Friday 24 November 2023

Dear Parents and Carers

I hope this letter find you well.

This week has again been busy.  Our School opened its doors to prospective Sixth Formers, both from our lovely Year 11 and also from other schools, on Wednesday evening.  The hugest thank you to Mrs Sutton, Mr Skinner, Dr Falls, Mrs Dalby, Gemma Goodwin and all the Facilities Team for their organisation and to all the Heads of Department and the Subject Ambassadors for their help.  AHS is a brilliant school, made so by such kind donations of time by its community.  We will again welcome prospective Year 12 students next Tuesday 28th for our Sixth Form Open Morning from 9.15 onwards.

This week our Green Schools' Challenge winning team of Year 12s visited their sponsoring company 'Whiffaway', more detail below.  Five A level Computer Science students also visited the Saïd Business School at the University of Oxford to take part in the Creative Destruction Lab (CDL) Senior Girls' School Programme.  The CDL is a non-profit organisation that brings together students, university researchers, top-tier investors, business leaders and start-ups, to breathe life into ambitious ideas.  Since the programme began in 2012, £12.6 billion has been created in equity value.  Our students had the opportunity to meet the start-up founders and sit in on mentoring sessions with industry professionals. They listened to advice being given to founders and also to get a sense of what is involved in taking an idea from concept to market. Yesterday's inspirationals sessions were all in the sphere of AI.

Well done to all students taking part in DofE Gold, and thank you for attending the Information Evening on Monday.  Many thanks to Ms Sowah for making this possible, it is a huge amount of work.

Our brilliant staff took part in a Charity Boogie Bounce for Rennie Grove Peace Hospice on Thursday evening.  The staff raised £200 towards Mrs Carey's personal goal of £2,500 for the Hospice.  She has already raised over £1,500 and so has another £1,000 to go before April.  Thank you to all the staff involved in this fantastic event.  

And finally, our Staff are also busy preparing the Staff Panto and their karaoke numbers for fundraising week #AHSWalksTall

Green Schools' Challenge

On Wednesday the winning team from the Green Schools' Challenge visited its sponsoring company 'Whiffaway'.  It was a useful and engaging morning. The Company Director, Seb Marshall, pictured below, gave the team a presentation on the background and science behind the company and then gave our team pointers to improve its presentation in preparation for the final against 5 other schools on the 8th December. 

Our team has named itself 'The Green Machine' and its winning idea is to have a loyalty card to improve recycling across the school.  Good luck in the final!

Mr Potkin, Head of DT

Sport at AHS 

The AHS Equestrian Team continues to compete in the National Schools' Equestrian Association (NSEA) Competitions and over October half term Orla, Amy and Brianna represented the school in the National Finals at the Addington Equestrian Centre.  The students and their horses were brilliant!  This was a fantastic achievement for all 3 students to represent AHS in National Finals and very well done to them all.

Last Friday our U14 Elite badminton team travelled to Cheltenham Ladies College to compete in the 3rd round of the School Sports Magazine Victor Cup. The team played a strong game resulting in a 6-0 win taking us through to the 4th round.

On Saturday our Junior and Inter Medley Swim teams competed at the ESSA National Swim Finals in Birmingham. Lots of long course PBs achieved with the teams finishing 20th and 22nd. Well done to all involved. Aside from the specialist swim colleges, not many schools qualified for more than one age group so this in itself is quite an achievement.

Our Year 7 junior NBA basketball team had their first match of the season on Tuesday, winning against Northampton School for Girls. Sophie was our highest scorer, followed by Mille and Mishbah. Well done to the whole team!

Our U18 football team played Sir Henry Floyd Grammar school on Wednesday, unfortunately not coming away with a win, however, a very good game was played.

Yesterday saw the U16 Hockey team competing in the Regional Finals, where the students worked really hard with very close games.  They only let in two goals but sadly could not find the net.  We were placed 6th overall, again well done to all involved!

Finally, thank you to our Y10 leaders who travelled to Buckingham on Thursday to lead a squash participation event for Y5 & 6 primary school students. 

Mrs Sole-Bradley, Head of PE

Young Scientist of the Year Awards Ceremony

Congratulations to Teena, Anouk and Lucie who received the Young Scientist of the Year award for Chemistry, Physics and Biology respectively.

We attended an evening of celebration of the achievements of the best Year 13 science students across Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire at the Science Centre in Headington. The evening began with a reception and an opportunity to try some 'hands on' fun STEM activities.  This was followed by presentations from inspiring local scientists and the presentation of the certificates.  It was a lovely evening and a real privilege to be there accompanied by such talented students.

Mrs Nicholls, Head of Chemistry

Well done AHS Students - Attendance Update

Thank you for sending our students into school, and to our students for making such a huge effort to get here too!  Our whole school attendance figure last week was 96%, which was good, well done, and is heading towards our target of 97%.  Gold stars to Year 7 on 97.9%, Year 8 on 97.7% and Year 11 on 97.1%. Research shows that regular attendance has been proven to have the strongest correlation with GCSE and A Level grades but, here at AHS, we also value regular attendance for its indisputable positive impact on our students' wellbeing.

To support this, we have a clear Attendance Strategy and we thank you for your ongoing support in upholding our work in this area. 

• Absences are authorised for students who are ill, particularly if they have been physically sick, have an upset stomach or a temperature.  

• We can authorise medical appointments if you are not able to get them outside of school hours, but ideally just for half a day. 

• We are absolutely not able to authorise holidays in term time. 

You may have seen information about EBSA in the press. This stands for Emotionally Based School Avoidance, and is a national problem. If you feel your child may be avoiding school due to a problem, please talk to us as soon as possible; we can offer lots of support to try to solve this, such as:

• Heads of Year and form tutors to help with friendship problems

• Subject teachers to advise if there are worries about a particular subject

• Mrs Crafts, our SENDCo, to help with a special educational needs concern

• Mrs Westcott, Mrs Kiteley and Miss Scott to help with wellbeing

• Mrs Nix, our matron, to help with a health or sleep issues.

Thank you again for your support. 

Mrs Queralt, DH Pastoral

Teacher Recruitment

Have you considered training to teach?  Do you know someone who might be thinking about it?  We would be happy to welcome you for a day's experience in a relevant department.  If you would like to ask any questions or just find out more, please email me, at sjeffreys@ahs.bucks.sch.uk.

(The application season for Sep'24 start is open now and runs through to June.)

Mrs Jeffreys, Teacher Recruitment Lead

Vacancies

We currently are looking for:

A part-time Cleaner to work all through the year (as opposed to term time only)

A part-time Afternoon Cleaner (term time only)

An Art Technicican for 20 hours per week to cover a maternity leave - To start in January

If any of these vacancies may be of interest to you, please click on this link to our Staff Vacancies page on our website

Wishing all well for a lovely weekend.  Thank you, as ever, for your support.

Marieke Forster