This term is a busy one for the business and management side of the school. Our annual census for the department of Children Schools and Families had to be completed. This year we had a record number of children on roll – 229 – and our school population is more diverse than it ever has been. We have also been through a four day audit of our financial procedures and I was pleased to find out that we passed all 18 standards in the new Financial Management Standards in Schools. In a separate checking exercise, a thorough overhaul of all our vetting and safeguarding procedures was also examined. We were pleased to hear that we were awarded 96% and came third out of the 440 schools in Hertfordshire! We have had numerous meetings with architects and planners as we try to equip our school for the future in replacing the mobile classrooms and also working with the Pre School Learning Alliance to try to bring the new childrens centre to the village.
The staff received two days training at the start of term as part of our ongoing endeavours to improve our school further. One of these days was spent looking at the distinctiveness of being a church school and the other day was developing our knowledge on Assessment for Learning.
We were pleased to be awarded our Bronze Award as an Eco school and our pupil Eco school committee are always giving us ideas about how they think we can improve our environmental awareness. Some of our children represented us at an inter school Eco event and came back with even more ideas! A further delegation took part in a School of Dreams workshop which enabled them to see that by working together it is possible to realise your dreams.
Our extracurricular clubs continue to be very popular. We have more of these than any other school of comparable size in the county. We were also awarded with the Sports Active mark for the third year running which reflects the schools commitment to delivering high quality sport provision. Both our football team and netball team remain unbeaten this season.
You can keep up to date with our news by reading the newsletters on our website each week: www.stpauls909.herts.sch.uk Norah Tattersall, Headteacher