Head Teacher Update 24/03/23

Thank you for all the positive feedback that has come in regarding the new school emblem. I would like to take this opportunity to publicly thank my husband, Ross Crichton, for taking our ideas and making them into a reality. The emblem is now with the campus design team, who are working on ways in which we can further incorporate it into the building itself.

It was also rather exciting to give the emblem its first outing in our letters to our incoming S3. The parents of all young people coming to us from MGS’s S2 cohort should have received a letter with a note of their child’s preferred Personal Pathways. Mr Valentine still has a handful of pupils to speak with, largely due to pupil absence. If you think your child has been missed, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Much of the activity over the last couple of weeks has been firmly focused on recruitment. Following on from an intensive period of interviews, we now have preferred candidates for the following posts:

  • Business Administrator (school office)
  • Science Technician
  • Class Teachers for The Brae x 3 (This team will start in May, to support transition)
  • Teacher of Social Subjects x 2
  • Teacher of CDT x 2
  • Teacher of English x 2
  • Teacher of Biology x 1
  • Teacher of Modern Languages x 1

Further interviews will be taking place right up until the end of term, and for the first couple of weeks thereafter. We will continue to keep you updated on the growing, thriving team.

Our first meeting of our Parent Engagement group took place last night, with a focus on vision and values. It was simply lovely to be able to connect with parents in this way. Using the data gained from the surveys we conducted earlier in the session, we drew out key vocabulary and looked at some suggested values and sample vision statements. Mr Valentine will now take our discussion points and feed them forward into a similar take with Pupil Voice groups. We will be ready to share the final vision and values early in the summer term.

With regards to further opportunities to connect, we will be arranging two further Parent Engagement Group Meetings in April/May. The first will be on home school communication, and the next on reporting/parent consultation. Details of these will go out to those who have signed up for the group. If you would like to join this forum but haven’t let us know so far, please drop us an email: admin@rosehill.elcschool.org.uk

We’d also like you to add a date to your diary. On the 25th May, from 5.30-7.30pm, we will be hosting a Welcome Evening at Wallyford Primary School. This will be a family learning event that gives you and your young person the chance to meet the wider team, learn more about each of our faculties, and to take part in shared activities. We’ll share further details nearer the time.

Following on from this, there have been a couple of queries regarding Parent Council. We are not able to form a Parent Council until the school opens in August. Working with the ELC Parental Engagement Officer, we have sketched out a plan to ensure that we will have the opportunity, in early September, to host an event that welcomes all interested parties, and to move on from there to draft a constitution and elect officer bearers. I do hope that we will have a good representation coming forward, and value your interest in this area.

The opening of the building gets ever closer and we are cautiously planning some twilight opportunities in June to visit the campus with your child, enjoying a friendly tour hosted by one of the leadership team. We anticipate these being very popular so a booking system will apply. Again, more on this to come over the next few weeks.

Finally, a quick ‘troubleshooting’ tip for Google Meets, as we will continue use this platform where appropriate, even after the school opens. To support security, any sign in which is not an ELC sign in can access any of our Google Meets, but they will be placed in a virtual waiting room and need to be ‘clicked in’ to the meeting. This will always happen within the first few minutes of the meeting time. Once a presentation has started (we will always hold off for 5 minutes), the meeting is deemed to have begun and we are no longer able to see/open the waiting room. You can join at any time using your child’s Google sign in, as that is deemed to be safe and can come straight into the Meet. I hope this helps for any future online events. Our recording of ‘Meet the SLT’ remains available on the Parent Engagement section of the website.

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