Welcome to Half Term 2
We were delighted to welcome back pupils last week and are looking forward to a great half term of learnings and events. A reminder that the first edition of our new College Newsletter is available here.
Parental Survey
We are seeking your views again through the next parents’ survey for insight to your feedback on our progress to becoming an outstanding provider of Catholic education. We would appreciate it if you could take 2 minutes to complete this by clicking here
Autumn Term Inspire Opportunities
A reminder that Autumn Term lunchtime and afterschool Clubs continue this half term details are here.
Careers Fair
Today, we hosted over 30 different Colleges, Universities, Training Providers and Employers in a careers fair. Employers who attended included the RAF, Ministry of Justice, Unilever, and many other representatives from different sectors from across the region. This provided pupils with an opportunity to find out about different career pathways, to make contacts for work experience placements and to improve their understanding of qualifications needed for different roles.
Parent and Pupil Arbor Access
A reminder that as a parent, you can access key details about your child’s life at St Mary’s.
This includes your child’s timetable, homework set and completed attendance, personal profile information, parent contact details, medical information, permissions you have given, trips, reports, positive and negative points. You will be able to notify us of amendments to your child’s details such as home address or emergency contact number.
More information and troubleshooting available here
Key Dates
Below are the key dates for this half term. In you have any questions in the meantime please, as always, contact the school via [email protected]
| Date | Event |
| Wednesday 9 November: | Year 7 Residential Retreat to Alton Castle |
| Thursday 10 November: | Year 12 and 13 Parents’ Evening |
| Tuesday 15 November: | Sixth Form Information Evening 6-8pm |
| Thursday 24 November: | Year 8 Parents’ Evening (in school 3.30 – 6.45) |
| Thursday 1 December: | Year 7 Meet the Tutor Evening |
| Friday 9 December: | College Closed to Pupils for Staff Inset |
| Wednesday 14 December: | College Carol Service 7.00- 8.30 |
| Tuesday 20 December: | Last Day of Half Term 2 (Pupils finish at 12:30) |
| Wednesday 21 December: | First Day of Christmas Break |
| Wednesday 4th January: | Start of Half Term 3 |
“Enough”: national campaign against harassment and abuse of women and girls.
St Mary’s is supporting “Enough”; a new national campaign to raise awareness and put a stop to the harassment and abuse of women and girls. The campaign includes television adverts, billboards, social media and radio advertising and will highlight different forms of violence against women and girls and the simple acts that anyone can take to challenge perpetrators of abuse. Mr Maddocks is running assemblies about this issue and pupils are discussing it during form time Inspire lessons. More information about the campaign can be found here. If you would like further information about this or would like to talk to someone in school, please contact [email protected] .
Contacting the School
As well as the main office email ([email protected]) , a reminder that Heads of Year and Learning Coaches can be contacted directly via email or by calling the main school number . Further information is available below and here: https://stmaryswallasey.com/whos-who/
| Year Group | Head of Year | Progress Coach | |
| Year 7 | Mrs C Willis | Mrs K Schuman-Edwards | [email protected] |
| Year 8 | Mrs L Watson | Mrs C Watson | [email protected] |
| Year 9 | Ms J Boisson | Mrs D Jones | [email protected] |
| Year 10 | Mr A Davies | Ms A Rubin | [email protected] |
| Year 11 | Mrs S Witan | Mrs J Cotgrave | [email protected] |
| Sixth Form | Miss J Jones | Mr S Cotgrave | [email protected] |
Online Maths Parent Workshop
Our Maths department will be running a webinar on Wednesday 16th November 5.00 – 6.00 about how to support your child in their maths work at home (with a particular focus on the use of Sparx.com). This will be available as a video after the event for those that cannot attend. If you would like to attend this event, please register your interest here.
Pupil GSuite and Arbor Accounts
Launching the homework app in Arbor has made a real difference to us and we hope it also supports you to monitor homework as parents and carers and again your feedback about how this is working is crucial so please continue to get in touch over this. To complement the parent app we have also opened the pupil GSuite accounts and Abor app to encourage children to be independent and as organised as possible – details of logins have been sent to the children’s school GMail accounts which have the same logins as Google Classroom accounts.
Bike Notices
A number of parents and members of the public have contacted us to say they are concerned about the safety of a small number of pupils who cycle to school. Please can you remind your child, if they do cycle to follow the highway code/bikeability training rules, wear a helmet and be mindful of pedestrians as well as cars. In particular, pupils should not ride on the pavement outside school or around Wallasey Village. Also in the darker nights, to make sure they have good lights and high visibility. These issues are also being raised in assemblies and in form time.
From January, Pupils who ride to school must leave their bikes in the allocated bike racks and not on the front ramp. Any bikes left there will be removed for Health and Safety reasons.
Free Parent and Pupils Careers and Apprenticeships Webinars
On: 13th December 2022 at 6.30 – 7.15 pm there is a Webinar to learn about apprenticeships at Lloyds Banking Group
Hear from current apprentices – a day in the life of an audit and data apprenticeship
Organisation insights including what skill sets Lloyds are looking for, their culture and values, how they want to build the bank of the future and where an apprenticeship with Lloyds could take you
Discover apprenticeship opportunities
PLUS a Q&A session, where you’ll be able to ask questions directly to their recruitment teams
Upcoming webinars (details to be shared soon):
CBRE Real Estate (January 2023)
National Audit Office (January 2023)
Jaguar Land Rover (February 2023)
EDF Energy (February 2023)
Deloitte (February 2023)
