11th September 2026

A Message from Mrs Murphy

Dear Parents and Carers,

Welcome to the first newsletter of the new academic year. The children have all been working incredibly hard this week and have settled wonderfully into their new routines and classes. A special well done to all of our new Reception children, who have now completed their very first full week at school.

Meet the Teacher Sessions for Year 1- 6

We are looking forward to welcoming parents and carers into school for our upcoming 'Meet the Teacher' sessions. These informal presentations are a wonderful opportunity to meet your child's class teacher, learn about the year's curriculum expectations, understand daily routines, and ask any questions you may have.

The sessions will be held in the following classrooms:

Year 1: Robins
Year 2: Kingfishers
Year 3: Snowy Owls
Year 4: Merlins
Year 5: Kites
Year 6: Hawks

The school gates will open just before the start time, and parents are invited to walk externally around the building to their child's classroom. If your child is in Years 3 to 5 and you have any accessibility needs that would make the slope at the back of the school challenging, please come to the main office and a member of staff will happily escort you internally.

The children will be in assembly during these sessions. Unfortunately, our teachers will not be able to discuss individual cases immediately after the meetings, as they need to return to class to supervise and dismiss the children safely. Please support us by waiting outside the classroom once the meeting has finished so that the children can move smoothly through the school and get ready for home time.

If you are unable to attend these sessions, or if you have multiple children at St James, we will provide a video recording of the meeting content.

Following a comment in our parent virtual suggestion box requesting more information about classroom learning, and as part of our commitment to environmental sustainability and paper reduction, we are moving to online year-group information sites this year rather than paper handouts. Further details will be shared during the meeting, and direct links will be sent out in the bulletin but these sites will also provide staff with a space to share photos of children's work, supporting those conversations at home about what they have completed in school.

Other Developments This Week

New Water Bottle Refill Station: The children have been very excited to use our newly installed water bottle refill station on the Junior playground this week. Installed over the summer, it provides a convenient place to refill water bottles during PE lessons and breaktimes, promoting healthy hydration while helping us reduce single-use plastics across the school.
New School Signage: With our new gates now in place, we felt it was the perfect time to refresh the sign at the front of the school. We are thrilled with the smart new look! We hope you like it too.
The Story of Our School Badge: As we explore the concept of belonging in our assemblies this week, each child in Years 1 to 6 has been exploring the meaning of our school badge. We have included the image prompt we use, so ask your child to tell you all about what each section represents.

School Nurse health clinics at St James

Starting from Wednesday 16th September, we are hosting monthly parent health clinics with our school nurse Caroline at St James. To register your interest for a 15 minute appointment from 2pm, please follow this form: https://forms.gle/FmzSxTdQrjpjoFbs5. These sessions are intended to support families with general public health matters such as sleep concerns, toileting issues, behaviour and emotional wellbeing concerns or any other general health and development queries. We hope these sessions will be a valuable addition to our family support offer here at St James.

Celebrating Reading: New look Reading Rainbow Awards

As part of our commitment to nurturing a lifelong love of reading, we are thrilled to re-launch our Reading Rainbow Awards! While we have celebrated reading at home in our Friday assemblies over the past three years, we wanted to make it even more exciting this year. As children reach key reading milestones, they will now earn a certificate, a pencil, a bookmark and then a badge. Please encourage your child to read regularly at home and keep updating their reading log so we can celebrate their milestones in our weekly assemblies!

Wishing you a lovely weekend,

Mrs Murphy

Safeguarding

Who We Are & How to Get in Touch

Our Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL): Mrs Cowden
Our Deputy Safeguarding Leads (DDSLs): Mrs Murphy, Mrs Wales and Miss Chadburn

Reporting a Concern: If you have a safeguarding concern, you can contact the team directly by emailing dsl@stjames-weybridge.surrey.sch.uk or speaking to us in person through the main office.

Safeguarding Policy: Our Child Protection & Safeguarding Policy is updated annually in line with statutory guidance and is always available to view in the policies section of our website.

Mobile Phones

At St James, we are committed to maintaining a mobile phone-free environment for all pupils, parents and visitors. To support safeguarding, privacy and positive interactions within our school community, mobile phones should not be used anywhere on the school site. This is in line with updated national guidance.

We kindly ask all parents and visitors to ensure that phones remain out of sight and are not used whilst on school grounds.

Allergy Awareness

Following our recent sharing of the updated national allergy guidance, here is a quick reminder of these changes and where to find our complete safety details.

The updated policy places a strong emphasis on proactive risk prevention, clear communication, rapid emergency response, and whole-community awareness across our entire site.

Our full Allergy Safety Policy outlines all of our procedures, staff training, and daily risk-prevention measures in detail. You can view or download the complete document at any time by visiting the Policies section on our website.

If your child's medical details, medication, or allergy needs have changed recently, please contact the main office as soon as possible so we can ensure their Individual Healthcare Plan is completely up to date. Thank you for your continued partnership in keeping our school safe and inclusive for everyone.

St James Church Events

Virtual Suggestion Box

We are incredibly proud of our community and want to make it even easier for you to share your thoughts. We are launching a Virtual Suggestion Box: a digital space for proactive ideas, "big picture" thoughts, or creative solutions. This is for constructive suggestions (e.g., "Could we explore a uniform swap shop?") and the Senior Leadership Team will review submissions once a month.

The link is here: https://forms.gle/KmPeMQ7gebij59Qw8

For urgent or individual concerns regarding your child, please continue to contact the office or teacher directly.

School Lunches - New Caterer

From September, Palmer & Howells (P&H) became our new school catering provider. Please see below the new three-week rolling menu from September.

Palmer & Howells pride themselves on preparing meals using fresh ingredients wherever possible and offer a varied menu that complies with school food standards. They also have considerable experience in catering for pupils with allergies and special dietary requirements, ensuring that all children can enjoy a safe and nutritious lunchtime experience.

There will be opportunities for parents and children to enjoy tasters in the Autumn Term. We previously advertised a parent taster session on the 1st October, however this has been postponed to a later date. Once a date for the parent taster session is finalised, we will send out a communication.

Meals should be ordered in advance through the Arbor app.

If your child has recently moved up to Year 3 in September, they will no longer receive a Universal Free School Meal. Unless your family qualify for Free School Meals, you will need to book and pay from school lunches on Arbor from September. An Arbor parent tutorial for ordering meals can be found here.

Autumn Term Clubs

2026 Club dates and times Autumn Term.pdf

Attendance and Penalty Notices

Weekly reminder - for parents/carers, that if they take their children out of school without authority for 5 or more days (which do not have to be consecutive), then you will be liable for a penalty notice fine

1. If you have not incurred a penalty notice relating to this child/children in a rolling 3 year period since 19 August 2024, then the penalty notice will be charged at the rate of £160.00, per parent/carer per child, if paid within 28 days. This will be reduced to £80.00 if paid within 21 days of receipt of the notice. Failure to pay the Penalty Notice will result in Surrey County Council considering legal proceedings against you in the Magistrates Court.

2. If you have incurred a penalty notice relating to this child/children since 19 August 2024, the rolling 3 year period will be activated from the date of the first penalty notice and the second penalty notice will be charged at the flat rate of £160.00, per parent/carer per child, if paid within 28 days. There will be no reduction for payment within 21 days. Failure to pay the Penalty Notice will result in Surrey County Council considering legal proceedings against you in the Magistrates Court.

3. If you have incurred 2 penalty notices relating to this child/children in the rolling 3 year period since the first penalty notice was issued, then you will NOT receive a third penalty notice – Surrey County Council will have no option but to consider a prosecution, per parent/carer per child, in the Magistrates Court under s 444 Education Act 1996.

Surrey County Council is not responsible for authorising pupil absence and therefore cannot withdraw any Penalty Notice requests without the written permission of the Headteacher.

The St James Attendance Policy can be found here..

Leave of Absence form can be found here.