Dear all,

I would like to start by saying thank you very much to everyone who has already completed the HP Families’ Survey that was sent out earlier this week. Receiving your feedback is absolutely essential for us to consolidate the incredible improvement of the school over the past few years and now move into the next part of our story.

Reading through all of the survey responses, it is immediately apparent that your children feel happy and safe at Holmleigh Park and that you believe we ensure our pupils are well behaved. Disruption-free learning is the foundation that we build everything else on at Holmleigh Park, so it is excellent to have this reinforced. The free text comments emphasised on many occasions that you feel we help teach our pupils to take responsibility for themselves through our high expectations and clear structures. You recognised the fantastic amount of extra curricular clubs and activities that we are now offering and that we have a broad curriculum offer available to our pupils.

You have also provided us with some clear and precise feedback about what we can do to become even better. I will be writing to you in more detail about this when the survey closes, but I wanted to share an initial response to the survey. I would like to invite interested parents or carers to attend our first HP Families’ Focus Group, focussing on home-school communication and developments that we can make in this area. The first session will take place next Friday 13th October from 9.00am to 10.30am. You can sign up to attend by clicking here, or indicate that you would like to attend a future session. If you would like to attend, please sign up using the form by 12pm on Monday 9th October. If demand is very high, then we may have to restrict attendance, but would be more than happy to put on additional sessions in the future. I very much look forward to meeting and talking with some of you there.

Personal development of our pupils is a key priority for us at Holmleigh Park. Personal development means developing responsible, respectful and active citizens. promoting equality of opportunity. promoting an inclusive environment. developing pupils' character and giving them qualities they need to flourish in society. We ensure personal development of our pupils through a range of different ways in school. One of these ways is through our PSHE curriculum which is available to be viewed here. PSHE is a subject that focuses on strengthening the knowledge, skills, and connections to keep children and young people healthy and safe and prepare them for life and work.

Another way we facilitate personal development is through our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion curriculum, which generally takes place during our afternoon tutor sessions. This week, our EDI lead, Miss Martin, launched Black History Month with our pupils. Year groups have had assemblies this week and next week Mr Dewfall will lead all pupils through a reflective task about the origins of discrimination. The following week we will read a range of texts linked to black history in DEAR time sessions and then we will move to the opportunity for our pupils to enter a poetry competition. 

That brings us to the end of another positive and productive week at Holmleigh Park. I wish you all a lovely weekend,

Mr Hudson
Headteacher