Dear Parents/Carers,
Another week with over two thousand positive reward points achieved by our students shows that the middle of term is every bit as successful as the start of the academic year. Last week we held our largest ever open evening event and this week we held the first of three open mornings, again larger than anticipated which is fantastic news. This shows that the collective effort of our staff, students, parents and carers is continuing to grow our reputation with families coming from as far as Westerham and Hastings due to the incredible work and support evident.
It was also lovely to see our first face to face parent’s evening return for Year 11 this week with the best attendance seen for a face to face event. Teachers love nothing more than to talk about the potential of their students and to have such a supportive group of engaged parents and carers our role becomes so much easier, so thank you all. Please keep an eye out on our school calendar for your parent’s evenings.
Important – consent required for new canteen tills
Over the half term break we will be increasing our canteen capacity by installing new tills and increasing the number of payment points. This should increase the capacity at break and lunchtime so students move through the canteen even more quickly. The new tills and fingerprint readers will now be provided by a new company, Live Reader, and we need parental consent to transfer fingerprint data to the new provider. Without such consent purchasing of food will become troublesome after half term. Please note that images of fingerprints are not stored (nor transferred) rather a mathematical model of key points of the fingerprint so that our cashless payment system can be efficient. Also note that Scopay will remain the way in which parents/carers will continue to top up funds for the canteen. Please can all parents/carers follow the steps below using the Bromcom My Child at School app or webpage to ensure consent is provided.
- To update your permission for us to collect your child’s fingerprint, log on to My Child at School either via the website or using the MCAS app
- On the left hand side, there will be a new heading, titled Parental Consent.
- Click on Parental Consent and then click save.
4. This permission is then saved on our system. If you wish to revoke access, please contact enquiries@mascallsacademy.org.uk
Water Bear College of Music
This week Water Bear College of Music came in to give two career talks firstly to Year 9, who will be selecting their KS4 options later on in the academic year, and then to our music students in Year 10-13 who have already selected Music and are now thinking about the pathways after their studies. A variety of careers and Further Education courses were discussed including, but not limited to, a sync manager, a promoter, a venue manager alongside the more well known careers such as a performer or a composer. Students learned the difference between a BA Hons course and an MA course, and our drummers and guitarists in the older year groups took full advantage of talking in detail with the two guest speakers who are professional musicians working within the music industry. One of our Year 13s was so inspired that he has booked on to the open day later in October and has secured an online audition.
Good luck Luke!
European Day of Languages
European Day of Languages was celebrated at Mascalls with a whole school competition and other language related activities in our advisory sessions throughout the week.
Students learned about the different origins of languages and links between languages through the completion of quizzes – our competition winners were E1 Year7, E5 Year8, S8 Year9, S10 Year10 and E14 Year11.
The final competition today involved a presentation of a language of their choice. We were overwhelmed by the number of entries and effort that advisories went to with over 15 different languages being researched.
A superb example of collaborative skills amongst our students was on display by Year 10 students in Earhart 11 who won the final competition.
Finally, from me as always, I would like to extend my continuing gratitude to parents and carers for their ongoing support. That support is shown through your communications with us, with other parents and carers, with your son and daughter at home but also through your attendance at events. We have always maintained that we are each other’s greatest allies and through it all have the same goal, to make sure your son/daughter is happy and making fantastic progress. And they are.
Yours sincerely,
Mr W Monk
Principal
