2022 Prom Night Celebrations

Let’s Get Active for Easter!

The Our Lady’s Easter Holiday Activity and Food (HAF) Scheme involved a week of sport, activity, drama, art, dance, nutritious food, health & wellbeing for 60 pupils from the local community during the 2022 Easter holidays. It was a great introduction to life in a secondary school. The programme has helped to boost the activity levels, skills and confidence of all those attending.

Structured and planned sessions helped staff and student sports leaders support the young people in developing their: • resilience • confidence • cooperation skills • team building • social skills • healthy activity levels The broad range of activities helped to provide a fun and exciting environment for the young people to get to know the school and make new friends. Sports leaders developed their skills and confidence, supporting and taking the lead during lessons and activities. The sports leaders took pride in their roles and took their responsibilities seriously, both of which were key factors in the success of the project. Well done on a brilliant job!

Student quotes

• I really loved the week, the teachers were so nice and I especially enjoyed playing dodgeball. • Great sports club with a range of activities.

My favourite activity was football!

Generous lunches! • Really good and enjoyable • We loved the scheme and enjoyed ourselves. We were upset it ended too quickly! • So much fun! I loved the multisport and enjoyed receiving the certificate at the end.

Parent quotes

A brilliant holiday scheme to keep children active during the half term breaks. My daughter enjoyed herself and it really increased her confidence to meet new people and play games that she hasn’t before. Really pleased to have this activity option for my son, who has spent so much extra time on screens in lockdown. He was very apprehensive on the first day as he didn’t know anyone else going (and can be very stubborn about resisting new things in such circumstances), so I was delighted that he enjoyed it so much and was happy to continue to join in on the subsequent days. This says a lot for how good it was. Thank you! I felt happy sending my boys. I found the scheme safe and my boys loved it. Can’t wait for another club to start.

Staff quotes

“This has been a well organised and thoroughly enjoyable week for children and coaches alike. The children enjoyed all of the activities, with healthy food for lunch. Children made new friends, socialised and had an active time in their new secondary school.” Miss Tkaczuk “It’s been a great week. The atmosphere was relaxed with an emphasis on enjoyment. This really helped the students to develop in confidence. It was still a learning environment and children benefitted mentally, physically and socially from the experience.” Mr Derrig

Thank you BMCS!

The Biological and Medicinal Chemistry Sector (BMCS) awarded Our Lady’s High School a grant of £1000. This allowed us to purchase chemistry equipment including handheld pH probes and atomic structure kits.

The first students to test out this new apparatus were year 5 children from our feeder primary schools. They took part in an acid and alkali lesson using the new equipment; they were given different household substances and were asked to decide if the substance was an acid or alkali, using litmus paper. They then used the pH probe to get a more accurate measure. The students were very engaged in the lesson and enjoyed using our new equipment. During transition week in the summer, we will be using the atomic structure modelling kit to get students to consider what makes up the wider world in terms of chemistry and the pH probe in our Forest School. We can’t wait to make use of this fantastic equipment!

Slavery Museum

Back in October we celebrated Black History Month and as many of you will remember part of that involved decorating our classroom doors and turning them into monuments to black excellence. The students who designed the best BLM doors were rewarded with a trip to the international slavery museum in Liverpool.

Mrs Gallagher led the trip along with 25 students from Year 10. The museum is located on the Albert Dock and houses a vast array of exhibitions that shine a light on the hidden lives of enslaved people from the past. It also looks at the insidious nature of contemporary slavery and how racism and discrimination continue to affect the lives of the descendants of enslaved people today. The museum has many artefacts and displays including audio walk in’s, photographs, visual displays and relics from the past. They each bring the information to life, although the horrors of slavery are in plain sight, the museum also has an uplifting message of triumph and the Black Achievers Wall and the Freedom Wall are a testimony to this. The students had a wonderful day exploring the lives of enslaved people in history. The tour was fascinating and the pupils had a brilliant day. Faye Southern: I thought the slavery museum was great. The tour was very interesting and the guide was knowledgeable and engaging with the group. Taylor Smith: The trip was a really eye opening experience and it was very interesting to see parts of history in person as opposed to just hearing about it.

Leaving a Legacy for Year 11!

Written by Destiny Osaghe, Year 11

This term, three wonderful students who attended Our Lady’s RC High School in the past, gave the year 11 students a preview into what the future awaits for us.

The ex-students were asked questions which were answered very considerately. They helped us understand what it is like to be in their position and what we will have to do in order to get there. They worked very hard to be in the position they currently are and tried adding and advising us to be successful just like they are. They told us what it is like to be in college, the challenges they have faced and how they overcame them. They also kindly gave us tips on how to keep our social and study time balanced, and gave us tips on how to keep motivated as they know how hard school can get to us. Overall, I had a pleasant time with these kind- hearted, hardworking, supportive students and how they cooperated with sensibly answering these questions during this interview. The girls have said they would like to come in again as we hope to offer more sessions like this to support year 11 students in their preparation for exams and transition to college. A huge thank you to the students that came in: Jessica Taylor (2020) Holy Cross- Successfully applied to Edge Hill University to study Creative Writing for September 2022 Alessia Ebohon (2021) Loreto College- Studying Chemistry, Biology and Maths Esther Boyede (2021) Loreto College - Studying Chemistry, Biology and Maths