Hyde Community College Newsletter – February 2016
Dear Parents and Carers, I am sure many people are aware of the recent article published by the Manchester Evening News referring to our school; I would like to reassure all our families that we take the safety and welfare of all of our students very seriously and that Hyde Community College remains a caring, happy and harmonious place to learn. I would also like to clarify that neither of the incidents reported were on school property or in the immediate vicinity of the school and that the alleged perpetrator is not a Hyde student. Our pastoral systems are robust and effective with our Ofsted report stating that “Students’ wellbeing is of paramount importance to the college staff and students receive high quality care and support” and that “Students say there is little bullying within the college, and when it does occasionally occur, staff deal with it promptly and effectively.” As always, our door is open and I would encourage any parents with concerns to come into school and talk to us. There are a wide range of communication channels open to parents and carers however the school will not become involved in playing out individual cases via social media despite our frustrations when issues are misreported. I cannot thank enough all those parents who continue to work positively with us to maintain our high standards and to ensure the very best outcomes for their children. As usual, school life is hectic at the half way point in the year! Year 11 are working incredibly hard to prepare for their forthcoming exams and deserve a special mention – we have many Year 11 students in school before 8am and staying through until 5pm to squeeze in those few extra hours of revision time with their teachers; they are an amazing year group and will hopefully be rewarded with great results in August so that they can then follow the college course or career path of their choice. Year 7 have settled well and we are enjoying getting to know their talents and their personalities. We are very proud of all our students and many were mentioned in this week’s celebration assemblies. Thank you so much for all your continued support, for your children and for our school.
Andrea Radcliffe, Headteacher
Business Enterprise Our fantastic Year 10 team reached final of Dragon's Den at Manchester Airport in December and raised £265 for charity. A huge WELL DONE to Dominic Mayhew. Hiba Al Dalaty, Katie Hodgkinson, Koryn Parker, Jack Tidmass and Chris Phillips.
University Visit… Mrs Lang and Mrs Mitchell recently took a group of Year 9 girls to Manchester Metropolitan University to experience what life at university would be like and learn some different elements of computer science. The girls created music using a programme called sonic pi, programming the code themselves and using electronics and computer parts to make different noises. They also experienced a university lecture with a Professor of Robotics and learnt where robotics could take us in the future. The professors they worked with on the day were hugely impressed by their resilience and computing skills and our girls are mentioned on their website at http://www.edlab.org.uk/widening participation/
Dates for your diary Friday 12th February – School finishes for half term Tuesday 23rd February School reopens at normal time Wednesday 24th February – Year 9 Options Evening 5.30pm Thursday 3rd March – Year 9 Parents’ Evening Wednesday 9th March – Deadline for return of Year 9 option forms Friday 25th & Monday 28th March – School closed (Bank Holidays) Friday 1st April – School finishes for the Spring Break Monday 18th April – School reopens for the Summer Term
Hyde CC students to the rescue… One morning last week, unfortunately, there was a nasty accident on Old Road when two cars collided one of which was carrying a Hyde student to school. On witnessing the accident, Year 11 student Charlotte Layfield helped the young man from the car to the side of the road and then, seeing smoke coming from the car, she prised open the damaged driver’s door and helped the driver to get out of the car and move away from the vehicle. Four other students then managed the scene with Charlotte until an ambulance arrived – Charlotte at this point was shivering in shirt sleeves having put her coat round the driver! Happily no lasting injuries were sustained by anyone involved. I am SO incredibly proud of our students…what decent, responsible and caring young people they are! A big ‘Thank you!’ goes to Charlotte Layfield, Hannah Monks, Alice Hollingsworth, Andrew North and Luke Aughton for showing what Team Hyde is all about – superstars!
Reminder – any students with overdue library books; please return them as soon as possible. Thank you!
Sporting Achievements: Our students continue to excel in a wide variety of sporting activities: This term Hyde students have represented Tameside in the Greater Manchester School Games in badminton and also qualified for the finals of the rowing competition to be held next half term. Our boys teams came 1st and 2nd in the Tameside Volleyball Competition and will now represent Tameside at the Greater Manchester School Games. We have hosted 3 major primary school competitions recently; two Off The Blocks events for 11 Tameside primaries and a Year 4 Strong Starts competition in which all 10 Hyde primary schools competed. All of these events were ably supported by our own students who are wonderful role models for the younger children. Many students have gone on to achieve further sporting success outside of school: Owen Feakes, Joel Ankers, Adam Bardsley and Dylan Royle were part of the winning team in the U16 FA People’s Cup held at Manchester Central and Owen, a member of the local Flowery Field Cricket Team, has also been selected to play cricket for Cheshire! Hannah Monks is now Captain of the North West U16 Volleyball Team and regularly competes all over the country. Hannah also plays for the Tameside Women’s Volleyball Team in national league competitions and younger sister Lauren is now following in her footsteps and plays for the North West U14 Team. I would like to congratulate each of the many students who have taken part in sporting activities this term – we frequently receive very positive comments about their conduct and attitude and we are very proud of all of them.
Maths News: This term’s winners of the Mathematics Award (showing initiative and independent working) for each year group: Year 7 Iqrah Choudhury Year 8 Chloe Phillips Year 9 Fahmida Begum Year 10 Michael Hesford Year 11 Ramisha Tabassum Very well done to those students! On Thursday 11th February, 8 of our brightest Year 7 Mathematicians took part in the Tameside Maths Challenge. This year's event was organised by our very own Mrs Howard and saw 14 of the 15 Tameside secondary schools competing across a series of Mathematical challenges. One of our Year 7s, David Vincent from team "JAMD", won one of the three prizes available for individuals who stood out as making a significant contribution to their team's success. Our other team, consisting of Luke Toomey, Rico Borejko, Halima Begum and Ishita Akhtar and selfnamed "The Bob Jeff Elephants", came an extremely impressive 5th out of 28 teams, with only 7 points separating them from the team who came second. Also taking part were Joshua Saxon, Matthew Cooke and Adnan Syed and all our students were a real credit to the school. Last term 30 Year 6 pupils from St George's C.E. Primary School took part in some special maths activities designed and run by some of our year 10 additional maths group. The year 10s were fantastic and made such a good impression with the primary pupils that even after walking to Hyde CC and back in the pouring rain the Year 6s couldn't stop talking about it! Well done to Tareq Hasan, Emily Connor, Andrew Arstall, Tawhied Ahmed, Abu Faiz, Syeda Rashid and Louise Ogden for their hard work!
School Council HCC has recently relaunched the 'HCC School Council'. A number of students from all year groups applied and we now have 20 representatives. Council meetings will run on a fortnightly basis in the new term and we are very much looking forward to working with our students on a number of projects both in school and in the local community. We already have a peer mentoring programme being organised as well as a community logo competition! Please keep up to date on all of our projects in the School Council Blog under the 'Students' tab on the school website! Head of Year Mrs Etches was surprised and delighted today to receive flowers from a student to thank her for her support and kindness and for always being there. Celebration Assemblies this week have shown just how proud all our Heads of Year are of their year groups!
Art update: Two of our Year 8s Helayna Warburton and Grace Selwood pupils worked with Mrs Wrigley last term to complete their Arts Award Discovery Level. They explored artists and created their own 'pop art' artwork. Their work will now be passed to the Tameside Arts Award Team and they should receive their award in the coming months from Trinity College, London. Well done girls! Duke of Edinburgh’s Award I owe an apology to Olivia Haigh who should have been listed with the gold award winners in our last newsletter. Congratulations to Olivia on this and on a great set of exam results last summer – what a star! Mrs R
Thank you for taking the time to read our newsletter; on behalf of all the staff at Hyde CC, we wish you an enjoyable holiday and look forward to working with you in the new half term.