BAROMETER GROUP MINUTES TUESDAY 24TH NOVEMBER 2015 Apologies: Mrs M Chilvers , Parent; Mr D O’Toole, Parent Mrs S Rafferty; Parent Present: Miss J Mason Mrs S Crawford Principal Deputy Principal - Pastoral Mr B Hannon Parent Mrs C Pomfret Mr J Goulder Deputy Principal -Teaching & Learning Parent Governor (observer) Mrs F Hannon Mrs T Partridge Parent Parent Mr J Barron Mrs S Duckworth Parent Parent Mrs R Pook Mrs S Cumming Parent Parent Mr N Hosking Parent Miss F Watts Parent Area of focus Key discussion points Follow up action Matters arising from last meeting Charlotte Wolf (Librarian) & Dave Clemow (English teacher & Y7 Head of Year) are trialling reading passports with Year 9 top set groups. These are ordinarily reserved for KS4 students. If successful, this will be rolled out to Y7 & Y8 to support the most avid readers. None Home Learning policy has since been updated by a group of staff. National & international research about the purpose & impact of home learning has been drawn upon. Parents have a chance to comment before the policy is taken to students & Heads of Department in January for ratifying. Please read through the policy & email Clare Pomfret with any comments by Friday 4th December on pomfret@heles.plymouth.sch.uk Tom Graham explained the new assessment and reporting system & stressed it is work in progress. We will be refining the system throughout the year, & feedback from parents, students & staff will be instrumental in this. A great deal of discussion followed. The rationale and the philosophy behind the new reporting system was deemed to be sound. The bar has been raised for students of all abilities, with an aspirational target of at least four levels of progress from their Key Stage 2 SATs results being set. Parents welcomed the increased challenge presented to all students, regardless of starting points. However, those students making progress in line with national expectations (3 Levels of Progress) are deemed to be under performing, which parents found misleading & unfair. There was some discussion about the value of keeping the current grade, or whether this added a confusing layer. There is variation in the way the current grade is used against the estimated grade – the school is working hard on ensuring consistency & clarity amongst all staff. Parents wanted to know what the next steps in learning are, & reported they would prefer to have this in one place (perhaps the student planner?) so they could discuss this with their children easily rather than having to look in books across a number of subjects. The role of the tutor that of subject teachers was discussed, with a request to find an opportunity when the Interim Assessment is issued in giving those next steps. There was suggestion that the tutor evening could happen for most year groups later in term 1, after the interim assessment had been issued. This would give parents and tutors more focus and purpose to the discussion. Year Tom Graham to lead further discussion at SLT meeting with a view to tweaking the system for IA2, specifically around: Assessment & Reporting (Tom Graham, Assistant Principal) information and help to interpret the new grading system ensuring consistency across teachers ways to capture & share next steps to close the gap between the current grade and the aspirational target grade consideration of the number of reports per year 7 could happen early in the term as a ‘meet the tutor’/settling in conversation. Anti-bullying policy – Sandra Crawford Sandra Crawford demonstrated the ‘Confide’ button on the school website where members of the school community can report any concerns or worries about bullying, & not be a bystander. Reports are purposely not anonymous since it is sometimes important to know who to speak to if follow-up is required. This came out of Student Voice, whereby some students were asking teachers to do more to tackle a clique mentality in some lessons where some students felt ostracised and that the teacher was unaware. Students termed this ‘silent bullying’. Children can decide who to report to: Mrs Pomfret, Mrs Crawford or Mr Graham. The system received a very positive response from parents. It was suggested that some students might feel intimidated about reporting to senior members of staff, although this doesn’t appear to have been an issue thus far. There have been 31 contacts made via the Confide button, with 15 of these being bona fide concerns that have been followed up. Mrs Crawford talked through how the school deals with incidents of bullying. Although rare, bullying can & does happen, but we have a robust system for tackling this swiftly. Cyber bullying has certainly has certainly increased over the years & has presented its own challenges. The current antibullying policy was distributed to parents for information. Please pass any further thoughts or comments to Sandra Crawford by e-mail crawfords@heles.plymouth.sch.uk AOB Parents who attended the recent Post-16 Opportunities evening were very appreciative of the support that was provided by staff and students, and wanted to pass on their thanks for an excellent evening. Some parents had attended open evenings at other schools but commented that "Hele's is up there with the best.” Justine Mason will pass on thanks and feed back to staff through the staff bulletin this Friday. Meeting closed at 7.40pm Date of Next Meeting: Tuesday 26th January, 6.30pm, in 5A Agenda : Food provision (specifically looking at the nutritional content of the menu) – Wendy Farnham, Business Manager Assessment & Reporting after IA2 – Tom Graham, Assistant Principal