Dear Parents, Guardians and Friends
I hope you had a lovely break; with many of us celebrating Easter, or Eid or Vaisakhi…..whatever you did, I hope you found some time to spend with family and friends to get out and about or even get some well-deserved rest over the holiday.
The Easter holiday always feels like a long break, and so whenever I come back to a new term, I am quickly reminded that the “magic elves of The Holt”, aka Mr McWilliam, our Facilities and Estates Director and his team, the site team, Mr Philips, Mr Giles and Mr Barnard have been hard at work the entire time transforming our site!
This holiday is no exception- they have once again done a marvellous job. There is now a beautiful, tree-lined avenue leading from the main car park to the hall. This will help protect the grass during the winter months. The trees were paid for by The Holt Association, who met at one of their twice-yearly lunches. Here are some before and after photos…..
Before: mud and no grass at the edges…….
After: beautiful and protected- these trees will keep growing …..
We are really grateful to Linda Carroll and her team who take an active interest in what is happening in school right now. The Holt Association along with The Friends of The Holt, raise a lot of money for the school and it really does enhance student experience.
This year, we are also hoping to buy some small benches to go along the covered walkway by the car park, as girls like to picnic there as you can see. They often bring blankets and plastic bags to sit on when the weather is wet, so benches would make a big difference.
The Holt Café also had something of a transformation over the holiday and is now a much improved, user friendly and attractive place to eat and chat with friends. The Café team are delighted with their new workspace and we are grateful to Chartwells for enabling it to happen.
Also, over the holiday, Mr Mosley, accompanied by Ms Schotting, Mrs Williams, Mr Henley and Mr Fulker led a successful ski trip for 44 students to Claviere in Italy. They had a great time and were blessed with amazing snow!
Thank you to all the staff that gave up their time over the holiday, we are very grateful.
If last term was about PPEs and relentless marking for our Year 11 and 13 students, this half term is about the final push before the start of the public exams, along with a final English PPE for Year 11. The final push is revision, past papers, looking at mark schemes and honing those exam skills. From the conversations I have had with students, it is clear they certainly have been putting in the work over Easter, so this term is about keeping up the momentum!! Our next groups to be sitting their PPEs are Year 12, and then Year 10, culminating in their actual PoR GCSE exam. We wish them the very best of luck!
As the weather is meant to be summery….(!) students are now able to follow “summer rules” uniform and we look forward to opening up the field for picnics at break and lunch, along with our more summery clubs time table starting shortly. One event which is the sign of the summer term, is the House winners cup party. This year, it was won by Broderers…….their first win, being our newest House, of only 6 years! Well done to them and to Miss Hayes, who has been their Head of House since the House was first created made up of a mere 30 students! More details will be sent to our Broderers in due course!
Mrs Pearce
Co-headteacher