13th September 2019A Message from the Head...As mentioned in last week's newsletter, the Leadership Team charity challenge this year is to ride one of the stages of the forthcoming UCI World Cycling Championships which take place in and around Harrogate starting next week. Our ride takes place on Sunday 22nd September and we are riding the short (46 miles!) route if anyone would like to come out and cheer us on - we certainly need all the help we can get! Thank you to those who have already sponsored us - we have raised over £500 so far and everything we do raise will be donated to Cancer Research UK. In a series of short blogs next week, the five of us will share our own stories with you explaining why this particular charity is so close to our hearts. These stories, together with the photos from our rides, will be then brought together in the form of a tribute book following the event. Join us in our special tribute...We would love to include some of your personal stories in our tribute book as well so, if you have someone in your life who you would like to pay tribute to, either for their courageous battle against cancer, or if they sadly lost their fight with this cruel disease, then please do email tributes@gatewaysschool.co.uk with a picture of the person you'd like to pay tribute to and the story you would like to share. All contributors will receive a digital copy of the book containing all the tributes alongside their entry paying tribute to their particular loved one. All we ask in return is that you make a donation via our Just Giving page (here) so that we can help Cancer Research UK continue their work to beat this unforgiving illness. Please mark your Just Giving donations "In tribute to..." or "In memory of..." so that we know to look out for your tribute arriving in our email inbox! We ask that donations are made prior to the race day on the 22nd September and that your tributes are emailed to the address above by the end of September in order to be included in the book. If you have already sponsored us and would like to submit a tribute for our book, please just email it as above. Please feel free to share this invitation to anyone who might like to place an entry in the tribute book, they do not have to be a member of our community to be part of this project. Let's hope with our pedal power and your tributes we can help to raise the UK's survival rates to be more in line with countries of similar wealth to ours! Sincere thanks. - Dr Tracy Johnson - Quick Links To Popular Content:Parents & Friends "Meet & Greet"Thank you to everyone who came along to our first event of the year - it was lovely to see so many new faces and to welcome you all back to school. Thanks to Wayne and his team for catering for us so well and we hope you all enjoyed the event!Just a quick reminder to 'like' our Facebook Page here. By 'liking' this Page you will then be kept up to date with all the events taking place throughout the rest of the year. As explained this morning, once you have 'liked' the Page, you can then request to join the Members Group if you would like to ask any questions or join in any discussions etc.If you would like to be involved with the PFA, then there is an informal "Christmas Afternoon Tea" planning meeting scheduled for next Friday morning (20th). Just go to the main school reception straight after drop off and Nurse Diane will escort you to the meeting room where there is bound to be yet more cake!!Finally, I must say a huge thank you to Mrs Emma Cundale who steps down from the Committee after 11 years of valuable service, support and comradeship! We will miss you Emma! - Kathryn Dyer, PFA Chair - Articles from ...Let the games begin...As usual, the start of the new school year sees the start of the competition to win the House Cup! The House Officials have taken up their positions and been awarded their badges so the competition has 'offically' started. Good luck to Mr Lenihan who takes over from Mrs Wilson in leading Newby... ... good luck also to Mr Crosby who takes over from Mrs Brown in leading Harewood. They both join Mr Reeves who continues in his leadership of Beningbrough! School charity work continues...At the end of last academic year, we had a fantastic year supporting our chosen charity, Plastic Oceans, in a variety of ways. The year ended with a high school beach clean-up and a full day of various presentations allowing pupils to share their own views on the impact of plastic pollution and what we can do about it. Last Friday we had our first assembly to share our fundraising plans and to remind our pupils of the great things they can do try and reduce the amount of plastic pollution that could potentially end up in the ocean. We are encouraging pupils and parents to use our in-school recycling scheme of all crisp packets, biscuit wrappers, pringle tubes and items of stationery that no longer work. Please collect these items and give them to your son or daughter to hand in. These items will be recycled into new products, putting an end to them being single use plastic. We are still running the eco-brick competition so any eco-bricks would be gratefully received. We are aiming to use them to build a structure such as a school bench to show how single use plastic can be put to good use. Please use the link (here) to find out how to make an eco- brick. In addition, we will continue to be a battery recycling centre so please send your old batteries in to school. We can provide you with a free battery collection box available from the school reception or Youngers hall. Finally, I would like to end by sharing with you some of the fantastic work that our high school girls composed during our Plastic Oceans themed day at the end of last term. Faye, now in Lower 5 chose to write a creative piece combined with her personal and emotive views about the impact of plastic and the knowledge she gained from her trip to The Deep. Click here to read her work. Maisie, now in Upper 6, chose to write a persuasive piece of writing which can be found here. I would urge you to spend some time to read these pieces. They convey the passion and impact that plastic pollution has on many young people. I am exceptionally proud of the work you have produced, girls. You give me hope that we might see a future when the world does not have polluted oceans. - Dr Sara Newton - |