Headlines by James Saunders - 21st January 2022

21st January 2022

HEADLINES

By James Saunders

COVID UPDATE It has been another turbulent week in the world of pandemic response. Hopefully you all received my hasty response to the announcement on Wednesday about the change to masks in classrooms. I had no advance notice and literally knew about this when Boris announced it. I welcome this change - anyone who has tried to teach a lesson with a mask on will tell you it is not easy. I expect mask rules to further relax at the end of next week.

However, as I stated earlier this week there is a real juxtaposition between what is happening nationally in terms of covid restrictions loosening and what is happening in schools. Honywood is no exception. I spoke to a few Head Teacher colleagues on Wednesday and all of them told me that on the day restrictions were loosening they had their highest number of positive cases. I would encourage everyone to be cautious.

There is a pattern to these cases. It is year 7. I don’t know if there is any connection but this is the age group less likely to have received a vaccine. At Honywood this pattern is mirrored. Yesterday cases began to rise in our year 7 cohort. We also have a few staff off too which is making things very difficult.

We are certainly not back to business as usual quite yet. Should the year 7 pattern continue in the way it has there may be the need to move them to remote learning for a few days. This is obviously something we want to avoid and I am only informing you as a precaution should things change drastically over the weekend. As of now Monday will be as planned and we will look at where things are after we return from the weekend. I shall keep you informed if the picture changes into next week.

LATERAL FLOW TESTING With cases spreading more freely please can I ask that families test learners on Sunday night or Monday morning before attending for the week. This will help

to minimise any further transmission.

MASKS IN CLASSROOMS Whilst the wider public message is to lose masks in classrooms we will be asking year 7 learners to continue to use them in classrooms until Thursday. We have spoken to public health and this is the advice they have given us. We shall review the data on Monday and will let you know of any changes.

VACCINATIONS In true pandemic fashion we received a last minute message yesterday from the immunisation team stating that the government has tasked them with offering a second vaccination to all learners by half term. So today we got a message that they would like to return as they did in November to offer a jab on Tuesday 1st February. They had previously asked for a date in March but this no longer fitted in with the government plan. The process will be the same as before and it will be up to families if they wish to consent. We are waiting for information to be sent across from the NHS team and once received will forward on the consent forms to you.

ROAD SAFETY It has been brought to our attention that cars are pulling into the fire station driveway, dropping children off and not watching them cross the road which is resulting in some very near misses.

MENTAL HEALTH AND SAFEGUARDING I have included a couple of extra documents with this week’s Headlines. The first is a link to a newsletter from the Mental Health Support Team whose work I spoke about in the letter I sent out earlier this week.

The second attachment is the first of our monthly safeguarding bulletins. We plan to provide an update at the end of each month containing reminders about how we approach safeguarding at Honywood as well as useful links to support families out of school. If you have a question about safeguarding our hope is

that our monthly bulletins will be able to provide the answer or at least some signposting to where you may get the answer along with details of who to contact in school.

UNIFORM CONSULTATION Finally, I want to share with you our plans to consult to make some changes to our uniform. When I arrived at the school I never changed the uniform, contrary to popular belief. I merely listened to feedback from learners and families and ensured that we all followed it. Over my time at the school we have had numerous audits of our provision. During these visits learners have always spoken about the pride they now take in wearing their school uniform. During our continuing work with learners we have received further feedback asking us to review our uniform.

Many of our learners have been asking about blazers and why we don’t have any. Indeed we are pretty much the only secondary school in the area not to have adopted them. I have personally always been a fan of our jumpers as, although they can carry with them the connotations of primary school, they also bring with them, as association with the community is so embedded in primary schools.

However, our learners have spoken. They have asked us to consider blazers as part of the uniform at Honywood. The motivation for this change comes from several places. Girls especially have indicated that the look of a blazer is more appealing to them - it certainly has the ability to be more equitable for those who are self conscious about body image. Feedback has been positive around this. Blazers have pockets, somewhere to carry items that you may need to keep upon your person. Without question the blazer does bring with it a more mature and academic look and those that have tried them on and helped us to find a design and fit that works will testify that they do make learners look smart. I have been through uniform consultations in the past - the most popular feedback I have always received has been about a uniform changing the culture of what we are about. Does that mean that a new blazer has the ability to change our culture and ethos - of course not; that remains.

We would therefore like to consult with learners and families over the next 6 weeks to gather some feedback. Our proposal is a simple one and is for changes to happen in the academic year 2023/2024, not this coming September.

We are proposing introducing a grey fitted blazer for both boys and girls with the Honywood logo on the breast pocket and two regular pockets with flaps.

We are conscious of the costs of school uniforms and have spent some time looking into other schools before we took this proposal to our governing body for approval. We have, over the last few years, worked to reduce costs of our uniform and have one of the more affordable uniforms in the area. Our skirts are half the price of some other schools.

We think that a blazer is more hard wearing than a jumper. Many of you have become quite adept at patching up ripped elbows or frayed sleeves. We feel that a blazer would last as long as two jumpers in terms of wear and tear and therefore would like your feedback on whether to keep the jumpers or make them optional thing and just have the blazer.

The blazer as it stands would be an additional cost if we just added it to the existing uniform.

Mr Caygill will be shortly sending out some information as well as pictures and will place a sample in our visitor foyer for you to look at. He shall include a simple form for you to complete to share your views. We would appreciate your feedback and will report back to you the final decision once we take the feedback to our governing body in six weeks time.

Have lovely weekend everyone.

James Saunders

Please familiarise yourself with our Inclement Weather Policy. This information is available on our website: https://www.honywoodschool.com/inclement-weather

Cohort 8 Duty Receptionists Isla Crux Morgan Dearsley James Sapsford Logan Evans Scarlett Evans

Thank You!

FUTSAL REPORT – C9 Team: Alex Whitehead, Rhys Rowley, Theodore McQuillan, Sammy Taylor, Jacob Prestney, Owen Johnson, Jack Garner, Logan Humphreys.

This week Honywood travelled to Notley High School to take part in the annual Futsal competition.

Honywood had to reach the semi final stage by qualifying from their group of four. They were successful in this task and in the semi final they beat Notley School by 3 goals to 0. The goals came from Theo McQuillan (2) and Jack Garner.

In the final, Honywood faced Ramsey School and went on to win 3-0, with goals from Sammy Taylor (2) and Jack Garner. Throughout the tournament Honywood only conceded two goals largely due the defence of Whitehead, Garner and the solid keeping of Rhys Rowley.

The midfield alternated between McQuillan, Johnson and Prestney who dominated in all their games. The striking force of Taylor and Humphreys were constant threats and each contributed two goals.

Well done Cohort 9

3000

House Points as of January 2022 House Points as 21st of 21st January 2022 2587

2636

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1912

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2025

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Attenborough

Hawking

Nightingale

Parks

Dates for the Diary Monday 24th January

GCSE Graphics Design Zoo Trip

Wednesday 26th and Thursday 27th January

C11 French Mock Speaking Exams

Thursday 27th and Friday 28th January

C11 Spanish Mock Speaking Exams

w/c 31st January

C11 Learning Group Photos

Tuesday 8th February

Dance Show 2022 - 6.30pm

11th February

C11 Media Coursework Day

14th February to 18th February

Half Term

Wednesday 23rd March

Back to the 80s - School production

Thursday 24th March

Back to the 80s - School production