ContactOctober 17

Welcome from Mr Wright,Executive Headteacher:

Welcome from Mrs Crawley, Headteacher:

Welcome once again to our Contact e-magazine!

As always, in this edition, we have much student achievement to celebrate, not least the fantastic student 2017 GCSE and A Level results. With prizes presented by the Mayor and the CEO of Warrington, last evening’s Presentation Evening was a lovely and fitting end to a very busy first half term. Earlier, the Lord Lieutenant was here presenting 253 Year 10 and 11 students with their Duke of Edinburgh Bronze awards. Simply amazing!

Parents will have received my letter and a copy of our recent Ofsted inspection, which is now on the website. Whilst the overall judgement may not have been what we wanted, much of the report praised the school in glowing terms. Here’s a snapshot:

• “The school’s work to promote pupils’ personal development and welfare is outstanding.”• “There is a strong culture of safeguarding which runs throughout the school.” • “The majority of teaching is strong and effective.”

• “Pupils are confident, mature and articulate. They are very proud of their school.”

The school has a number of big projects: our conversion to a Multi-Academy Trust in January 2018; coping with the impact of the Livewire leisure services development and the limitations to PE and access routes; planning Warrington Borough Council’s request to increase our numbers on roll to accommodate needed secondary places in West Warrington, which we hope will see a transformed former Barrow Hall primary site.

Meanwhile, school has been busy with increased extra-curricular activities and a range of opportunities and students have been doing what makes us so proud, getting involved and being successful! Well done to all. Please enjoy reading about all they have been doing

Welcome to the first Contact of this academic year. This has been a busy half term in school and I am delighted to see our new year 7 students have settled in so well. It was great to see so many parents at the “Meet the Tutors” event and when surveyed 100% of our new parents agreed that our transition events had prepared their child well, 100% also agreed that the parent guide and transition evening had prepared them to support their child’s transition. Our Open Evening was extremely busy with nearly 700 visitors being shown around school by 200 of our student ambassadors and again survey results were overwhelmingly positive with visitors commenting on the enthusiasm, politeness and maturity of our students and the quality of our learning displays in classrooms.

We celebrated the achievements of the class of 2017 at our annual presentation Evening at the Parr Hall and held our first Duke of Edinburgh Awards Evening at school, celebrating 253 studnets in years 10 and 11 achieving their Bronze award. 9 We have had much to celebrate this half term! I know that Mrs Woodruff has just started the Bronze award with the current Year 9 and is about to launch the Silver Award with Year 10. I look forward to hearing about their adventures throughout the year! We also had our Ofsted visit and Mr Wright has already discussed this but again I feel this was a real celebration of our strengths and has given us a real focus moving forward. I wish you all a very happy and safe half term break and will see you all when we reopen on Monday 30th October.

AUSTEN BANNISTERWhat a fantastic first half term Austen House has had. I’ve been really proud of how well the students have settled back into school life and lessons. Our lovely year 7 forms, 7AB and 7AD have found their feet and are really enjoying their first half term as ‘Sankey students’. At our Open evening this year, I was extremely impressed with the amount of Austen students that volunteered to help. The students involved were a real credit to our school and house and the feedback I received from parents was wonderful to hear.

I’ve been really proud of how well our year 7 forms, 7BB and 7BG have settled in and is was lovely to see them getting involved in the first Inter House Quiz. We were a brilliant third with a superb turn out from Year 10 – well done to everyone who turned out. It’s been a very busy half term and everyone deserves a relaxing break. I look forward to seeing everyone back in November for another busy and exciting half term.

Have a great week , Ms Clark x

A huge thanks goes to Mrs Mullins and her form 11AD for their ‘surprise’ birthday party they threw for Ellen Houghton. She was over-whelmed by all the love and generosity and everyone had a fantastic afternoon. We even had some surprise messages from some celebrities!!

I want to wish you all a relaxing half term and I look forward to see you all in November ready to start the next half term ahead.

Take care, Mrs Masher

I am so excited to join Bannister House, covering Ms Bayne’s ma-ternity leave. I have been made so welcome by all the tutors and more importantly by the students. Jamie Pick and and Leah Thor-pe the two new House Captains have been absolutely fantastic making sure there has been a smooth take over. As we finished our first day in school the newest addition to Bannister was born, a very timely arrival by Nell Elwen-Bayne. Both doing well and we are awaiting our first visit – maybe to our next assembly

NEWTON PARKSCongratulations to Katie in 8PH!! Katie was selected to represent Warrington Gymnastics Club in the British Gymnastics Challenge Cup earlier this month. This was a national competition. Katie had a clean competition on all apparatus and was placed 32nd out of 90 gymnasts from across Great Britain. Katie was 1.3 points off qualification for the British Championships as a first year espoir. Katie said that she felt nervous before the competition but also excited and that she was proud of her performance and very pleased with her final position.A fantastic achievement Katie - we are so proud of you.

Inter House

We had a busy afternoon on Thursday 12th October as there were several inter house competitions taking place.Many thanks to Ellie, Emily and Tom from 11PL who represented Parks House in the Year 11 Bake –Off. Unfortunately, Parks did not win but we had lots of laughs!!Meanwhile, Parks House was represented by 8 superb teams in the Inter House Quiz. The teams endured round after round of questions from sport to flags of the world. A fantastic turn-out and commitment on the part of Parks House proved successful as Parks House won the quiz.Well done to all the participants and to the form tutors who ‘encouraged’ you all to attend!!

Mrs Lee

It has been a positive and busy start to the new academic year and I have been particularly impressed with how well Year 10 students have started their GCSEs and I am also delighted with how 7NA and 7NT have settled into life at Great Sankey. I would like to give a special mention to Grace in 8NN who competed in the British transplant games over the summer holidays winning 2 silver medals! Well done to the year 7 interhouse football team who came second narrowly missing out on the win on goal difference. Finally, I would like to say thank you to all the students that have been selected to be a form representative this year.

Have a fantastic half term! Mr Bate

STEPHENSON THOMPSONIt has been a really busy and exciting start to the year, with some fantastic work being completed in and out of the classroom. It is great to see the new year 7 students in Thompson house have settled in to their new school community so well. The students in Thompson House once again joined in with the first round of Inter House competitions with enthusiasm. Many students took part in the Quiz whilst the year 11 students had to face the ‘technical challenge’ of the Bake off! After half term the work for our year 11 students will rachet up a notch as they begin the run in towards theIr GCSE mock exams in December.

Enjoy the half term break!

Mr Cawthorn

A fabulous start to the school year. 7SE and 7SL have settled in well and made a fantastic start to life at Great Sankey High School.I am very pleased to introduce the House Captains for this school year, Danika and Alex.

I know they will lead the team of Form Representatives really well. The Form Representatives for this year are:

Form Form Reps7SE Elias and Lois 7SL Aaron and Hannah 8SE Owen and Hannah 8SJ Billy-jo and Joe 9SM Jay and Emma9SG Elliot and Charis 10SK Ife and Qi Min10SP Fay and Tyler 11SK Tom and Tia 11SP Katie and Matt

The forms have all been work-ing hard on researching and choosing the House Charity for this school year and I they have come up with some really good ideas for raising money. The first whole school event will be the non-uniform “Wear it Pink/Blue Day” event on the 20th October to raise money and awareness of various male and female cancers and for the Teenage Cancer Trust. The charity representatives have some exciting fundraising ideas so hopefully we will raise a lot of money and have fun whilst doing it. Mrs Steele

News

Congratulations to Y8 student Marcus who has been nominated as a Warrington Wolves Man of Steel – he is one of three finalists in his age group. We wish him well in the final.

MAN OF STEEL

Christmas treat orders are now being taken for Parks Charity! An order form has been added to the last page of this edition of Contact so please support Parks and order some festive treats. Orders close on the 3rd November for the baking to commence. Please place order forms and payments in a sealed envelope in Mr Jenkin’s pigeon hole or hand deliver to T11. Some order forms have been placed on the notice board also for convenience.

CHRISTMAS BAKESWe want to say a big “WELL DONE” to the Year 10 Food Preparation and Nutrition groups who have made an excellent start to their GCSE course!

There was a fantastic response to this offer and the 40 places went within 24 hours of opening.Letters will be sent out shortly to all those who have paid a deposit.

Mr S James

Race For The Line is a STEM competition that all year 7 will be taking part in as part of their D&T lessons. The aim is to design, build, test and race a Model Rocket Car. The competition is inspired by Bloodhound SSC (the 1000 mph land speed re-cord attempt car) and helps to link the STEM subjects together through an exciting design challenge.

So far the pupils have formed teams, selected job roles and team names. They have also started to research into what makes a reliable, fast vehicle.All the teams have until January to design, build and test their vehicles, ready for race day.

Coming soon for Year 9! After school on Thursdays in the weeks leading up to Christmas, Mrs Meredith & Mr Bryan will be running an extra curricular club, “Year 9 Extravaganza”. Come and perform in small ensembles to rehearse Christmas songs of your choosing. You don’t have to be able to play an instrument; come and sing or record the sound for our CDs and Youtube channel. There will be opportunities to perform your songs around school over the festive period. Our BHC students will be on hand to mentor.

The Young Engineers club has started up again on Monday, after school, in T3. The idea of the club is to allow pupils, generally in KS3, the opportunity to work with engineering materials and processes in order to complete a series of small projects.The new year 7 pupils are starting these new tasks and are building up their skills.The year 8 pupils are developing the skills, learnt in year 7, by starting to work on the rebuild of the electric powered race car.

ContactmagazineAutumn12017

YoungEngineers2017.

TheYoungEngineersclubhasstartedupagainonaMondayafterschool,inT3.Theideaoftheclubistoallowpupils,generallyinKS3,theopportunitytoworkwithengineeringmaterialsandprocessesinordertocompleteaseriesofsmallprojects.

Thenewyear7pupilsarestartingthesenewtasksandarebuildinguptheirskills.

Theyear8pupilsaredevelopingtheskills,learntinyear7,bystartingtoworkontherebuildoftheelectricpoweredracecar.

Young Engineers

Former Great Sankey High School student Harlee is aiming for chart success with her first single in the download charts called “Holding on”. Signed to a label in New York she has collaborated with producers including Sky Adams (Ella Eyre, Rixton), and Knightstarr (Anne-Marie, Janelle Monae). Good luck Harlee!

EX STUDENT AIMS FOR CHART SUCCESS!

YearMusic Extravaganza

9The Geography

TRIPto ITALY October 2018

Welldone!

Artist In Residence Weekend

The Art department welcomed artist Ian Murphy to the school for a workshop with Year 11 students.

Students produced fantastic work over the weekend of 1st October. Well done to everybody involved!

My confidence has grown massively over the past two days.”

“Great experience.”

“I never thought I would have enjoyed coming to school at the weekend, but it was really amaz-ing. A great opportunity and Ian was great.”“I’ve had a great time and learned to let go of some control to create pieces very different to what I usually do.”

“I truly exceeded my own expectations. I am so proud to have been chosen for this— thank you!”

“I have had a really enjoyable time and found Ian really inspirational. Thankyou!”

“An absolutely amazing couple of days.”

Year 11

253 Pupils were awarded their Bronze D of E Award in October – Awards were presented by Lord lieutenant of Cheshire David Briggs, M.B.E., K.St.J.

This current Year 9 currently has 234 pupils signed up. Yr 10 Silver enrolments begin after half term. Letters go out Friday 20th October.

presentation night

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CROSS COUNTRY

Fantastic start to the WAC cross country league races, great turn out from GSHS athletes. A particular mention to Molly Wermould and George Hill who came first in their respective races. The next race is 18th November

SWIMMING

Two girls teams took part in the ESSA relays championships at Everton Park. Girls A team; Nyah Kingdon, Abbie Smeltzer, Sophie Weston and Mille Duncan- 2nd place in the medley and 3rd place in the freestyle.

GIRLS FOOTBALL

Congratulations to the U13 football team. They are currently in the third round of the U13 ESFA Cup.

SCHOOL SHOW 13th/14th DEC 2017…

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InspiredbytheMotionPictureBringItOnWrittenbyJessicaBendingerThisamateurproductionispresentedbyarrangementwith

MusicTheatreInternational(Europe)AllauthorisedperformancematerialsarealsosuppliedbyMTIEurope

www.mtishows.co.uk

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