MUSSELBURGH GRAMMAR SCHOOL
HEAD TEACHER'S NEWSLETTER
It was a pleasure to welcome Ms Lesley Brown, executive director for Education & Children's Services, to school last week. She was impressed by the refurbished social area and toilets and delighted to meet Kayla and Orla, part of our Head Pupil team: I’m always proud to show off our school and pupils, and this visit was no exception.
Councillor Andy Forrest visits us on Monday, and I’m sure he will be equally impressed.
The S1 Parents' Evening was another success, and it was lovely to welcome so many of our newer families to school to meet teachers - lots of excellence to celebrate in S1!
Have a lovely weekend.
Jodie Hannan
Key Dates:
Wednesday 9 November: Parent Council online 7-9pm. Please use this link: https://meet.google.com/gsx-ggxv-gae?hs=122&authuser=0
Friday 11 November: Remembrance Day assemblies in school
Sunday 13 November: Remembrance Day ceremony at noon at The Fountain. Rory Steedman and Kayla McKinnie, Head Pupils, and J Hannan, Headteacher, will represent our school.
Tuesday 15 November: Employability Evening 6-8pm in school
Staff Updates:
Please note that Ms Chisholm is now full time acting DHT and Head of House for Moray, Ms McCrorie full time Acting PT Geography and History, and Ms Dudley full time Geography and Modern Studies teacher.
Kayla and Rory's Weekly Rundown
Hi guys, welcome back to another one of Rory and Kayla’s weekly rundowns. We hope you have all had a good week and have enjoyed the Friday dress down for Ukraine. Quick reminder for all senior pupils that there are study support classes available for you all as we get closer to prelims.
It was so great to see and meet so many of the S1 parents and we hope everybody’s reports were all good! This week another member of our head team, Orla, attended the 1.5MAX:Global Schools’ Climate Summit where she along with other pupils talked about climate issues around the world and discussed what could be done about them. It was a great experience for them all and we cannot wait for them to take climate action in the school.
We hope you have a good weekend as we get into the colder weather and we hope you all enjoy the fireworks on Saturday! :)
Kayla & Rory
House Points - Weekly Total
1.5 MAX Global Schools’ Summit
Over the last three days, we have been involved in 1.5 MAX Global Climate Summit, where we have been talking to other schools about how the climate crisis is affecting our communities in Nepal, Malawi and also here in Scotland. After some discussion we decided that our main problem was litter, especially plastic.
On day 1 we watched some clips which helped us to understand what was going on and how serious the climate crisis really is and what effect it's had on our planet. We split into smaller groups and came up with questions we wanted to ask the other schools.
On day 2 we called other schools from around the world to discuss our problems and tried to help each other come up with solutions. From this we then came up with our own solutions that were an Eco Week, which includes loads of different climate conscious activities such as litter picks, clothing/book swaps etc. We also plan to do a new classroom scheme focusing on climate justice and includes an initiative called PSE Pen Pals, which would include time in our PSE class to talk to young people about their climate issues in different parts of the world. Finally, we have come up with a few ideas to make our cafeteria more eco-friendly such as encouraging people to bring their own lunch containers, buying packaging in bulk where possible, food waste bins as well as having colour-coded recycling bins in the cafeteria as well as classrooms.
On day 3 we came up with action plans in order to make these plans reality. We planned out how these ideas are going to work as well as who we had to talk to to get these approved.
We would like to thank Sustainability Partnerships for making this summit possible and all the staff who participated, especially Miss Hepburn who helped us through the whole thing, and Ms Hannan who allowed us to take part. Finally we want to thank everyone who took the time to read this and we hope this has encouraged you to help us in the journey to make Musselburgh more sustainable.
1.5 MAX Pupil ProposalsBlythswood Shoebox Appeal
51 shoe boxes were delivered to the Blythswood charity this week. Thank you for all of your kind donations - much appreciated by the Duke of Edinburgh group and the charity.
Poppy Scotland Appeal
Pupils will be selling poppies in school next week so please bring a cash donation if you wish to purchase a poppy. In addition, a Remembrance Assembly will take place on Friday 11th November. Thank you.
MGS Policy Review
Now that our new policies; lateness, uniform and devices have been in place for a while, we are keen to gather your opinions on how they are improving our school. If you wish to find out more about any of these please visit our parent handbook here.
A huge thank you to our S1 Pupil Voice Ambassadors who have done a brilliant job surveying 93 parents over the course of the S1 and S3 parents evenings - we are very proud of their commitment to volunteering and helping to gather parents' views. We are now keen to hear from parents from other year groups or parents who were unable to attend. This short survey will take no more than 5 minutes of your time: https://forms.gle/9gFxfgeEycAWYqGYA
Thank you in advance for sharing your views.
Christmas Fayre 2022
Christmas Fayre 2022 planning is underway and there has already been Christmas Music heard playing in the Business Education Department! This year we will also have Mrs Howie and Mrs Beveridge’s Free to a Good Home Stall, if any pupils would like to donate clothes or accessories please bring them to Miss Andrew’s room (B31). We are also looking for donations of coat hangers for our clothes rails. The cut off for accepting donations will be Wednesday 07 December.
Literacy
We’re delighted to share that S2 and S3 pupils have been working hard with the Super Power Agency over the past six weeks. This week, pupils started to explore potential titles and cover designs as they moved towards completing final drafts of their writing. With two weeks left we’ll be sure to update you on our creative and nonfiction titles when they are are ready to print.
Faculty of Chemistry and Physics - Pupils Of The Month
Mrs Shaw - Zoe Wright
Miss Scott - Asia McIntyre
Mr Jarvie - Grant Myles
Miss Ferguson - Rory Patton
Mr Watt - Rosa Morris
Miss Rankin - Hannah Scott
Congratulations on all of your hard work and effort in class.
Cleaning Jobs
There are several opportunities for cleaners at MGS.
25-30hrs per week Mon-Fri
Term time contract
Hourly rate £9.90
Any successful candidates will be subject to a full PVG check
Any interested parties should email kMcCann@fes-group.co.uk in the first instance.
Future Pathways Evening
Raffle Donations
We are delighted that the MGS Christmas Market has got the go ahead this year and will take place on Saturday 10th December. Pupils in the Inclusion space have been given the task of arranging the raffle for this event and we are in the process of handing out letters to all local businesses to ask for donations. We would also be very grateful to receive any prizes that parents and carers may be willing to donate. Last year, we were very lucky to receive some excellent prize donations from local businesses, parents and carers and raised over £200 in the raffle alone. If you can donate anything towards our raffle, please hand it in to the school office and let the staff know it’s for the Christmas raffle. Thank you for all your support.
Cleaning Jobs
There are several opportunities for cleaners at MGS.
25-30hrs per week Mon-Fri
Term time contract
Hourly rate £9.90
Any successful candidates will be subject to a full PVG check
Any interested parties should email kMcCann@fes-group.co.uk in the first instance.
Lost Property
There are lots of jackets, water bottles, glasses and pencil cases. Come and see if they belong to you. Thank you, Ms Harvey.
Newsletter Archive
There's an archive section on the newsletter site with all of the previous newsletters organised by date. It can be viewed by clicking on 'Archive' in the menu or using this link: https://bit.ly/ht-newsletter-archive.