Parent Update

Pupils in Year 11, 12 and 13 have started their mock exams this week, and some pupils in Year 12 are sitting real GCSE exams too. 

If your child is in Year 11, Year 12 or Year 13, you should have received a copy of their exam timetable both by email, but also on paper as well. It is important that pupils attend school on time every day to complete their exams, and that they have both eaten well and slept well in preparation for success in their exams. 

Attendance to school was good last half-term. On average, pupil attendance was around 95% which is significantly above both national and local averages. I am very grateful for the effort and support of parents in making sure that their children attend school regularly and often. 

However, I am determined that attendance can continue to improve further:

• Please only keep your child away from school if their ill-health is so significant that they require medical attention 
• Please organise all medical appointments for outside of school hours
• Please never arrange to take your child out of the country during school time

A significant number of families have received fixed penalty notices (fines) from the local authority as a result of long or repeated absences from school. As a school, we will be firm and consistent in supporting such action. 

We have also made a really strong start to the year in terms of homework completion, with this week 10 Snowdon, 7 Long Mynd and 8 Helvellyn all receiving rewards and recognition for being the classes with the highest rates of homework completion in the school last half-term. 

Remember, that pupils have homework to do every day when they get home from school and that this homework should take them around an hour to complete each day. 

Below you can see who in each year group achieved the highest XP (Sparx) and who answered the most questions correctly (Century) last week.

All parents should now have received their unique login details for the My Child At School (MCAS) website and App. MCAS provides parents with daily updates about their child’s attendance, homework, behaviour and timetables. If you haven't yet received your login details, you can request for them to be sent to you again by emailing info@arkstalbans.org

Applications are open for places in our sixth form. If you have a child or know of families with children looking for a place in Year 12 next September, you can find out more information about our sixth form online and you and can make an application by using our online application form.  

Please do save the date for our next consultation event on Thursday 23rd November at 4pm. This consultation event will return to the topic of relationships and sex education. 

Last half-term, a huge number of trips and events took place focused on the world of work and careers: you can read about our visits to Cadbury World, the Offices of HS2 and to Google HQ online, as well as news stories about workshops which have taken place with Ernst and Young and Young Enterprise.