The two items in my blog this week are linked. Internet safety day is 11^th February and this is the theme for our year assemblies this week. The internet, as we know, is a fantastic tool. It allows us to work, shop, book holidays, do research and most importantly communicate with each other. The last point about communication has many positive elements attached to it, but there are also some risks that you need to make sure you are aware of. Mr Thompson talked about these risks in whole-college assembly last week. It is absolutely essential that you make sure that you are the right age to use social media sites. Your privacy settings must also be high, so that you only communicate with people that you know.

This year’s online safety theme is #Freetobe – FREE - Fairly treated, Represented, Equal and Empowered. Safer Internet Day (SID) 2020 is Tuesday 11 February, however, running all week during tutor times, assemblies and PSE lessons, there will be specific activities addressing the areas of ‘Free to be me online’!

Welcome back and a very Happy new Year to you all! I hope you all had a very good Christmas break and are ready and refreshed for a new term. A new year always gives time for reflection and an opportunity to plan ahead. It is a new start for everyone and looking back on last year, we had very strong examination performance, students going to some of the best universities in the country and also an increase in the number of students attending our College. The number of students wanting to attend here has also gone up and we have been asked to take more students in September.

As you read this, we are in the last week of a very busy term. Last week alone there was a lot happening in our College. I’d like to thank you all for your participation in the carol services and for your behaviour, attitude and engagement both in the Church and on the way there and back. The orchestra and music were fantastic – my thanks to all involved. As a College, we welcome students of all faiths and none – in this respect we mirror the society we live in. We have a faith room in College, which will be opened after the Christmas break and is in the AEN corridor. It will be run by Beth Pinder from the Church for two lunchtimes per week and will be open to students of all faiths and those of no faith.

We live in a democracy and this week on Thursday, a General Election will take place. We will have the opportunity to choose our leaders this week, including the political party(ies) that will eventually govern us.

Our school community has grown over the last few years and we now have just under 1100 children. One of our values is respect and it is essential that we all show this to each other, all the time.

We want to make sure that you all achieve your very best results in your GCSE and A-Levels. This will only happen if you work hard in every lesson, every day

This blog goes ‘live’ for tutor time every Monday. Therefore, by the time this is read our Armistice assembly will already have taken place. In my assemblies last week, I stressed the importance of the Royal British Legion poppy appeal and that we should support it and remember those who fought and lost their lives in order that we can live our lives in freedom. We owe a debt of gratitude to those people and it right that we show our respect in the assembly and in the subsequent activities in tutor time. I was pleased to see increasing numbers of you wearing a poppy throughout the week. I also know how respectful you always are with regard to marking this occasion and I would like to thank you for the fantastic levels of respect you showed in the assembly.

Welcome back! I hope you all had a really enjoyable half-term and are feeling refreshed for the run up to Christmas.

This is one of the longer half-terms in the academic year and I would like to start by thanking you for your good manners, politeness and positive behaviour over the last seven weeks. I know that we all don’t get everything right all the time – and I include myself in that – but we must all remain determined to do better when we get things wrong. My message in assemblies this term has been about kindness, respect and hardwork. We must keep all those things uppermost in everything we do.