, and will be a particularly important part of our P7 transition work.
As you will have noticed, the chance to work at the campus has attracted excellent candidates from both within East Lothian and beyond, and I am absolutely delighted that we are able to draw on this breadth of knowledge and experience from a range of local authorities.
You may also have noticed this national level of interest in WLC has extended to the media, too. For those who haven’t yet seen it, the link below is for a recent article in the Times Educational Supplement. My youngest daughter’s comment was that she could ‘hear’ me when she was reading it, which I have decided to take as a good thing!
Many of you will have heard me talking before about the importance of partnership with parents. For many schools, this focuses on the vital role played by Parent Councils. However, in our current situation, there are a couple of important points to consider if we want to work as a genuine collective:
- We have a lot of important decisions to make with regards to policy and practice in the coming months, where parent input would be hugely valued; but we can’t officially convene a Parent Council until the school is open.
- Many parents are keen to work with the school at this important time, but will not be able to attend lengthy, formal meetings or a regular basis, whether due to work commitments, caring commitments, or any other aspects of busy lives.
To this end, we have decided to form a Parent Engagement Group. This will be an important forum throughout the summer term and, if successful, is something we may decide to continue with as we move into next session. The group will be based around a series of short (45 minute max) ‘single item agenda’ Google Meets. The time of day/day of the week will be varied to support as many people as possible getting involved. There is no need to commit to all of the Meets (just drop in when it works for you), and there is no need to prepare anything in advance!
If you would like to be involved, please sign up using this Google Form. Thank you to everyone who has already indicated an interest.
This form will remain open until 12 noon on Friday 3rd March. Please ensure that you include your preferred email address for us to send the Meet schedule and the relevant joining details thereafter.
One of our first topics for discussion and decision making will be around finalising our school vision statement and school values- we are certainly not short of ideas! Thank you to everyone who contributed to the survey on this topic. The data summary can be accessed here: Vision and Values Data Summary
We have made some good progress with regards to agreements around the naming of the school, its Houses, and the SCN provision. Please bear with us as we engage with all stakeholders. One lovely thing I can share this week is that our SCN provision will now be known as The Brae. This reflects the hilltop position of our building and draws on the idea of being able to take in the views of our beautiful East Lothian countryside wherever we are within it. Mrs Fleming has already begun to connect with the East Lothian ASN team and looks forward to playing a full part in transition of pupils to The Brae when she starts in April.