19 December 2018

Dear all,

At the end of my first year as Headteacher of The Buckingham School, there is much to reflect upon, and I will be writing separately to our community at the beginning of the new term with some of my reflections about the present and future of this great school.

As ever, in these pages, you will find just a mere flavour of some of the activities that have gone on here in recent weeks.

One thing I will say is that, in my entire working life, I cannot remember a greater sense of pride in my school than that I felt on Friday 9 November 2018. One thousand students and one hundred staff participated in a beautifully poignant act of Remembrance, planned and carried out entirely by students. It is a reminder of something that is sometimes forgotten: young people are capable of so much and we do nothing for them when we shield them from opportunities to succeed, to fail, and to take responsibility. How apt that those who fell one hundred years ago were remembered with such sensitivity.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank parents, carers and our community for their ongoing support, as well as students and staff for their hard work and commitment. 

Season’s Greetings and I wish you all a peaceful Christmas break.  

With best wishes, 

Mr A McGinnes
Headteacher

Celebration Evening - Thursday 6 December 2018

The Buckingham School held its annual Celebration Awards evening on Thursday 6 December to celebrate Year 11 and 13 student achievements from the academic year 2017-18.  This is always a wonderful occasion and we were delighted to see many students and ex-students with their families return to The Buckingham School to collect their well-deserved Awards. 

The evening was attended by members of staff, Governors (including the Chair of governors, Matthew Watkins), Cllr. Robin Stuchbury and we had the honour of Mr Jon Harvey, the Mayor of Buckingham making an address and handing out all the awards to our high achieving students.  As part of the Mayor’s Speech, Mr Harvey presented to the school a book about Jo Cox; for background information about the book and to read the Mayor's speech click the link below. 

https://themayorofbuckingham.blogspot.com/2018/12/journey-beginnings-and-one-ending.html

This event was supported by local businesses and we are very grateful for their generosity, best wishes and support for our students. Thank you, all.  

As part of the Celebration Evening The Buckingham School Dance Company led by Imogen Willmot performed a dance called 'Big God'. Thank you to all the dancers: Imogen Willmot, Millie Baldry, Izzy Hopkins, Ella O'Connell, Mille Porteous an Ella Rose Smith. Also, a big thank you goes to the school's Twilight Dance group for performing during the evening too.  You were all amazing! 

It's SHOW TIME!

Last week, the Performing Arts Department performed a wonderful Christmas production, Singin' in the Rain Jr. A lot of love, talent and hard work has gone into the show's production, and we congratulate all students and staff both on stage and off for such a fantastic production. The show ran from Monday through to Thursday.  It was a slick and professional production from 50 students, mainly in Key Stage 3 and 4. Well done to all involved. 

Here's a quick peek at the set (video credit. Jed Hunt)

Change Maker 

Miss Barten and her Change Maker students have been collecting unwanted change (mainly coppers) over the past year to raise money for the WE Organisation. 

WE is an international charity that partners with communities to help lift themselves out of poverty. Our Change Makers have collected an amazing £690 to help the Education Pillar in Ecuador.  The money raised will go towards primary school kit including uniform and equipment, seeds for the school garden and a watering well.  

Thank you for making Change happen! 

Miss J Barten, English Teacher

School Christmas Trees 

Thank you, Lakers Nursery – Garden Plants & Tea Room, for providing this year's Christmas trees.  We have two trees in school, one in our main reception and a 10 foot beauty in the Jubilee Hall.  They are both stunning trees. Thank you!  

Also, thank you Simply Education - staffing agency providing supply work to teachers and support staff across the UK, for funding both both trees. 

We really appreciate your support and generosity, thank you Lakers and Simply! 

The lovely gingerbread baubles shown below were made by James Keer in Year 7 and the Christmas tree bauble by Oliver Herring. Thank you Mrs Wilkinson (Humanities Teacher) for sharing.  What great creativity!  

Inter-House Christmas Card Competition 

The school's new House system is now well underway and you may have seen or heard about the various Inter House competitions that have been running throughout the Autumn Term.  We had a great response to the House Christmas Card Competition! The winning cards can be seen below, congratulations to the winners:

KAITLIN FILINOVA-MATTHEWS (7 CHANDOS)
HOLLY BEACON (8 SWAN)
MEGAN TOWSE (9 SWAN)
NATASHA HUNT (10 CHANDOS)
VICTORIA PRICE (11 SILVERSTONE)

The winning five entries were made into Christmas Card packs for parents to purchase with all profits from the cards going to the charity Young Epilepsy.

Remembrance Week at The Buckingham School

The Buckingham School marked the 100 years anniversary of the end of the First World War with a fitting and moving Remembrance service, on Friday 9 November.

The service, entirely led by students, paid tribute to those who died during the First World War, including 95 soldiers from Buckingham and the surrounding villages.

The service started with all students and staff paying their respects by attaching a poppy onto the fence of the main playground. Written on the poppies were names of soldiers who died during the war, with many including the names of family relatives. The sight of one thousand poppies was striking and set the tone for the rest of the service.

Tom Hardy, Year 13, led the ceremony with a powerful and poignant speech which emphasised the reasons we remember, speaking of the freedoms we have today and linking this to why people went to war in 1914.

It was touching and inspiring that only students spoke or performed as part of the ceremony. It should not be taken for granted that 100 years on, young people today will remember a past they were not part of, yet all the young people at The Buckingham School showed a deep understanding of how this past links to today and to their own lives.

The ceremony included a number of performances and readings of poems. The school’s choir performed two songs; a group of dancers dedicated their piece to the wives, mothers, daughters, girlfriends and friends who received the telegram no-one wanted to receive; and the poems ‘The Soldier’ by Rupert Brooke and ‘My Boy Jack’ by Rudyard Kipling were read, while students and staff listened in silence.

Appropriately, the ceremony ended with a beautiful rendition of The Last Post, played on flute by Abi Pearce (Year 11), and then a two-minute silence to remember the fallen.

It is safe to say that the positive repercussions for the student body of an event such as this one will last for a long time. 

Mr Mandel, Subject Leader of PSHE

Welcome Back Mavis!  

You may have seen the social media post welcoming Mavis back to The Buckingham School. Mavis is now in her 90's but attended The Buckingham School in 1938 when it was newly opened. On her visit, Mavis had a tour of the school and she relived her memories.  Mavis was presented with a school tie to remember her visit and she kindly left chocolates for school staff to share.   

INTERNATIONAL RE-START A HEART DAY

On Tuesday 16 October, South Central Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust ("SCAS") came to our school to deliver a free live-saving CPR training for ‘World Restart a Heart Day 2018’; an event taking place across the UK. They teamed up with The British Heart Foundation and Resuscitation Council UK to deliver this event.  We were one of 56 schools participating in this event.

The aim of the campaign was to train 10,000 school children on the day in CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) and how to use a defibrillator.

Restart a Heart Day is designed to encourage more people learn how to do life-saving CPR (or chest compressions) should they come across someone collapsed, not breathing and potentially in cardiac arrest. 

For every minute that passes without CPR starting on a person in cardiac arrest, their chances of survival reduce by 10%.

Students in Years 7 through to 11 participated in the event - 133 Buckingham School students were trained! This is an amazing number of students learning this simple life skill, which one day could save someone's life. You should be extremely proud of yourselves!    

Nic Morecroft, Head of Operations – Community Engagement & Training at SCAS, said:  “We know that one of the big concerns members of the public have about giving first aid and chest compressions to someone who has collapsed and is not breathing is that it might harm the patient."

“Even if you are not an expert in giving chest compressions, it’s been shown from studies that you can at least double if not treble someone’s chances of survival by having a go at giving chest compressions. That’s why SCAS is delighted once again to be part of Restart a Heart Day which will get thousands more people trained in how to carry out effective CPR and use a defibrillator."

Thank you, South Central Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust, for organising this event and showing our students how to learn this simple skill, which one day, could mean they help save someone's life! 

Award Winning and Bestselling Author

The award-winning, bestselling children’s author, Billy Bob Buttons visited our Year 7s at the beginning of the Autumn term.  He is the author of sixteen very popular children’s books including the bestseller, ‘I think I Murdered Miss’. Last year, this book sold over 100,000 copies in the UK alone and won the 2014 UK People’s Book Prize.

He delivered his popular literacy workshop to our Year 7s focusing on planning a story and developing characters.  Afterwards, there was an opportunity to buy a signed book. This was the third time Billy Bob Buttons has visited the school to work with our Year 7s.

Find out more about Billy Bob Buttons and his books at www.bbbuttons.co.uk

STEM at The Buckingham School by Lacey Townes, STEM Leader

In my role at The Buckingham School as STEM Leader, I have the pleasure of showcasing the fantastic work our teachers have done this first half term in promoting STEM subjects and supporting students in their drive for progress. Everyone has hit the ground running from day one and the wide variety of enrichment activities on offer is amazing. Showcased below is some of the opportunities that students have to select from.

Prestigious Royal institution Christmas Lectures

Every year since 1825 the Royal Institute has been putting on a prestigious science lecture, one that has been broadcast on television since 1936. The lecture has been so popular that the RI has been using a ticket ballot similar to the Wimbledon ballot to evenly distribute tickets to schools.

This year we were lucky enough to visit the Royal Institute for lectures and showcase our students singing talents in a project prior to the lectures - singing "This is Me" from the Greatest Showman, which fit in with the theme of this year's lecture which is "Who am I?"  Students were amazed by the lecture allowing them to visit the wide range of genetics to explore the answer to that question. 

We invite everyone to watch the broadcast on BBC 4 on Boxing Day, 27 December and 28 December. We are very proud of our students.

http://www.rigb.org/christmas-lectures/2018-who-am-i
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00pmbqq/broadcasts/upcoming 

STEM CLUB

The STEM Club (formally the Computing Club) has embraced cross curricular projects this year. One of the projects has been the AstroPi challenge. Mission Zero offers students and young people the chance to have their computer programs run in space on the ISS! Teams write a simple program to display a message to the astronauts onboard. Students receive a special certificate showing where exactly the ISS was when your program ran!

ESports Team 

With the support of Vertigo VR (https://vertigovr.co.uk) The Buckingham School has joined the inaugural first season of the British ESports Championships. After hard fought tryouts, we’ve launched two teams each for Rocket League and Overwatch.

We are very excited to participate in this championship series as ESports have been shown (based on developing research) to: Provide cyber and transferable skills, improve dexterity and concentration, positive social and communication benefits, promote teamwork and develop communities, decision making, reaction times and multitasking.

More information can be found at http://www.britishesports.org/assets/WhatisesportsPDFOCT17V2pdf1.pdf

Science Club

Science Club is a Key Stage 3 Club that allows students to explore science outside the standard curriculum. Every week the students will visit a new topic and participate in a fun experiment that cements their learning. Want to know what this is and how to make to make it? Come to Science Club!

Year 7 and 8 Maths Club 

Students are challenged to complete a series of fun mathematical challenges, from the weekly Parallel Maths Project to the Cyber Security Challenges of Encryption. 

         CHALLENGE:

         Can you break the following code
         (Hint… it’s a caesar cipher)?

Bucks Skills Show Results

This year fourteen students had the opportunity to visit the Bucks Skill Show, based on their involvement with last year’s Enterprise Club. The students were given certificates, and a exclusive chance to build a LED flashlight.

In addition, students visited the interactive booth, which featured highlights from the NHS, Royal Air Force and VR booths.

More information can be found at https://wannabebucks.org/bucks-skills-show/

Monster Confidence Conference in Birmingham

The Buckingham School secured twenty-five tickets to send Year 10 and 11 girls to attend this year’s MonsterConfidence conference in Birmingham.

Monster Confidence Conference is for young women aged 15+ who want to explore their options in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths world of careers, whilst meeting industry people and gaining some #MonsterConfidence for their career.

See full details at https://monsterconfidence.co.uk/birmingham

The Diana Award Anti-bullying Ambassador Programme

Nine students from different year groups took part in an anti-bullying training day delivered by the Diana Award Anti-bullying Ambassador programme. Together with other students from different schools, students discussed what bullying is, the impact it has and how, as a school community, we can tackle bullying. We are very proud that at The Buckingham School bullying is rare, but recognising that we live in a diverse and increasingly technologically aware society, the training day was aimed at raising awareness of bullying issues (including online) and promoting the skills needed to support others.

Our students were absolutely superb during the training day and we are very lucky to have this team in place. Students have already thought about many ideas that will help celebrate our differences and make every single student at The Buckingham School feel valued and supported.  

A very special well done goes to Ed Odley (8 Swan), who was chosen by the organisers of the training day as the 'Anti-Bullying Ambassador of the Day' for his positive contribution and leadership skills shown on the day. Ed will be our student leader on anti-bullying, so we know some great projects are ahead.

A massive well done to our Anti-Bullying team: Ed Odley, Scarlette Baldry, Colby Glossy, Lucy Fox, Johnny Forward, Rihanna Yardley, Tom Hardy, Lauren McPartlane and Zoe Roberts.'

Another term and more fantastic news from The Buckingham School PE Department. 

Starting with the Year 9 team rugby team after a successful year last year. The boys began with friendly fixtures against John Colet and Waddesdon which allowed the team to improve on their tactics and execute some eye-catching displays. The boys were also enrolled in the new Rugby Championship competition, winning their first games against Walton High School (46-0) and a closely contested game against Akeley Wood where two late tries from Jobe Read and Will Glister, as well as superb kicking all game from Henry Pearson at number 10, sealed the points to win 37-19. They await the next round of fixtures which could see them pitted against some of the Grammar schools that we have yet to encounter. It looks to be a strong season already and keep up the great work boys. 

Year 7 & 8 rugby teams have started brightly. Year 7 are yet to win a game, but they have made massive strides in terms of their understanding of the game and their ability levels. Notably performances so far go to Rowan Asekun-Taylor and Beau Horn as players that have impressed Mr Lagdon so far. Good luck for the remainder of the season boys. 

Year 8 rugby team have built on the excellent start they had last year at The Buckingham School. They have beaten John Colet, Royal Latin School, Akeley Wood and narrowly missing out against Waddesdon School. Stand out performances from George Pearson and Jake Weingart have led to call ups to the Year 9 team. Leo Talbot and Joe Maguire have also contributed with excellent performances, as well as Raymond Osei-Tutu being the most improved player according to their Head Coach Mr Minns. Well done boys. 

Year 11 boys football team have made a fantastic start to the football year, beating both Thorpe House (4-0) and The Grange (2-0), progressing into the quarter finals of the County Cup. Some excellent defensive displays has led to them conceding no goals at all so far this season. Best wishes in the next round against Bourne End Academy and bring home the trophy! 

The attendance at extra-curricular clubs has been amazing, please encourage your son or daughter to keep attending. We have so many clubs on throughout the week that students can take advantage of. We look forward to more exciting and successful stories as the year goes on. 

Mr J Ribbans, PE Teacher

Fantastic Enrichment opportunities available

Our new and exciting Enrichment opportunity programme which is available for all year groups centres around offering your child an opportunity to take up a new activity they have never tried before or to develop their skills in a particular area, to even learn a new language. 

There is a growing focus in education on the quality of the education provided for young people which is not just about what grades they get at the end of Year 11 or Year 13. Rather, it is about how we educate our students in all aspects of their lives, offer them opportunities to learn about different cultures and societies, broaden their view of themselves and to want to learn or develop new talents.

Women's World 7s Rugby Series

Miss Collie recently travelled to Dubai to play in the Women's World 7s Rugby Series.  We are pleased to report that Miss Collie and her team were very successful in the competition, winning the Women's International Open. 

The team competed over three days in temperatures above 30 degrees and ensuring a very successful campaign.  Miss Collie managed to score a number of tries over the weekend including three in the semi-final and two in the final, the team winning the semi final 41-0 and the final 24-7.  Having won the Dubai 7s, the team now look forward to competing in the Paris Women's World 7s Series.   

The Buckingham School Sports Partnership has been successful in its application to become part of The FA Girls'' Football School Partnership. 

The Buckingham SSP works closely with the Mandeville SSP, The FA and the Youth Sport Trust to increase the number of opportunities available to our young females both in primary and secondary environments. This has a positive impact on not only our young talented footballers but also will ensure our young leaders have pathways to progress in a variety of different roles.

This is a really exciting year for all primary and secondary schools that are part of the Buckingham SSP. Watch this space for updates....#Lionesses (Miss Collie).

National Inter-County Swimming Success

Earlier in the term, Izzy Ford and Gracie Hudson were selected for the Oxon and North Bucks County Team to compete at the National Inter-County Championships at Sheffield.

Both girls had fantastic swims to help the team finish 9th out of 20 county teams (two places higher than last year) and helping them to remain in Division 1. Here's a few pictures from the Championships.  Well done, an awesome experience and great swimming! 

School Equestrian Team 

If you follow the School's facebook and instagram accounts you may have read about the school's Equestrian team and most recently their outing to the NSEA Championships Plate at Keysoe.  To see the photos from the event click below. 

NSEA Championship Photos

Outstanding Success for A Level Business & A Level Economics students

Once again our Business students secured places on undergraduate courses at a number of Universities and Apprenticeships.  Congratulations.  

Performing Arts - The James Cousins Dance Company

On 17 October the Performing Arts team had the pleasure of hosting two dancers from The James Cousins Dance Company.  They worked with Year 9 and Year 10 GCSE dancers on exploring one of the professional works ‘Within Her Eyes’ which is performed by the company.

The students were extremely focused and were certainly challenged in their contact work.  They all achieved lifts and holds which they had first thought incredibly difficult.

Our thanks go to the two dancers, Georgina Frampton and Yieling Nah. 

Did you know we are now on Instagram!  Hop on over to @thebuckinghamschool and start following us.  

Please click here for details: Vacancies Page on www.buckinghamschool.org

Christmas Notice.  T Kings Associates, our uniform suppliers, close for their Christmas break on Friday 21 December, reopening on Wednesday 2 January. Online orders can be placed in that time but please allow additional time for them to be fulfilled as they will not start to work on them until their return in January.

Advice for Parents and Carers: Talking Mental Health with young people at secondary school

Anna Freud, National Centre for Children and Families, has provided the school, as part of their nationwide campaign, important and useful resources aimed at Years 7-9, where children are experiencing the uncertainties of adolescence and may become vulnerable to mental health problems. 

A free booklet and leaflet (see below) have been developed by the Centre‘s child mental health experts, providing simple advice and guidance to parents and carers about how to make conversations about their child's feelings part of everyday conversation.

The teenage years are both exciting and challenging to parents and carers. It can be hard to know whether your child's feelings and behaviour are normal or becoming a problem. 

Click here to view and download the booklet and leaflet.

Pupil Premium and Free School Meals

If you submit an application and your child becomes eligible for ‘Free School Meals’, they will receive a daily allowance to spend in the canteen on healthy, and preferably, hot food. In addition, the school will receive extra funding called ‘Pupil Premium’. We use this extra money to improve the educational provision and resources at the school.

To read the letter in full click here and to download the Free School Meals & Pupil Premium Application Form click here. 

Head Lice - Parent Information and Guidance 

Within most schools at any one time, there will be a small number of children infected with head lice. We as a school feel it is our job to promote and ensure parents/carers are provided with the advice and support to effectively detect and treat cases of head lice affecting their own children.

We have provided two links below with useful information to help combat the little bugs! 

Parent & School Information regarding Head Lice 

Evidence-based Guidance

Bucks County Council Transport Consultation

Bucks County Council are running a consultation to ask the public’s views on changes being made to the Council’s home to school transport arrangements. BCC have prepared a draft Home to School Transport Policy to show what the proposed arrangements will be.  This has been drafted in line with the Department for Education’s statutory guidance. 

To read more click here.

Bucks BucketBand @ The Buckingham School 

Useful links from the school website:

Calendar Events for this week, and further ahead. 

Click here.