NEWS
Week ending 8th March 2013
LETTER FROM THE HEAD Dear Parents This week has been so busy with such a lot of activity around and beyond the school that it is difficult to know where to start. In fact I don’t know if it would have been possible to fit any more in to the time available! It was good to talk to so many of the parents of Year 8 girls at their Parents’ Evening on Tuesday. It is clear that this year group has gone from strength to strength over the last 12 months and that their academic progress is placing them in an excellent position for the coming years of exam preparation. It was lovely to receive so many positive comments from parents regarding their daughters’ happiness since entering the school, as this positive spirit of cooperation between staff and girls is exactly what we seek to foster at the school. This positive and warm spirit was seen again on Wednesday evening at the Careers seminar event organised by Mrs Gower. There was a great turn out of girls and parents from a range of year groups to come and hear presentations from, and ask questions of, a wide selection of careers from medicine to media, banking to biological research and everything in between so it seemed! The purpose of the evening was for girls to investigate career areas that they may not have thought about or even heard about, as well as finding out more about careers they may have firmly in mind. A major highlight for me was the way in which the girls helped with the organisation of the event, looking after our guests, directing people to the right locations and generally being as helpful and cheerful as anyone would ever want. They were an absolute credit to the school. The Year 12 and 13 mocks are taking place this week and the results of these will be really useful in diagnosing what actions need to be taken by girls over the coming weeks to maximise their performance in the summer. I look forward to seeing many th parents of our Sixth Form at their Parents’ Evening on Tuesday 19 March. We received results from public examinations taken in January and it was good to see so much progress being made by girls as they proceed through their A Level studies – I trust that this will continue and that we will be celebrating with the girls as they receive excellent results in the summer. The school was awash with visitors on Wednesday as we hosted a major GDST sports rally with gym, netball and cross country competitions throughout the day. Teams from far and wide travelled to the school and the day was marked by a spirit of friendly competition. The day went very smoothly, with both staff and girls helping to ensure that any last minute glitches were ironed out quickly and effectively. Well done to all who were involved in this major event in the GDST calendar. th
As part of the GDST’s 140 anniversary celebrations a number of girls have been busy polishing their spelling (albeit in foreign languages!) in order to compete in the GDST Spelling Bee. As you know from a previous newsletter, several of our teams progressed from the regional heats to the national finals, which were held at Howell’s School, Cardiff on Monday of this week. Yet again the girls did Croydon proud winning and being placed in a number of the different categories. This is real testament to the depth and quality of modern foreign language teaching in the school and, yet again, gives us a clear indication of the talent th that our girls possess in so many areas. Victory for our Year 10 debating team against 6 Form opposition in the local Rotary debating competition also amply demonstrates this point and reminds me why I am proud to be Headteacher of this great school. That is not to say that we don’t know how to have fun, as the Junior School’s sleepover this week illustrates, as well as the staff preparing for Red Nose Day next week with a special film being created for the girls to view (I will say no more!). Yours sincerely
D Leonard
CROYDON HIGH SCHOOL Old Farleigh Road, Selsdon, South Croydon, Surrey CR2 8YB Tel: 020 8260 7500 Fax: 020 8260 7461 E-mail: info2@cry.gdst.net www.croydonhigh.gdst.net