Dear Parents and Carers,

I hope you enjoyed a good half term break and are now enjoying the loooooong days taking us into summer! It’s so nice driving into school in the daylight and being able to admire the countryside from the M56!

I have changed the title of the bulletin, you will notice, to ‘Headteacher’s Bulletin’ as I feel I have used the word ‘Coronavirus’ enough this year! Where necessary, the Headteacher’s Bulletin will continue to include Covid updates and will still continue to celebrate all that is great about Altrincham College!

Covid Update

Unfortunately, Trafford is currently in the middle of a major spike in Covid cases amongst 15 -19 year olds. This has seen us move from students not wearing masks to wearing them all the time, which is no fun for anyone but a requirement at this time. The students have been wonderful, as always, in complying with this. We will remain in bubbles and zones until the end of term but are currently timetabling for a return to subject classrooms again for September so that students can move from lesson to lesson. Again, this may be subject to change in light of further Covid restrictions but is something to look forward to.

We have had four positive student cases since half term and one staff positive case. Close contacts were quickly identified and sent home. A huge thank you to Mrs Careswell, our Track and Trace Co-ordinator, for her highly efficient work and we sincerely hope all those individuals feel much better soon.

The Y11 Prom can no longer take place sadly, but we do have some ideas for marking the end of KS4 with our students and Mr Hughes will be in touch separately about this very soon!

May I remind you that students should continue to test at home twice a week with 3-5 days in between? I know it can be hard to remember but students could set reminders on their phone to ensure they don’t forget. It’s really important that all results are reported, whether negative, positive or void, as this helps Public Health get an overview of what the situation is in our local area. It also helps them identify areas of Trafford where intensive support may be required.

If your child requires further testing kits these can be obtained from school (from the main hall every break-time). Testing should continue throughout the summer holidays and also the night before/morning of our return to school in September. We will ensure we have enough stocks of testing kits to provide to your child before we break up. Students in the current Y11 who are returning to our Sixth Form will be notified when they can come into school to collect them.

Attendance – Every School Day Counts!

Please ensure your child/ward attends school every day unless they are REALLY ill. If they feel unwell often, and there seems to be no medical reason, there may be other issues we can help with. Please let us know how we can support your child in maintaining 100% attendance. Every 10% of time away from school in a year equates to one grade lower at GCSE/A-level. With lost learning time nationally at an all-time high due to the pandemic, we have put lots of support and intervention in place in school to help your child catch up. To benefit from this, they need to be in.

Student Leadership

Mr Keegan is currently developing Student Leadership in school and has plans to roll this out to all students from September. We have asked students in the current Y10 to apply for the role of Student Leader and they are being appointed later today. The next round of applications will be from these Student Leaders for Head Student, who will be appointed next week. Students Leaders will be appointed in September in other year groups, including Sixth Form, and further information will soon be available on the school website.

The Duke of Edinburgh’s Award

 

 

 

Mr Stephenson leads our D of E Programme at school and this is delivered either through timetabled sessions or on an extra-curricular basis. We have successfully managed to ensure students could still complete this award within Covid guidelines with a few modifications! I was very pleased to receive a letter from the Lord Lieutenant recently congratulating us on all we have done as a school throughout the pandemic, but especially in maintaining progress with D of E. A huge thank you to Mr Stephenson for working with our young people to make all of this happen during such a poignant year.

 

Student Star of the Week

The award this week goes to Chloe S in Year 8 who was the ball carrier at the England game on Sunday! How amazing to be chosen Chloe! Well done from everyone here at AC – we are very proud of you!

Staff Star of the Week

The award for Staff Star of the Week this week goes to Miss Whitworth, our Head of Maths! You may or may not know that in her spare time(!) she is a Special Constable and works really hard with GM Police to ensure our local community are safe. Not only that, Miss Whitworth has written an article about her voluntary job which is to be featured in the Police magazine “Special Impact” which is out soon! Many congratulations Miss Whitworth from all your AC colleagues!                     

 

Thank you for your continued support of our school!

Stop the spread! Stay safe!

 

Kind regards
Ms. Earle
Headteacher