Another milestone passed

I write my blog this week on Thursday evening, looking back to the annual Year 11 whole year group photograph that took place this morning. I know that not every school does this anymore, but I really like the tradition of getting the whole of Year 11 together alongside their form tutors and pastoral staff for a huge picture. It always amazes me how well organised the whole thing is, starting off with getting 300 teenagers in height order (I look after the tall section, obviously), seeing them fill the temporary scaffold staging and then the inevitable tension of trying to get so many people to all look at the camera and smile at the same time. I have to say that the students were fantastic today, despite the distinctly average weather of intermittent rain and barely 6 degrees in temperature. At least today there wasn’t any wind to speak of and so the photographer only had to shout ‘hands down’ five times rather than 500. There were a few worried faces and hushed conversations about frizzy hair though but the members of staff concerned just had to put up with it.

Also today half of our Year 10 students took part in mock interviews with volunteers from around 40 businesses. It can daunting going for an interview and this experience is a great way to dispel some of the myths about what it is really like. The feedback from the interviewers has been fantastic with the students a real credit to the school. I am sure the second half of the cohort will do equally well on Friday.

On top of all this of course we crack on with the core business of teaching students in every year group. I’ve spent quite a bit of time this week visiting lessons and am always impressed with the positive relationships on show between students and staff. It’s one of the things that makes our school what it is, and never fails to make me smile.

Have a lovely weekend,

Joe Barker

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