Harrow High School
Newsletter
Autumn Term 2 (16 December 2022)
Dates For Your Diary
3 January 2023: Start of term - school returns
25 January 2023: Sixth Form Parents Evening
2 February 2023: Year 11 Parents Evening
Message from the Headteacher
We have reached the end of a very long and now chilly Autumn term. It has been very successful with lots of aspirational visits, Pre Public Exams and excellent teaching and learning. I would like to thank all parents and carers for supporting the school, be it reinforcing high expectations, emphasising excellent attendance or insisting that your children complete all their revision and homework.
As we look forward to the holidays, I would like to look a little further beyond to next term. This will be even busier. It is the final term for Year 11, 12 and 13 before exam season - the term in which parents evenings get underway and the term in which we release our first set of Key Stage 3 reports for the year.
With all this in mind, can I once again emphasise the importance of excellent attendance at school. Nothing has a greater impact on a young person's chance of exam success that the amount of time they spend in school. We currently have a number of learners whose attendance is below 90% - this is just not good enough - and we will be writing to those parents separately. However, we should all be aiming for a minimum of 95% attendance; though even at this level a learner misses 10 school days per year. That's 60 hours of education including 30 hours of Maths, English and Science. Please pay close attention to your child's attendance and make sure they are here and absences for any reason are as few as possible.
I would like to close with a big thank you to all our staff and learners for their wonderful efforts over the last 16 weeks. I am thankful for and proud of all of them.
Mr Paul Gamble
Y9 DofE Volunteers Raise Money for University College Hospital
The Year 9 volunteers for Duke of Edinburgh are doing charity work to raise money for University College Hospital. We have chosen to this charity in honour and remembrance of Scarlet, who suffered from cancer and unfortunately passed away this year.
Scarlet was a kind and hardworking student at Harrow High School, who unfortunately passed away on 4 November 2022 after her battle with cancer. She was the sister of Rio, and twin sister of Rianna.
We held two fundraising events at the end of term:
Doughnut Sale on 14 December
Mufti Day on 16 December
If you wish to also contribute any funds to this worthy cause, please send the money in an envelope with your child who can give it to their form tutor. All the money we raise as a school for this event will be donated to the University College Hospital, to help fund their cancer services and to honour Scarlet's name and all those who are battling cancer.
(Year 9 DoE Volunteers)
Excellent Behaviour
It has been an incredibly busy term getting to work with staff and students on our new behaviour routines as we seek to establish a calm, orderly, supportive and safe environment in which students can learn and thrive. Our focus has been on excellent behaviour in lessons with an emphasis on high behaviour expectations. This has been driven by our core aim which is to inspire learners towards striving to be 'exceptional everyday' in their learning, behaviour and communication. As a result, lessons are a lot calmer and movement along the corridors has improved.
To ensure that we are able to provide a world class learning experience for your child, there will be an even greater requirement for all students to demonstrate sensible and calm behaviour in lessons, and when moving around the academy. We expect our students to be excellent ambassadors when travelling to and from the school and when in the local community. During the coming term, we will continue to focus on routines which are embodied in the attached codes of conduct and which define the behaviour that is expected from all students. In your role as parents/carers, we expect your full support with this.
Year 7 Museum of London
This term, the History department took the Year 7s to the Museum of London to conduct a local study as part of their KS3 curriculum.
The department, led by Mr Lawrence, organised two separate trips taking close to 180 learners over consecutive days. Whilst at the museum, the learners were tasked with exploring and researching three distinct areas of the museum, all of which were reflective of what the Year 7 learners have studied so far in their time at Harrow High School. The history trip also incorporated a compulsory unit of the Year 7 history curriculum; to examine a local study at KS3. The aim of the trip was to study an aspect in local history dating from a period before 1066 and a study over time, testing how far sites in their locality reflect aspects of national history.
The trip started with London before London, before moving onto Roman London and finishing in the Medieval London exhibit. Learners were given booklets to work through and guide them through the different exhibits.
The learners represented the school incredibly well and all the staff were hugely impressed with their level of interests and enthusiasm. This was the first post-pandemic Harrow High history trip and we were lucky to catch the Museum of London in its final week before it closes for its planned move (reopening in 2026). Mr Lawrence and the team hope everyone enjoyed the trip and look forward to welcoming learners on more history trips in the future.
(Mr J Bruce)
Equality Diversity and Inclusion
Over the last two years at Harrow High School, we have been working very hard to develop a more equal and inclusive school environment. Mr Patel and Mr Preda have worked together with all staff and we would like to tell parents and carers more about the things we have done and some of our plans for the coming year.
Our first initiative was to work on a series of strategies and plans to better represent our school’s distinct communities, and to that end we have found ways to develop a diverse curriculum and we celebrated various holidays which are important to students, parents and staff alike.
Most importantly, all of these lessons and activities were designed to be an opportunity to reflect on the diverse heritage of our school community but also, how diversity and inclusion can be a bridge between people from all over the world.
For example, every October is Black History Month, and the theme for this year was “Actions not Words”. It was wonderful to see Mr Burt deliver an assembly on some of the luminaries of the Black community, and their incredible impact on our daily life. Additionally, Ms Carver set up inspirational displays throughout the school. Some of the highlights of the lesson activities were:
English - lessons on the experiences of Ira Aldrige who was the first black Shakespearean actor
Science/Computing - activities that celebrated the scientific progress made by members of the Black community (space exploration, engineering, ICT technology, etc.)
MFL - biographies of members of the Black community were read
Inclusion - lessons on the life of Rosa Parks
Personal Development - media portrayal of Black footballers
Food and Nutrition - The contributions of Black chefs and restaurateurs
During this year we will be celebrating the following days and we hope you will join us in the festivities:
Christmas and Orthodox New Year, Lent, LGBT+ History Month, Nowruz (Persian New Year), St Patrick’s Day, Eid and LGBTQ+ Pride.
Another aspect of equality that we will work on is creating a leadership team that includes more women. At the end of last year Mr Preda and Ms Holyszko organised a focus group where we explored some of the common barriers that women might experience in the workplace in terms of career progression. Following on from that we have envisaged a new way to do professional development which we hope will encourage more women in middle and senior leadership in the coming years.
(Mr C. Preda)
Congratulations to Partnership Group Graduates
All learners in the Partnership Group (Y7-9 Bristol) continue to work very hard on developing their receptive and productive English skills, as well as learning key aspects of Science, Drama, PE, Spanish, IT, Maths and Life in the UK.
However, two learners have done extremely well in their Autumn 1 tests across all subjects. They are: Daniil and Bartu . In addition to their excellent learning and progress, they demonstrated outstanding attitude to work, teachers and their peers. We are very happy for their success and wish them good luck!
(Ms M Sava)
Online Safety
There are lots of fun and interesting things you can do on the internet and it can be a great way to stay in touch with friends. But it is important to understand how to stay safe online. Sometimes people will try to trick you into clicking dangerous links or sharing things about yourself. Or something you’ve shared might be used to bully or frighten you.
Do not post comments online that you would not ordinarily say if you were face to face.
Everything that is written or posted online is stored forever.
If you feel threatened or bullied, leave. You would not stay in a room if you were being insulted or physically attacked, so do not stay in a group chat.
Do not accept or join groups of people you do not actually know.
Do not post or comment anything that could be considered racist, homophobic or unkind. There are many things that are done online that can be considered a criminal offence.
Parents/carers please make sure that you are aware of what your children are doing online and make regular checks on their activities.
(Ms S Barrett)
Sparx Maths Champions
Sparx Maths is the foundation of Harrow High’s innovative mathematics homework strategy, which sets bespoke, challenging, but most importantly achievable homework. Hence, learners experience weekly success in building confidence and motivation. Research by Cambridge University found that time spent actively working in Sparx Maths is positively and significantly associated with high outcomes in maths. Learners with the most XPs each half term are rewarded with an Amazon voucher and a certificate of achievement.
Year 7
Henry N. (11,010)
Murtaza (8,671)
Tiam (7,726)
Year 8
Tuvraani (10,536)
Muhammed S. (9,668)
Ruwaida (6,898)
Year 9
Vivaan (6,591)
Eman (6,029)
Tia (5,608)
Year 10
Richard P. (6,803)
Sayan (4,897)
Enrico (4,104)
Year 11
Lemar (2,921)
Dani (2,769)
Andreea (2,728)
(Mr P Parekh)
Attendance
It has been amazing seeing so many of our learners maintaining 100% attendance this term. Despite the cold weather, strikes and traffic issues most learners are being responsible and getting into school on time every day. Well done to them.
Attendance is so important for academic success. It seems obvious to state that if a learner is persistently late, or not even in school, then learning opportunities are missed and the chances of success are reduced. Government figures show that this is the case across the country when looking at GCSE grades for English and Maths.
Learners getting grades 9 to 5 have an average attendance rate of 96.3% or higher.
Learners getting grades 9 to 4 have an average attendance rate of 94.8% or higher.
Learners getting below grade 4 (U - 3) have an average attendance rate of 91.2% or lower.
More worryingly learners who are persistently absent (attendance below 90%) are more likely to be involved in crime and serious violence.
We want the absolute best for all our learners. Their success is our success too so we all benefit. These statistics prove that being in school on time every day gives children the best chances of success and better life chances with a set of good GCSE results behind them.
Learners are expected to be on school site at 8:45 so they are here for an 8:50 start.
If learners are persistently late parents and carers must get them to leave earlier or change their journey to be here on time.
(Mr M Jukes)
Pablo Picasso (1937)
Year 9 Art
This term Year 9 has been painting portraits, we have studied and analysed the work of the great artist Pablo Picasso.
Weeping Woman is based on an image of a woman during the war. It is taken from Picasso’s anti-war mural, Guernica. Picasso painted both works during the Spanish Civil War (1936-39). It was in response to the bombing of the Basque town of Guernica. The attack was carried out in April 1937 by Nazi Germany’s air force, in support of Spain's Nationalist forces. Hundreds of people were killed. The figure of the Weeping Woman is based on artist and photographer Dora Maar. Maar photographed Picasso's making of Guernica.
Dorian (9 Imperial)
Nishka (9 Imperial)
Ouiam (9UCL)
Bianca (9 Oxford)
Safeguarding
We pride ourselves on effective safeguarding at school. We had a recent audit from a qualified Ofsted inspector who judged us to be effective in working hard to keep learners in our care safe. The inspector spent the day on site observing lessons, breaktimes, speaking to staff and learners and interviewing myself about our case loads and processes.
Our Personal Development curriculum, tutor time and assemblies give ample opportunities for learners to be taught about how to be safe and what risks to be aware of. This includes online safety, respectful relationship, harmful sexual behaviour, bullying, diversity and mental health. If any learner has a concern, our reporting systems are simple and straightforward - either speak to any member of staff or report on our online facility - See It, Report It, Stop It - button on our website.
The pastoral teams work hard to get all learners into school and deal with problems that arise. Sometimes it can be frustrating when we don’t get the best outcome despite all our efforts but we all keep plugging away to ensure learners feel safe and happy at school.
Please use the link below to access the Safeguarding page on our website for further links to support for both parents and learners. https://www.harrowhigh.com/about-us/safeguarding-and-mental-health
Excellent Behaviour
It has been an incredibly busy term getting to work with staff and students on our new behaviour routines as we seek to establish a calm, orderly, supportive and safe environment in which students can learn and thrive. Our focus has been on excellent behaviour in lessons with an emphasis on high behaviour expectations. This has been driven by our core aim which is to inspire learners towards striving to be 'exceptional everyday' in their learning, behaviour and communication. As a result, lessons are a lot calmer and movement along the corridors has improved.
To ensure that we are able to provide a world class learning experience for your son/daughter, there will be an even greater requirement for all students to demonstrate sensible and calm behaviour in lessons, and when moving around the academy. We expect our students to be excellent ambassadors when travelling to and from the school and when in the local community. During the coming term, we will continue to focus on routines which are embodied in the Codes of Conduct (below) and which define the behaviour that is expected from all students. In your role as parents/carers, we expect your full support with this.
