Last week ended on a real high with our brand-new S3 football team playing their first ever match. This was a friendly against North Berwick High School, and we are delighted that it was a 5-3 win to start them off. I was so pleased to hear about how well they conducted themselves on the pitch, with respectful behaviour at all times. Our S1 also hosted Ross High for their first friendly, and we loved seeing the support from families on the side. I know there is a busy season ahead, and would like to thank the staff who support the pupils daily on a voluntary basis.
We also undertook our first formal partnership work on Monday, with a team from Play Scotland spending the morning with 12 of our young people. The aim of the session was to tease out how young people feel about their local area and the facilities within it. Again, there was recognition of our young people’s excellent conduct and engagement throughout. You can find out more about the work of the organisation here: https://www.playscotland.org/
Thanks go to the young people who have become the poster boys and girls for Rosehill. As you are all aware, there is national interest in our project, and we had a photographer in school for three days this week, capturing the building in action. I rather enjoyed getting back to my Drama teacher roots by calling out, ‘Right- look like this is the most interesting Science lesson you have ever been in!’ and ‘Your motivation is to do the most accurate measuring of your life!’ This also served as a good reminder that we still don’t have information on photo permissions for a minority of young people. We take getting this right seriously so please contact the admin team if you have misplaced any of the forms that were sent out at the start of term.
We are delighted that our first Parent Council Meeting will take place on the 10th October, at 6.30pm. This will be an AGM, followed by an informal opportunity to look at next steps and priorities. Anyone with a child at Rosehill is welcome to come along. As HT I attend and participate in Parent Council meetings but they are, of course, run by our parent forum. They will keep you updated on their activities throughout the year.
As well as the Parent Council, and number of you have also signed up to join our Parent Engagement Group. This group meets online around once a term. We use Google Meet and it’s an informal opportunity to share your experiences and help to shape our work with the wider parent forum. Those already signed up will have received information about our first session, which takes place at 7pm on the 3rd of October. The topic is ‘Our curriculum’. If you missed signing up to this at the start of the school year, but would like to join, please contact our admin team.
You can also get involved in our second Family Learning event of the year. As per information sent earlier this week, this takes place on the 24th October. Booking is available from 5pm on Monday 2nd October, using the link in your letter. Thank you to the families who took the time to give such positive and helpful feedback on our last event. We will use this to inform the family learning opportunities available in the second half of this year. We look forward to seeing as many of you as possible there.
In line with the commitment to children’s rights outlines in our School Improvement Plan, we have provided a number multiple opportunities for pupil voice activities since opening the school. SLT have particularly enjoyed our 5 a Day programme. This involves each of us taking around an hour out of our week to have one to one conversations with our young people. Pupils are selected at random so it’s an ideal opportunity to ensure we are hearing from everyone, including the quiet middle who can sometimes miss out. Our theme over the last couple of weeks has been ‘what makes a good teacher?’ and we have loved being able to pass on compliments to our teaching team. Comments included the importance of being kind, explaining things in different ways, being strict when they need to be, and being a good listener. Our next theme will focus on S3 and the development of their senior phase curriculum.
We have another exciting first this in terms of the gradual opening of the Margaret Oliphant public library. Please be reminded of the current opening hours:
Friday 2-5pm
Saturday 10-1pm
We wish our colleagues in the library service all the best with their new chapter.