Welcome Back to 2015 – 2016

Welcome back! Suddenly we are at the beginning of another academic year wondering where the summer holidays went!

The Autumn term is traditionally a very busy one for us in school and we are looking forward to welcoming you all into school. We would also like to welcome our new pupils and their families into our school community. We hope you enjoy your time with us at William Ransom.

On Monday we will be sending home a list of known dates for this academic year. Please keep it handy. We make every endeavour not to change dates once they have been set, but there are times when this is inevitable, however we will try to give as much notice as possible.

If your child is ill and unable to come to school:

Please telephone school and leave a message on option 1 before 9.00am

Alternatively you can email any information to the school office on admin@wransom.herts.sch.uk

Please phone each day to keep us informed of their progress.

Once your child returns to school please send a letter explaining their absence.

In the case of long term absences we will assume the pupil will be off school unless you tell us otherwise.

Any unexplained absences will be followed up with a phone call before 9.30am.

 

All of these procedures are intended to keep your child safe, please help us by keeping us informed.  I hope these arrangements are clear but if you do have any queries please do not hesitate to contact me.

Please remember that we have been advised by County that we are to avoid granting permission for pupils to be absent during term time. The law is quite specific about this and allows for parents to apply for permission for their child to be absent, for UNAVOIDABLE reasons only. It is only the School that can authorise an absence. Attendance Inspection Officers visit all schools regularly to enquire about attendance and inspect registers and letters about absence. This happens once every half term. Therefore I would ask that all requests for absences are made in writing to me and if you are requesting an absence for longer than 2 days please make an appointment to see me so we can discuss the situation. Where possible, doctor and dentist appointments should be arranged for times outside the school day. All holidays should be taken during the official school closures. Could I also share with you that 3 absences every month equals a whole year missed over 5 years!

At the beginning of a school year we always have a purge on names on uniform! Please ensure your child’s uniform and PE kit is named clearly. The first uniform shop of the year will be held on Monday 14th September 2015 at 3.25 in the Dining Hall

As we start this new Academic Year, clearly we are embarking upon a very interesting challenging year! There is no news to report on the expansion plans except to say that the building plans have now been submitted to Town Planning and we await any decision regarding the plans, however, the expansion will go ahead! If you have any concerns regarding this, please do not hesitate to come and talk to me, and we will endeavour to keep you posted on any developments!

Clearly site security is an important issue at all times but especially so during the building works. There will be regular site meetings to ensure the safety and security of everyone in school.

However, in order to establish good practice before the building works start we intend to limit parental access into school through doors at the back of the school. If you have a need to see a teacher or teaching assistant, please come via the office and this can be arranged. Please do not access the mobile classrooms or the main building without signing in at the front office.

Every year we write a School Development Plan to highlight the areas of our work which we will be focussing on during the academic year and I thought you would be interested in knowing what some of our key priorities are for the coming year:

To monitor the progress of reading across the school and the associated resource implications.

To look at the gender differences across the school, is there a difference in the results of boys and girls, if so why?

To introduce a new music scheme – Charanga and for all classes to access it.

To introduce a Values Based Education across the whole school

ALSO:

To ensure the continued high level of teaching and learning whilst there are major building works across the school

 

We will have lots of information for you about our Values Based Education within the next few weeks.

Please remember if you have any concerns about your child at school, do not hesitate to come in to see me.

I look forward to seeing you in school in the very near future.

Mary Driver