Senior School

What a strange beginning to the term. Even during School holidays we normally have more people here on the campus!

Thank you to all those students, parents and carers who joined us (via Zoom) for our Year Group Meetings on Friday, 9th July. It was a real pleasure to see so many participants and to explore your excellent questions. It is our hope that by taking the opportunity to communicate directly with both students and families we will be able to more successfully navigate the challenges of COVID-19 as a community. 

Thank you to all those families who have made the decision to keep your children at home this past week. While we remain open for those students who need to be here and will continue to make them welcome, it has been good to see numbers on campus drop as low as one single student this week. This has allowed us to keep the vast majority of our staff working from home also, something much appreciated in this time of heightened risk. 

Thank you to our wonderful students for rising so quickly to the challenge of online learning once again. While we all hoped that remote, online lessons were a thing of the past… it seems they are to be a feature of our lives for a little while yet. I have had reports from teachers of the exceptionally hard work of our students, something they should rightly be proud of in this season. Our teachers have also once again leapt into online learning, creating a range of interesting and engaging online lessons for our students. I urge parents who may be working from home to ensure that students log in to lessons at the beginning of each normal period time in order to touch base with their teachers and receive instructions. In my experience, in times of upheaval the more structure and normalcy we can offer to our young people, the better! 

I will look forward to welcoming everyone back on campus when restrictions end… although for those who know the Senior School well… I am not sure our resident wood ducks will agree!  

Mr. Owen Laffin

Deputy Head - Head of Senior School