Building stronger relationships

Welcome to New Mills Parent Forum

Building Stronger Relationships

What is a parent forum?

A forum where parents/carers can meet to:

• Receive information and have your say about what happens in school

• Discuss and share ideas to improve your school and the local community

• Organise and make decisions about whole school events that affect your son/daughter

Why get involved?• To give your opinion and be involved in the decisions that are made in school

• To socialise with other parents and contribute to the wider school community

• To report back on the outcomes of your feedback and what changes we have made.

• To share with you our plans to work collaboratively with Cheadle Hulme High School to help us drive school improvement.

• To hear from you about what area of school improvement you would like the parent forums to focus on next

• To build stronger relationships and improve communication between parents and the school.

Objectives for this evening

Exam Results

A Level• 25% of all A’ Level results at A* or A grade.• 55% were A*-B grade.

GCSE• 53% gaining 5 A*-C including English and Maths.• 66% of students achieving 5 A*-C grades.

University Course PlacedPlymouth Marine TechnologyGloucester Film Production (going next year)Manchester Met Medicinal and Biological ChemistryUniversity of York EconomicsMedia City Post Media ProductionNewcastle Uni Combined HonoursManchester Met Biomedical ScienceUclan Journalism

Huddersfield Chemistry with Industrial Experience

Sheffield Hallam Social WorkManchester Met Biomedical Science (Foundation)Sheffield Hallam Film and Media ProductionSalford Journalism: BroadcastSheffield Hallam IT with Business StudiesLincoln Graphic DesignManchester Met Product Design and TechnologyEdinburgh Linguistics and English LanguageLoughborough Aeronautical EngineeringUniversity of York Environment, Economics &EcologyChichester Film and Television StudiesSalford Media ProductionEdge Hill Media, Film & TelevisionLoughborough Aeronautical Engineering

Highest Achievers

A* A B

Ellen Dean 7 3 1

Frances Cope 5 6

Sam Foster 4 7

Ellen Scotney 4 7

Alex Greensmith 4 2 4

Thea Bannister 2 9

Molly Winterbottom 1 5 4

Harry Hughes 1 5 2

Andrew Daniels 4 5

New Mills is a school where:

• all students and groups of students have high aspirations, enjoy learning and achieve their potential

• students, staff and the local community are proud of their school

• students and staff feel valued and are happy to be part of

• more parents make New Mills their first choice

Vision

• Raise levels of progress through raising expectations

• Provide high quality marking and feedback to students to aid student progress

• Create better systems for tracking and addressing under achievement

• Raise levels of achievement by ensuring that teaching is consistently good or better across all subjects

• The setting of homework needs to be consistent and challenging

• Raise standards of behaviour, appearance and punctuality through consistently high expectations and application of school systems

What needs to improve?

Your Feedback - What needs to improve

• Standards and Discipline• Homework• Reporting, parents evenings and marking of

books• Communication• Teaching

Standards and DisciplineYou said:• Uniform not

consistently monitored• Students out at

lunchtime• Smoking• Code of conduct should

be enforced• Disruptive pupils not

dealt with adequately

We did:• Appoint two new pastoral

managers

• New behaviour policy

• Uniform standards reinforced daily

• Sanctions for smoking and being late

Pastoral House Teams

Homework

You Said:• Regular homework • Lack of consistency in

homework marking• Homework timetable –

enable parents to plan/support/check complete

We Did:• Homework policy

• Homework timetables

How much homework?Subject Year 7-9

English 2 x 30 minMaths 2 x 30 minScience 2 x 30 minFrench/German 1 x 30 min eachHistory 1 x 30 min*Geography 1 x 30 min*RS/PSHE 1 x 30 min*DT 1 x 30 min*Music 1 x 30 min*Art 1 x 30 min*PE 1 x 30 min*

Year 10 & 11Students in years 10 and 11 should be set an average of at least 1 hour per subject per week, with the exception of English, Maths and Science (at least 2 hours per week). 

Reporting, Parents Evening and Marking

You said:• Reports at the end of

year – no written feedback

• Not enough time at parents evening

• Homework handed in, never seen again

We did:• Written reports for all

year groups

• 3 hour parents evening

• Marking and feedback policy

Communication

• Communication • Support on-line? – for

parents to help pupils with homework

• Website up-to-date ALWAYS – awful

• Letters• Newsletters• Sims Learning Gateway• Parent Forums

You said We did

Teaching

You said:• Some teaching not

seen as inspiring

• Differentiation within lessons

We did:• Appoint a Director of

Teaching and Learning• Staff training

programme focusing on teaching and learning

• Working with CHHS an outstanding school and training school

School to School Support

Working with Cheadle Hulme High School to support school improvement

What areas of school improvement would you like to focus on at the next Parent Forum?

Building stronger relationships

Next Parent ForumTuesday 2nd December

Building Stronger Relationships