RTS Parents' Newsletter

RTS Parents' Newsletter 10 February 2023

Head Teacher's Message

Here we are at the end of the first half of Spring Term already.

Year 11 students have been busy meeting with a careers advisor 1:2:1 over the past couple of weeks and we hope that parents who have been able to attend these as well have found them purposeful and reassuring as their children think beyond GCSEs and RTS.

Year 9 have met with a member of the Senior Leadership Team 1:2:1 over the past week to talk about their next steps - the Y9 Options process is well underway and it has been lovely to meet and talk to these students individually about their hopes for the future. We look forward to meeting Y9 parents on our return from half term for the Y9 Parent and Subject Teacher Consultations on Wednesday 22 February - don't forget that these will now be on site rather than remote meetings.

The rest of the school have also been active with sporting fixtures, intermediate maths challenges, visits to the Science Museum, attending the Poetry Live event and much more. Our Y11 GCSE Food Tech students have also completed their timed assessments this week - the smell around school was mouthwatering and some staff were lucky to be taste testers!

Like many of you, I have been saddened by the harrowing images of the Turkey-Syria earthquake and was keen to support our Turkish families. Please do read the email sent out earlier and also the section below on what RTS is doing to help.

A reminder that school is closed to students on Monday 21 and Tuesday 22 February due to INSET days when staff will be training. School is back open to students at the usual time of 08:35 on Wednesday 23 February - but will finish early at 15:00 due to Parent Consultations for Y9.

Wishing you all a relaxing half-term.

Ms K Dooley

Dates for the diary

Monday 20 and Tuesday 21 February
- INSET Days: School closed to all students for staff training
Wednesday 22 February 2023
- Early finish at 15:00 for all students
- Parent/Subject Teacher Subject Consultations for Year 9, 16:00-19:00 - face to face in school
- FoRTS General Meeting, 18:00
- Pre-loved uniform sale, 18:00
- Parent Forum, 18:30-19:30
  - Learning Performance will run a session for KS4 parents on how to support their child with revision.

Contacting the School

If you wish to contact the school, the School Office is open (term time only):

Monday-Thursday - 08:15-16:30
Friday - 08:15-15:00

Telephone: 020 8891 2985

Email: info@rts.richmond.sch.uk

Please use the Parents Communications Summary for guidance on types of query and where advice may be found/who to direct your query to.

RTS Community

Christmas Jumper Day

Thank you to your generosity towards fundraising for Save the Children via Christmas Jumper Day. Collectively, either via ParentPay or direct to the RTS Just Giving page, the school community has raised a total of £701! The UK government will match all donations made before 01 March so this will mean £1402 will go directly towards Save the Children helping mums-to-be, new mums, tiny babies and bigger kids in Kenya. Read all about their plans for monies raised during Christmas Jumper Day 2022 here.

At the heart of RTS is our connection with our community - be that our immediate student community, our community of families; and also the wider community of Twickenham and the boroughs of Richmond upon Thames and Hounslow.

Turkey-Syria Earthquake

Like many of you, we were horrified by the earthquake in Turkey-Syria earlier this week and the harrowing aftermath that thousands of families are experiencing. The loss of over 20,000 lives is tragic and sadly the number is expected to keep on rising.

We have been contacted by our Turkish families and are exploring the best way that RTS can support this crisis. There are many local charities and potential donation points that are springing into action; and if we are given further information we will share it with you.

With this in mind we have set up a payment option via ParentPay to which families can make a donation if they choose to - you may already have donated elsewhere, so this just provides an alternative. We will leave this option up until the end of the month; and will update you after this time as to how much RTS has raised and where the money has been donated to.

Our thoughts are with our Turkish students and their families.

The RTS Way

Back in October we shared with you the gymnastic achievements of Caitlyn in Year 7 - we are delighted to update you with the exciting news that she has been selected onto the 2023 Tumbling Development programme at British Gymnastics. We cannot wait to see what she achieves next! Well done Caitlyn.

Year 11 Leavers 2023

A message on behalf of the Year 11 parents:

"A kind reminder for Year 11 RTS students to sign up for the end of year prom, deadline is 31 March 2023. Please note this event is being organised by parents and not by the school. Do not send any querise to the school as staff are not involved in the organisation of this event."

Please contact Kelly or Manju via kellybatten@hotmail.co.uk / manjwalia@yahoo.co.uk if you have any questions.

RTS Catering

Over the past couple of weeks (as always), the RTS Catering staff have prepared, cooked and served some absolutely wonderful dishes - the variety and flavours of food on offer are wide and multi-cultural. The team work hard at ensuring a balance of healthy, fresh prepared dishes across the week to satisfy all appetites.

Here are just a few pictures of the food this week, warning - they will make you hungry!

FORTS NEWS

Rugby parking volunteers needed - 12th February

Another international rugby match will be held at Twickenham Stadium this Sunday 12th February. This is our biggest money maker for the school so if you can spare some time in 2-hour slots from 11.30am-7.30pm please sign up here.

Future matches where help will be required are:

Saturday 11th March

Thanks to all the parent volunteers who helped as parking marshalls last Saturday - you raised just over £2,200 for FoRTS to spend on additional enrichment activities for the RTS pupils.

FoRTS General Meeting and Second Hand Uniform sale

The next FoRTS meeting will be held at the school on 22 February at 6pm.

We will also be holding a pre-loved uniform sale during the evening.

Your FoRTS team,

Carey (Chair), Mark (Treasurer) and Carmelle(Secretary)

General: forts@rts.richmond.sch.uk

Uniform: fortsuniform@rts.richmond.sch.uk

Parking: fortsparking@rts.richmond.sch.uk

Voluntary donations: Peoples Fundraising

Safeguarding

If you have concerns in relation to a student at RTS or indeed with regards to your own child, you may want to contact Single Point of Access (SPA) which acts as a central information hub for all professional agencies in Kingston and Richmond.

Richmond and Kingston SPA

The SPA phone lines are now open as follows:

Monday-Thursday 08.00-17.15 and Friday 08.00-17.00 - the phone number during these times is 020 8547 5008
Out of hours: 020 8770 5000

Hounslow Early Help Assessment

Telephone number: 020 8583 6600
Out of hours: 020 8583 2222
Email: earlyhelp@hounslow.gov.uk

NSPCC:

Speak to a counsellor 24 hours a day, 7 days a week

Telephone number: 0808 800 5000, or text 88858
Email: help@nspcc.org.uk
Signvideo using British Sign Language (Mon - Fri, 9am - 6pm)

Local News - Please note RTS does not endorse items included as Local News

girls-rugby-flyer.pdf

Secondary Parent Webinars Poster 2022.23. Education Wellbeing Service (2).pdf

Parent_and_Carers_Infographic.pdf

Term Dates 2022-2023

Full term dates and Inset day information is available on the website:

Spring Term 1: Wednesday 04 January 2023-Friday 10 February 2023
Half-Term: Monday 13 February-Friday 17 February
Spring Term 2: Monday 20 February**-Friday 31 March
**INSET Days: Monday 20 and Tuesday 21 February (school closed)

Parents' Calendar

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