Embedded Files
HT Update 03/10/25
Thank you to all the parents and carers who attended our first in-person Parent Consultation Evening. This involved using a new booking platform, a new set up, and a new responsibility for the PLT! These evenings are always intensely busy, and we thank everyone for their cooperation in ensuring as smooth a running as possible. There was a lovely buzz in the Assembly space and a lot of very positive connections made. Thank you also to those who have already completed their evaluations. There were some very kind and thoughtful comments which I’m looking forward to sharing with staff next week. The evaluation will remain open until the end of next week.
I’d like to draw your attention to a couple of upcoming events for our S3-S5 pupils.
· Tuesday 28th October: Senior Phase Success, an in-person Family Learning Event with workshops including study skills, mental health, and career planning.
· Tuesday 4th November: Senior Phase Curriculum Information Evening, and online meet looking at the structure of the curriculum and course choice processes.
Emails about each of these will come out well ahead of time, but you may wish to note in your diary now.
You will be aware, via ELC comms, of the issue with Google last week. The IT response to this has meant that we have been unable to use Google Drive as we normally would. Staff have worked hard to minimise impact on learning and teaching, but we appreciate that this has been a challenge for some of the young people who are used to e.g. digital accessibility features. We are also aware that this may have impacted on access to our Parent Survey ahead of school review. It seems that some parents have, quite reasonably, signed into their child’s edubuzz to do this, then got stuck. However, the survey can be accessed universally, from any login. Thank you to those who have taken the time to complete the survey already. This will remain open for the next week.
We welcomed Active Schools Coordinators and Young Ambassadors for sports from across the county to Rosehill yesterday. Young people were undertaking training and engaging in planning to support them in leading others to engage in physical activities and lead healthy lifestyle. It’s always a lovely reminder when you have visitors of just what an impressive space we have, which they were all very excited to be working in.
The Expressive Arts team completed their first excursion of the season yesterday too, with an evening performance at the Usher Hall, from the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. This event was made possible by their generous funding of tickets for school pupils, encouraging them to engage in classical music that might otherwise be challenging to access live.
Over the last few weeks, the Senior Leadership Team has been engaging in lots of 5 A Day conversations to support our quality assurance. These include:
· S1: Transition into Rosehill
· S5: Transitioning into Higher classes (covered in previous updates)
· S2/S3: Recognising achievement
We will provide summaries of the discussion around each theme as part of our regular Pupil Voice updates on the website, but it’s important to note at this stage just how engaged and insightful the young people have been. It’s definitely a highlight of our weeks!
Our Pupil Support Team has also deployed a universal safeguarding survey, in which all young people were asked to rate their sense of safety out of 10. Almost all pupils scored this at 5 (average) or above, and 35% scored this at the maximum scores of 9 and 10. This is very encouraging. Pleasingly, young people were able to identify the many ways in which they are supported when they have a worry around their safety, including Homeroom teachers, PSWs, House Heads and, commonly, ‘any teacher or adult in the school’. They also highlighted that, when there is a feeling of a lack of safety, this is most often related to the poor choices made by a minority of their peers, or around events and worries outside of school being on their mind. As a follow up, these results with be shared and discussed with all pupils via the MyWorld programme to help us look at anything else we can do more of, or better, on the subject of sense of safety.
We send all good wishes to one of our Biology teachers, Nathan Moore, who will be leaving Rosehill at the end of this term. Due to a change in family circumstances, Nathan will be relocating to London. Nathan has made a significant contribution to Rosehill, having been with us in the beginning and taken an important lead in developing the curriculum within the Science and Technology Faculty. Nathan has also been a passionate advocate for equality, diversity and inclusion, supporting our Worldview Wednesday Homeroom programme and helping to develop key polices supporting inclusion. We wish him the very best of luck as navigates this new phase of his life. Interviews for Nathan’s post are scheduled for next week. In the interim, we will make some minor timetable changes to ensure that National 5 and Higher Biology continue to have access to an appropriate specialist.
HT Update 26/09/25
Earlier this week, all parents should have received a copy of the ELC issued questionnaire for parents that accompanies their regular school review processes. From the 21st to the 24th October, we will welcome staff from both the central education team and other East Lothian schools to discuss practice. It is hugely helpful to us to have a representative sample of stakeholder questionnaires to look at, so we really appreciate your support in completing these. We are also looking to set up a parent focus group, with information on this to follow. Your young people will be completing their own surveys, as well a taking part in discussions with the review team both in class and in pupil voice groups.
Our final Tree of Knowledge session took place on Wednesday, with all senior pupils invited to participate in workshops with a focus on success in assessments and examinations. Leading on from this, we will have two family learning events designed to support senior phase pupils coming up:
28th October (in person): Senior Phase Success. This will be an opportunity to engage in workshops around study habits, mental health, and employability skills. Invitations will come out before the October holiday.
4th November (online): Senior Phase Curriculum: Our annual event looking at curriculum structures and course choice processes.
Given that we are running Highers for the first time, this week’s 5 a Day was focused on S5s undertaking 3 or more. It was a pleasure to speak with them about their commitment to their studies, and their tips for young people new to exams made me smile, including the following:
· If you have too many distractions at home, use the library or somewhere else without all your stuff!
· Put your phone in another room (said very emphatically)
· Stay focused in classes; it’s fast paced, and you can miss things really quickly, even if you go to the bathroom
· Make a plan/ timetable and stick to it; even if you only have 20 minutes, use those 20 minutes
· Accept that you have much less time for gaming
Our partners have asked us to share the following information about the (free) Musselburgh Communities Day:
· 11am to 3pm Saturday 4 October, the Fisherrow Centre, South Street, Musselburgh EH21 6AT
· Come along to the Fisherrow Centre on Saturday 4 October for a day of activities to find out more about what’s going on in Musselburgh and how you can get involved. Developed by the Musselburgh Area Partnership to bring a large number of community groups and organisations together, this event boasts loads of fun activities for all the family. Even better - it's completely free to attend! It includes local voluntary organisations, clubs and groups, arts and crafts – not to mention musical entertainment, refreshments, a Bookbug session, circus skills, face painting, balloon modelling and sporting sessions. Find out more online.
And last but by no means least for today, it’s a very fond farewell to Pupil Support Worker and all-round legend Phil Gilhom, who retires. Phil will be a huge loss to our school community, a remembered fondly by staff, young people, and the wider community. We have the honour of hosting a ‘wee do’ for him this afternoon, joined by friends, family and colleagues to celebrate the fascinating career of a great man. Our new Pupil Support Worker, Hannah Dry, will be joining us once pre-employment checks are completed, and I know that House Thistle and the rest of the Rosehill community will make her very welcome. In the interim, the Pupil Support Team will be pulling together to support House Thistle and consistently as possible.
HT Update 19/09/25
Thank you to all the parents who attended our first Parent Council Meeting of 25-26 last week. We had a particular focus on our S4 attainment and were able to celebrate the successes as well as consider next steps. In particular, we thought that all parents might be interested in some key points around the relationship between attendance and attainment.
Put simply, our data clearly shows that young people who do not attend school at least 85% of the time are not able to attain in a way that fulfils their potential. Our ambition is for all young people to attain at least 5 formal qualifications by the end of S4, at the highest possible level. As well as being assessed in up to 6 specific subjects, all young people are also assessed in their Literacy and Numeracy.
The following bullet points tell you about the relationship between attendance and attainment in ‘real life’, here at Rosehill, with data taken from last year’s S4.
· All young people with an attendance of 85% or more achieved Level 5 Numeracy, the highest that can be awarded at this stage. No young person with attendance below 85% achieved Level 5 Numeracy.
· Almost all young people with attendance over 85% achieved Level 5 Literacy. When attendance is under 85%, this drops to just over half.
· Almost all of those with attendance of over 85% got at least one Level 5 formal qualification. When attendance is under 85%, this dropped to just over half.
· Most young people who attend between 85-100% of the time attained the ‘gold standard’ of 5 or more Level 5 formal qualifications. Only 3% of those with attendance under 85% managed to achieve this.
Of course, the relationship between attendance and attainment does not start in S4, but can be seen throughout the Broad General Education in S1-3. As many of you will be aware, we send out alert letters on to those whose attendance is below 90%, on a monthly basis. Whilst we fully appreciate that there can be specific reasons for non-attendance, we would encourage all parents to be aware of their young person’s ‘number’ and to engage with us if there are barriers we don’t know about. Whilst our overall Rosehill attendance increased by 3.3% last year, we are aware that there are key groups for whom attendance is a particular issue, and will be sharing more on this topic throughout the year.
We had further engagement with parents in welcoming guests to our Welcome to Rosehill Family Learning event, with S1 and P7 young people and their parents participating in workshops across Expressive Arts, Global Citizenship, Health and Wellbeing, and Science and Technology. There will be a further S1/P7 Evening in January to look specifically at progress in Literacy and Numeracy. It's important to note that, whilst we had over 140 people booked onto the event, only around half of these signed in, and only a handful of non-attenders cancelled in advance. Please can we once again make the appeal that, if you have secured a booking you can't use, you let us know so that we can offer the place to someone else. We had to turn away people from the event that could otherwise have participated.
Our young people did a great job last week when we were visited by the Chief Executive of East Lothian Council, Laurence Rockey. Laurence was keen to see ELC’s newest secondary school and enjoyed both a campus tour and the chance to join in the learning in Biology, English, Modern Studies and Photography. Our guests were full of praise for the warm atmosphere in the school, and especially impressed by the PLT members who showed them round.
Our co-curricular offers (including study support options) are now up and running. In this week’s assembly, I spoke with young people about the short-, medium- and long-term benefits on engaging in these. Information about this programme was sent to all families last week, by email. In case you missed it though, the programme is here: Rosehill Co-Curricular Opportunities 25-26.
The Senior Leadership Team has begun this quadrant’s round of Learning Walks, and will visit every class teacher over the course of September. It’s been my absolute pleasure to focus on those members of staff who joined us in August. Whether making vegetable couscous, calculating the median, or learning about lab safety, it has been a joy to learn alongside our young people.
Our PT Equity, Dean Pearson, wanted to share the information below about an important event in the school calendar:
Carefest is taking place between the 20th and 24th of October this year. Being Care Experienced Young Person (CEYP) or a Young Carer (YC) can put extra strain on our young people. East Lothian have arranged for Carefest to take place to give our young people time and activities away from their everyday responsibilities to take part in various activities throughout the week. These activities range from sports to Lego, to arts and baking.
I would really encourage our CEYPs and YCs to take advantage of the activities and give themselves a break. If your young person is a CEYP or YC and would like to take part in Carefest, please encourage them to find out more from Mr Pearson. All activities are free to attend- all that is required is a permission form to take up a place.
In staffing, we have a preferred candidate for the post of Teacher of Geography, replacing Hannah Berg. In the interim, Ms Anderson is ensuring that senior classes continue to be supported by her as a Geography specialist. Sam Taylor, ASN auxiliary, has moved on to start his university course. Although we have a preferred candidate for Sam’s post, there will be small gap in provision before our newest members of the team join. Any changes around child’s plans will be communicated directly with the relevant families.
And finally, on a personal note, it’s ‘back to school’ for me this weekend, as I am beginning my Educational Doctorate programme in Leadership and Learning at the University of Strathclyde; a mere 5-7 years of part-time study to eventually be Dr. Preston. I’ve bought a new (teal) notebook, so it’ll be fine.
HT Update 05/09/25
We have had an incredible level of interest in our next Family Learning Event (18th September), the S1/P7 Welcome to Rosehill session. This was completely full within 24 hours, so thank you very much for your support. Please can we make an extra appeal to anyone who has booked and finds themselves unable to attend, to contact the admin team in good time to let them know. It means that we can offer up any spare spaces ahead of the event.
SLT have been enjoying connecting with some of our new S1s through the 5 a Day programme, who have been reporting a great start to the school year. Key themes have been around how much they are enjoying the extra independence that secondary school brings, and how much they appreciated the variety of different subjects and teachers they are working with.
Around 40 of our S5 pupils headed off to the UCAS Discovery Day on Tuesday, finding out more about higher education options, the supports available in making applications, and the career opportunities associated with continuing in education. The group were also fortunate enough to be able to tour key parts of the University of Edinburgh. Whilst almost all young people make higher education applications in S6, we were keen to start them thinking about their direction of travel now, as the settle into a crucial year. One described it to me as, ‘pretty overwhelming, but in a good way!’ Thank you to Alex Macdonald and Martha Macleod for organising and accompanying the group.
Our S3 had a busy afternoon on Wednesday with the launch of the Youth Philanthropy Initiative (YPI) which is now a well-established element of our practice. You can learn more about this national programme here: https://ypiscotland.org.uk/ Lead teacher Rebecca Wynne tells us here about what our S3 cohort experienced:
We had our pupils make use of the Pod lecture space throughout the day to meet Laura, our YPI programme officer who introduced the YPI competition and explained what the pupils will be doing.
We then had our first “charities fair” where we invited representatives from local organisations to meet the pupils and share information about how they help and support the local community. We were joined by Teens+, Bridges Project, The Hollies, CHAS, Teapot Trust, Pennypit Trust & Women’s Aid.
The day gave the pupils an opportunity to engage with adults from outside the school building their confidence and communication skills and launch the YPI in a new and exciting way!
I managed to chat with some of the charity representatives after the event, all of whom spoke about how polite and respectful our young people were.
The Rosehill and the Brae Parent Council Network would like to draw attention to the first meeting of the session, on Tuesday 9th September. Parents are welcome to join us from 6.30pm for a prompt 6.45pm start, with the meeting closed by 8pm. Please remember that whilst we support the Parent Council, its organisation does not sit with the school, but with the Parent Council itself. Should you have any queries, please contact our PC Chair, Charlie Wood, on parentcouncil@rosehill.elcschool.org.uk
In staffing, we are delighted to have preferred candidates for our PSW (replacing Phil) and ASN auxiliaries. Whilst pre-employment checks will take a few weeks, we look forward to them joining us soon. Unfortunately, we have not been able to recruit an appropriate Business Administrator as yet. We thank all our families for their continued patience in terms of our shortages in the admin team, which we know make things harder for everyone in terms of responses to queries. Interviews for our Teacher of Geography post (following Hannah Berg’s promotion) take place after the September weekend.
In lovely staff news, we would also like to formally congratulate Mark O’Neill, CL Support for Learning, who gets married tomorrow.
And finally, there will be no HT Update next Friday, due to the September weekend. School will be closed to both pupils and staff on Friday 12th and Monday 15th September. Our family will be enjoying a short break in the Highlands, so fingers crossed for crisp autumnal days rather than downpours!
HT Update 29/08/25
Thank you to everyone who attended out first Family Learning Event of the year, on our BGE Curriculum. For anyone who missed this and would like the summary slides, they are available here: BGE Curriculum Information Evening
In line with our Improvement Planning, we have a few key areas in terms of quality assurance over the next few weeks:
· Universal safeguarding survey: All young people will be asked about their views of feeling and staying safe in school, enabling us to focus on anyone who is struggling with this.
· Learning Walks (Learning Check Ins): Members of SLT will make visits to all classroom teachers over September, with a focus on relationships for learning.
· Attainment Meetings: I have begun meeting with all Curriculum Leaders to discuss their analysis of their attainment data, capturing the learning around the reasons behind successes and anything we want to modify for current cohorts.
· Re-commencement of 5 a day programme: Our first area of focus is S1 transition and settling in.
Our senior cohort has made a strong start and is already beginning to think about how to get the most out of the year, Parents of senior pupils will have received information about Achieve, our online programme to support attainment in SQA courses. Dean Pearson (PT Equity) will be working with the rest of Maths and Computing team to ensure opportunities for all young people to sign up if they have not already done so. If you have a young person studying National 5 or Higher, and they tell you they don’t have anything they need to do, this will be untrue! We encourage all young people undertaking the relevant courses to spend time using the Achieve platform as part of their study routines. I have included the link to the letter again here in case you missed it (please note that this can only be accessed via an edubuzz account): Senior Phase Study: Achieve
In staffing, congratulations go to Ms Hannah Berg, who has been successfully appointed to the position of Principal Teacher of Social Subjects, in Falkirk. Whilst we of course will be very sad to lose Hannah, who has been an absolute stalwart in our Global Citizenship Faculty since opening, we are truly proud that she is moving into a formal leadership position and wish her well. Hannah’s last day with us will be Monday 8th September. As well as work within the classroom, Hannah has also played a crucial role in our Duke of Edinburgh and Rights Respecting Schools programmes. We are delighted that Carys Mitchell will be taking on the role of D of E coordinator, and that Cailey Doyle will be leading Right Respecting Schools. I think this says a lot about how we perceive the value of each programme. Recruitment for Hannah’s replacement is in motion. Our Curriculum Leader Ms Anderson, who is a Geography specialist, will be taking over certificated classes to ensure learning continues at pace during this period of transition. We have also had exciting news from our ASN auxiliary Sam Taylor. Sam will also leave us in September as he takes up a place at university to move him forward in his ambition to become a PE teacher. We wish him all the best and know he will be an asset to the profession.
HT Update 22/08/2025
With so many new staff joining us this month, I wanted to take the time to share some of the feedback they have offered on their first few days at Rosehill. I also shared this with the young people during Homeroom earlier this week:
· I’ve had a great first week!
· It’s been busy, but good busy.
· Everyone has been really welcoming.
· Pupils know that when there is a rule, it’s for a reason.
· Pupils are willing to ask for and accept help.
· There is a lovely atmosphere in the school.
· The young people are really respectful overall.
· The pupils are actually interested in me how my day is going and seem interested in me as a person.
· Your pupils are so polite!
· I love how many pupils have asked how I am.
· The great relationships between everyone are really clear.
I don’t think we could ask for much more.
It will not have escaped your attention that the campus is becoming busier. As well as Rosehill (which now sits at around 600 pupils) and the Brae (which has 43 learners), the Community Centre and sports facilities are also in continuous use. This leads to an increase in traffic and, inevitably, to frustrations when the spaces are used in ways for which they were not designed. Almost all of our young people walk or take public transport to school, but we do appreciate that there are some instances where family circumstances mean that they need to be dropped off by car. Please ensure that you do this using the bottom car park (clearly signposted as Wallyford Learning Campus Parking). In particular, please do not try to come in and out of the small parking area near the front of the school. This is designed to support accessibility needs/deliveries. Please also be mindful of the signage outside the Community Centre/Brae entrance which clearly prohibits stopping/parking. We have multiple potentially vulnerable learners in this area and I’m sure we would all agree on the importance of keeping young people safe. Thank you for your support in this matter.
Our Pupil Leadership Team (PLT) is up and running. Our PLT Coordinators Shayna, Kasper and Samera, introduced themselves via our online assemblies this week, and did a great job. Mr. Zack Williams, who will be the staff lead for the project, will meet with the whole team next week. The PLT is excited to plan for the ways in which they can support the school and further build a sense of belonging in our community.
With so many young people keen to get involved in activities beyond the classroom, our team has begun to pull together our co-curricular offer for this year. As in previous years, we will be starting off with our sports offer, in partnership with Active Schools. Our participation rates are significantly above both the national and East Lothian averages, and we want to keep up the good work with all year groups, including our new S1! These programmes were shared with young people this week, and via a mailing to all families. However, we are repeating both links here, for ease:
Any questions about Active Schools can be directed to our Active Schools Coordinator, James Sloggie, who works alongside our PE team on campus.
With regards to other co-curricular offers, these will be advertised around the September break. Once we are into the autumn, we will also home in on study support activities as applicable, too.
It’s not just the young people keeping active, either. We are very proud of Kieran Ferns, Tim Noakes, Jade Woodhead and Michelle Yeoman who completed the Edinburgh Half Marathon last weekend. The heat was a huge factor, but all four battled through as Finishers. I feel almost guilty that, whilst they were doing that, I was eating an Alanda’s gelato in North Berwick… but we all have different skills!
As our senior phase expands and we begin working with more young people to consider higher education, we are offering an opportunity to a targeted group of seniors to attend the UCAS Discovery Day 2025. You can find out more about this programme here: UCAS Discovery Days . We are keeping this on a small scale this session (as we have no S6) with the hope of then expanding in future years. Eligible pupils will have received an invitation via Mrs Macdonald, our stretch and challenge lead.
Parents of young people in S1-S3 will now have received their invitation to our BGE Curriculum Evening on Wednesday 27th August. This short online session provides an overview of this stage of Scotland’s Curriculum for Excellence, and what this means day to day at Rosehill. This will be led by our DHT Curriculum, Ms Lynsey Stewart-Young.
In line with our Key Dates document, already shared with all families, you may also wish to make a note of the following events this month:
· 9th September: Rosehill and the Brae Parent Network
· 18th September: Welcome to Rosehill: P7/SS1 Family Learning Event
HT Update 15/08/2025
Welcome back to session 25-26. We know it will have been a bit of a thought getting back into the routine, but it’s amazing how quickly that happens!
We held two Professional Learning Days for staff on Monday and Tuesday last week. On Monday, we looked specifically at Wellbeing, Equality and Inclusion, and spent time both in and beyond our teams looking at the good practice that exists and how we can continue to develop to meet the needs of our learners. On Tuesday, the focus was on Leadership of Change and considering the ways in which staff at all levels contribute to school improvement. We also had the benefit of a Tree of Knowledge workshop for all staff, which linked into the key messages they shared with our seniors during the pupil sessions in June. We will be welcoming Tree of Knowledge back in September, when they will work with S4 and S5 around dealing with exam pressures.
We could not be prouder of our seniors who completed their (and our) first ever set of SQA exams and SCQF qualifications. We are of course delighted with the multiple pupils who scored top grades across the board, but we have also been clear that we are equally proud of everyone who gave it their all and gained certification. We now embark on our first Higher courses as well as existing Level 4 and 5 options, and I have no doubt that the new S5 will once again set a high bar.
We must also give credit, as a whole, to the 600 or so young people who now make up our rapidly growing school community. The school is visibly busier, and the work we have done in terms of our focus on school values has really come into its own as the young people navigate a one-way systems, longer queues, and working in more of our open plan spaces, as well as getting to know new staff. They have absolutely risen to the challenge. Whilst this may be the start of year three, we are all acutely aware that we are still only part way through a period of extensive growth. We are no longer Scotland's newest secondary (that honour is now with Greenfield Academy in Dundee, whose Head came to visit and learn from us last session), but we are still doing many things that are new to all of us.
In staffing, we welcomed over 30 new members to the team earlier this week across Rosehill mainstream and the Brae, and have been delighted with the positive start they have made. We start the year without any teacher vacancies, providing strong subject specialist knowledge across the curriculum. Our legendary PSW, Phil, has let us know that he will be retiring at the end of September- and we will certainly be making a fuss of him. Phil’s retiral plans opened up one of our permanent PSW roles, and Connor was successful in gaining this at the end of last term. Connor’s role was funded by PEF, and so we will now use this fund to recruit a third PSW as soon as possible.
Our first Family Learning event takes place on the 27th August, and this is our online BGE Curriculum Evening. Parents of young people in S1-S3 will receive invitations to this at the start or next week. Please also look out for links to our Key Dates document for the year which will go out to all families in the next few days.
As I write this, it's a gloriously sunny evening and looks set to stay that way for the weekend, so lets enjoy the summer whilst we can!
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