Prelim timetable

The Harlaw Academy prelims run from Monday 14th January to Friday 29th January and S4-6 pupils are on study leave for the duration of the prelims.
Pupils can use the timetable below to plan their study over the Christmas break.   Some faculties are running class sessions for pupils(highlighted in blue in the timetable) over the prelim diet, these sessions are not exams and pupils will be informed by their class teachers if they should attend.
Assemblies on the prelim exams will be held on our return and S4-6 pupils must attend to pick up a copy of the timetable and guidance on the dates below:
  • S5 and S6 on Monday 7th January 2019
  • S4 Tuesday 8th January 2019
A copy of the guidance notes for pupils is available here Prelim Guidance for Pupils

10th-14th December 2018 – Christmas Kindness

As we head towards the Christmas holidays we will try to strike a balance between keeping the focus on the work and acknowledging some of the key ideas around this time of year.

On the work front we are very aware of the need to prepare senior pupils for prelim exams in January.  Therefore pupils and staff know they will be working hard in class up to the end of next week.  The same is true for pupils in S1-S3 where we are trying to impress on them the importance of working hard to ensure they are working at at level 4 or above by the time they are finishing S3.   Parents are urged to support us by ensuring they do not take pupils off outwith the school holiday period and they get pupils in school, every day, ready for work.

We will have some activities linked to the festive season and these have been grouped around the theme of “Christmas Kindness”.  We recognise that many of our children come from Christian families and that this is a very special time of year for them.  We also recognise that many of our children come from families of other faith backgrounds and from a no faith background and who do not have the same relationship with some aspects of the celebration of Christmas.  We also serve a very diverse pupil population which includes people from affluent households and people who are living in poverty.  We have some youngsters who thrive on the excitement of the festive season and we have others who become incredibly stressed by excitement and changes to routines.  We need to ensure that whet we do is accessible to all and which includes everyone.

With all of this in mind we have come up with an overarching theme of “Christmas Kindness” – where we try to do things which are accessible, inclusive and promote kindness – to our community, to our classmates and to ourselves.  The theme started on Friday and will continue through next week with some of the highlights being listed below:

  • On-going:  Collections of items for the Incharth food appeal for Tillydrone Flat
  • Friday 14th :  Christmas jumper/festive colours day in aid of Save the Children (this raised over £560 for the charity)
  • During the week – Christmas movies some lunchtime in the Hall
  • Tuesday 18th December – Christmas concert
  • Wednesday 19th December – S1 LEOs fundraiser
  • Wednesday 19th December – Turkey lunches in the canteen
  • Wednesday 19th December – Albyn HT assembly (form time)
  • Thursday 20th December – Carden/Holburn HT assembly (form time)
  • Friday 21st December – Waverly/Victoria HT assembly (form time)

Winter Weather Arrangements

Parents and pupils are asked to note the arrangements in place for spells of severe weather:- 

School Closure/Delayed start

Where heavy early morning snow is forecast the start of the school day may be delayed until 9.30am to allow pupils and staff time to travel to school safely.

You can find up to date information on Harlaw school closures from the following sources:-

  1. The school information line

The number to call is 0870 054 1999 followed byPin Code 011050

2. AberdeenCity Council Website

3. NorthsoundRadio

4. Groupcall message service

Shortened Lunch hour

Where there are safety concerns over severe weather the school lunch hour may be shortened to 45 minutes and the school will close at 3 pm. If a decision is taken to shorten the lunch hour and close at 3pm, this will be communicated through our Groupcall message service.

Priority Paths
 
The priority paths our janitors clear in the morning are indicated on the diagram below and are cleared in order from 1 to 3.
 
 

3rd – 10th December 2018: Success and reassurance

National success:

The highlght of the week was being able to tell people of our success at a National level.  We use a system called accelerated reader to promote reading for our pupils.  The company behind this Renaissance Learning keep an eye on how well it is being used and as a result we were in a short list of 3 Scottish Secondary Schools at a National Awards Event in London the other week.  At the event Harlaw Academy were confirmed as the best Secondary school in Scotland and as well as picking up a trophy we also got a good feature in the local press:  https://www.eveningexpress.co.uk/fp/news/local/literacy-award-for-aberdeen-academy/   

Reassurance:

There are a whole lot of situations which can disrupt the normal running of the school and over the years we have developed plans to respond to each of these.  They range from our winter weather arrangements, fire alarms, heating systems not working, lack of water, gas leaks, lack of phone/IT systems, intruders and a host of other situations.

Most days things tick along without incident then every so often something crops up which puts us into one of our ‘response plans’.  Wednesday was one of those days when we needed to get pupils out of the building safely and assess a situation.  As it took place within the last 20 minutes of the school day we took the decision to ask pupils to leave the building with their bags so they could be dismissed from outside the school.  As it was wet and cold the decision was taken to get them heading home early rather than hang around for 20 minutes in the rain.  Experts came to check the concern and were able to confirm everything was safe and we could open the following day as normal and a group call massage went out to confirm this.

I know when things such as this happen it can cause anxiety for pupils and parents.  Our plans seek firstly to keep people safe and thereafter keep them informed.  In the main our processes worked and the people involved responded in the correct way.  We understand some parents may have wished more information on what was happening but this was not initially possible as we were ensuring people were safe and after things had been checked there was nothing to report other than we were all clear to open normally the next day.

Each situation is different and after each situation we de-brief and make adaptations where necessary.  As part of the de-brief I want provide staff, pupils an parents with reassurance that not only did our our plans/systems  work as intended but our people also all responded as intended.  

26-30th November 2018: Focus on S2 other updates

Focus on S2:

  • Learning and teaching:  Over this week senior staff have been popping into S2 classes to look at the quality of the learning and teaching.  We have been very impressed by both the quality of the teaching we have seen and the attitude shown by pupils towards the work.  As well as visiting classes I also sat in with two pupil focus groups where pupils gave feedback on what it is like to be a learner in S2 at Harlaw Academy.  This information along with the class visits will help us to share what is working well and improve things where required.
  • Teenage Cancer Trust:  On Wednesday all of our S2 pupils had a presentation from a charity called Teenage Cancer Trust.  Over the years I have known a number of teenagers who have had their lives affected by cancer.  Whilst cancer is an illness which affects people of all ages there are particular issues which make it hard to cope with when it affects a teenager.  In recent years this has had growing recognition and indeed facilities at Aberdeen Hospital have recently been upgraded to be more teenage friendly and there are a couple of specialist staff to support teenagers and their families.  Teenage Cancer Trust have specialist workers who can also provide support and we were keen to have a relationship with them should any of our families need their help.  We also wanted them to provide all our pupils with information on the causes of teenage cancer, treatments and preventative measures.  For more information visit their website https://www.teenagecancertrust.org/

Other updates:

  • Building works:  We were advised of three additional pieces of much needed work were being added onto the current contract.  These are: windows to the front of the school by the Hall entrance, the doors and surrounds to the front of C block and redecoration of the stairwell from behind the stage up to science.  These additional jobs will add a few weeks to the planned work and take it through to the Christmas holidays.  As a result we will have to stick with the shorter lunch and early finish during December.  I want to thank staff, pupils and parents for their co-operation and also thank the contractors who are doing very well to work with and around us to get the work done.
  • Staff updates:  We are looking forward to Debbie Green starting with us in the Science Faculty from next week.  At the same time we have unable to fill vacancies in; Computing (to replace Mrs Brodie) and Maths (to replace Mr Bell).  We are currently advertising to fill posts which will become vacant after Christmas in; English (Miss McCrone) and maternity posts in Social Subjects (Mrs Wilson) and English (Mrs Skelly).  Filling posts at any time of year is a growing challenge but I remain hopeful we will find suitable applicants for most of these vacancies.  In the meantime I am asking a lot of staff (both here and in other schools) who are picking up new classes and many youngsters will be having changes of teachers.  If you know of any teachers keen to join our fantastic staff and pupils here at Harlaw Academy ask them to get in contact and to apply.

Scottish National Standardised Assessment (SNSA)

Over the next 3 weeks S3 pupils in Harlaw Academy will be taking part in the Scottish National Standardised Assessments (SNSA).  Full information for parents and pupils is available in the below and copies of this letter have been issued to S3 pupils by their English teacher.

19th-23rd November 2018 – Opportunities

On any given week there is a fair bit going on in Harlaw Academy.  The blog this week lists 10 of the varied activities taking place over the last 5 days in the school:

  • a group of our pupils went to Bridge of don Academy as part of a young inspector project
  • most of our Seniors went to safe drive stay alive a hard hitting presentation aimed at reducing fatal accidents on NE roads
  • pupils from our 4 Primaries visited us for a really successful Health and Well Being morning
  • seniors pupils trained to use the careers web based resource ‘my world of work’ visited two of our Primary schools to show it to P7 pupils
  • S2 girls played well in a multi team netball event held at AGS
  • We had 3 pupils taking part in the Scottish schools swimming trials
  • we had some groups, including our girls coding club, taking part in VEXRobotics the first schools robotics competition which was held at RGC
  • Evening Express carried a report on the extensive volunteering taking place in Harlaw Acadeny
  • Our model UN group took part in a debate with other schools this time in St Margarets School
  • The Parent Council met on Thursday evening with presentations on; pupil support from Mr Mitchell and pupil poverty from Mrs Kermath.  Mrs Lawrence and Mr Blance also made contributions in the Parent Council meeting itself.

It is a very varied and impressive list which shows great commitment on the part of the pupils who take part and parents who support the activities.  It also reflects a huge commitment on the part of staff who offer in these opportunities to pupils and parents.

Footnote:  In my last blog I mentioned that I was thinking about retaining the shortened lunchtime but shifting it so we could have a 3.15 finish.  It now looks likely that the work on replacing the windows will be complete fairly soon and at that point we will be able to revert to the normal school day with the 1 hour lunch.  That being the case we will stick with the current arrangement until the work is finished.  I will contact parents by groupcall when we revert to the normal school day.