Headmistress' Introduction

This week the ongoing public examinations continue, with students working diligently through their papers. We commend all our students for their hard work and focus during this time.  If you need us, please reach out, we are here to support you all.  

Huge thanks to all staff, students, parents and carers who enabled fantastic trips over the half-term week.  Students went on an enriching trip to the Loire Valley which Mrs Lemonde said was really enjoyable.  The trip to Iceland, was also thoroughly enjoyed by all who went, with plenty of Iceland's natural wonders on display, as you can see from the pictures above and below.  17 Year 12 students completed a D of E Gold practise expedition in a wet and wild Wales; further details about that below.  

We said goodbye to Mrs Turnbull in English this week.  She has been a highly valued member of our community and we will miss her very much.

Looking ahead to the weekend, our Year 10 students are preparing for their Bronze Duke of Edinburgh (DofE) expedition.  We wish them all the best and hope for good weather, as they demonstrate their teamwork and resilience.

Parents' Information Morning - Wednesday 18 June 2025 -9.00 am - 10.30 am 

Dear Parents and Carers

We will be holding a Parents' Information morning as above.  There will be a short talk from Mrs Crafts, our SENDCo, on 'Executive Functioning: how parents of a daughter with SEN can best support them in areas such as how to revise, organisation and advice about procrastination circles'.  There will then be an opportunity to talk with other parents and share ideas about supporting a young person with SEN. 

You are also most welcome if you would like to meet with a member of the Senior Leadership Team, or pastoral teams, as we have offered in previous afternoons, to discuss other wider pastoral issues.  If you would like to attend, please complete this Google Form and we will get back in touch with you, after half term, with details of times and who you will be meeting.

We look forward to welcoming you into School.

Heads of Year for 2025/2026

Miss Morrin will continue in her role as Head of Year 7, welcoming our new cohort to AHS.

Mrs Williams will take her Year 8s into Year 9.

Mrs Saunders will take over as Head of Year 8, which means that her Year 9s will now be led by Mr Stanley in Year 10.

Mrs Taylor will take her Year 10s into Year 11 and Miss Quesne will take her Year 12s into Year 13, meaning that Miss Kilkenny will take over as Head of Year 12.

Our Pastoral Support Assistants will continue to support their Key Stages:

KS3:  Mrs Sheed

KS4:  Mrs Faulkner

KS5:  Mrs Kaley

We thank them for all of their hard work in supporting our students.  Please do get in touch if you have any questions or concerns.

2025-2026

7: Claire Morrin

8: Sarah Saunders

9: Emily Williams

10: Charlie Stanley

11: Ellie Taylor

12: Kayley Kilkenny

13: Jo Quesne

Important Safety Information

We would like all students to be aware of the Probation Centre that is the Wynne Jones Centre, next to KwikFit, on the Tesco roundabout.  We have been advised that it is not a safe place for students to wait for parental collection; this advice is from the Probation Service and is made because they have a constant stream of people on probation and releases from prisons.  If students need to wait for parents after school they can attend Homework After School club in the Library or wait in the Dining Room until 4.30 pm. 

Instrumental Tuition

Aylesbury High School actively encourages as many students as possible to receive instrumental tuition as part of enriching their education, and a considerable number of the students take up this opportunity. Lessons are given in our dedicated music practice rooms during the school day. If you would like your child to receive instrumental music lessons from September 2025, please refer to the information under 'Learning -> Music Ensembles and Instrumental Tuition' on our website and complete this Google Form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSebmaB_j8oB2Bc9IuKsbq38A38jCNpSACGQORHcNTiiWNAHdQ/viewform?usp=dialog (which is also accessible through the website).

Could I please ask that any requests are completed by Friday 27th June, so that I am able to allocate teachers before the end of this term.

Mark Warner

Director of Music

Sport this week

Cricket

U13 Cricket vs Chesham Grammar - We lost by 4 runs but it was a super close game and the students were great!

Rounders

The Year 10 District Rounders Game was played here at AHS on Wednesday evening. Moki was voted player of the matches owing to her outstanding hitting skills! 

the results were:

Waddesdon 1st       

AHS 2nd     

Cottesloe 3rd

Tennis

The U12s, U13s ,U14s ,U15s  tennis teams played Wycombe Abbey school this week.  

We won 16-8

Year 12 Sports Leaders working with Stocklake Park School

The Level 2 Qualification in Community Sports Leadership is an Extended Study option for Year12s.  Over the years we have built a fantastic relationship with Stocklake Park Sixth Form, which is a secondary special school of over 100 pupils, with a broad diversity of complex needs, including Profound and Multiple Learning Difficulties.

We have worked hard this year to develop this relationship to provide meaningful physical activity sessions for their Sixth Form students.  Nigel the lead member of staff from Stocklake visited the sports leaders to talk to them about their students and introduce us to Makaton, a language program that uses signs, symbols and speech to help individuals with communication or learning difficulties, to communicate.

We then visited Stocklake Park to observe the students in their own environment to see how they learn best, what they enjoy and used this to aid our planning.  They then visited us once a week for 4 weeks, taking part in fun, active and adapted physical activity sessions led by our leaders.

Alice and Caitlin said:

'Over the last half term we have been leading fun sport sessions for students at Stocklake Park, which is a local secondary school for students with learning difficulties. In the first two weeks, we led sessions on parachute games, football skills and matches, followed by basketball sessions in the last two weeks. As sports leaders, we have learnt how to adapt sessions to make them accessible and inclusive for everyone to participate in, and we have really enjoyed getting to know the students each week. Recently, we were also invited over to Stocklake Park to run their sports day, which involved leading different events, including obstacle courses, throwing challenges and bowling. We hope all of the students have enjoyed their sessions with us and trying new sports!'

Nigel was incredibly grateful to our leaders emailing to say:

'Thank you so much for organising this and getting the girls over, they were absolute superstars! A real credit to you and your team.

If you don't mind, on Tuesday, I'd like to give them one of the medals that we gave our students, just to say thank you and make a bit of a fuss.'

We were all delighted with this feedback and they did indeed receive their medals!  

The leaders have been amazing and have overcome many barriers to lead fantastic sessions for Stocklake Park, which is just a section of the course.  Huge congratulations and thank you to all of you. We look forward to welcoming Stocklake Park Sixth Form back next year!

If any students are interested in taking the Level 2 Qualification as an Extended study in Year 12 and want to know more, please email me kcarpenter@ahs.bucks.sch.uk.

Kerry Carpenter

Teacher of PE

Gold Duke of Edinburgh Practise Expedition 

17 Year 12 students took part in their Gold DofE Practise Expedition during half term in the beautiful Brecon Beacons, Wales.  The remote location and wet and windy weather made the training challenging, but in true AHS style, this was no problem for our resilient students.  Expedition Wales DofE Manager was extremely complimentary about their achievements:

"Considering the weather was grim, they were brilliant.  They were very positive, coped well with constant wet and windy conditions and navigated very successfully in poor visibility.  We were really impressed.  They did the School proud."

Mrs Hamilton

External Visits Coordinator and Duke of Edinburgh Manager

Essay Writing Success

Huge congratulations go out to Lottie M in Year 10 who was recently 'Highly Commended' in the International Scholastica Essay Competition.  Her history essay got shortlisted and ended up coming in the top 100 essays internationally.  In addition to her certificate, she won a 50% merit scholarship, which Lottie has decided to put towards an online internship in International Relations and Politics.   What a fantastic achievement, we are so proud of you! 

Gymnastic Success

Huge congratulations to Nikol who took part in the gymnastics World Cup, which was in Varna, Bulgaria and took place between 8-11th May.  She competed on the bars and beam and reached the finals for both.  She came third in the beam final and seventh in the bar final.  This was her first ever World Cup medal and it was in front of her home crowd!

As if this wasn't enough, Nikol then took part in the European Championships in Leipzig.  Despite being injured, she managed to complete all her routines, including bars, beam, floor and vault.  What a fantastic achievement, we are super proud of her!

Year 7 Geography 

Yesterday, Year 7 created Playdough models of the three different types of rainfall.   Students had to use their creativity to make three Playdough models of conventional, relief and frontal rain.  They then annotated their models with the different steps and processes involved for each type. 

Miss Kilkenny
Teacher of Geography

Free Courses from Bucks Adult Learning

Did you know that there are lots of courses available free of charge?  For example, Supporting Your Child's Mental Health

For the full list of courses, see here.

Free webinar: Degree Apprenticeships - What Are They All About?

My Great First Job is offering a free webinar on Tuesday 10 June 18:30 - 19:30. This is primarily aimed at students in Years 12/13 and their parents/carers but younger students and their parents/carers are welcome too.

The session will cover:

• How Degree Apprenticeships work

• Where you can find the opportunities

• When you should be applying

• What can an application process look like?

• Finances for apprentices

Sign up here to attend. 

Wishing all well for a very happy weekend.  As ever, thanks for your much appreciated support for our School.

Marieke Forster