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Term 2 - 19 December 2024
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Dear Parent/Carer
We are officially Outstanding!!!
As well as wishing you a very peaceful Christmas holiday I am delighted to be able to celebrate what has been a fantastic term of recognition and praise for KSHS students and staff.
Today the outcome of our recent Ofsted inspection is published: both on the Ofsted website and on our own school website. My eager anticipation to share the verdict with both you and students has had to be contained for 4 weeks, but today in assembly we were able to reveal to students just how much the inspectors recognised their commitment, aspiration and attitudes to learning. Do look out for the press coverage in January and scroll down for some more detail.
This endorsement was followed up with the news last weekend of our being ranked 3rd highest achieving state school in the East Midlands by The Sunday Times. Again, read on for more.
Emke, our Deputy Head Student gave her vote of thanks to our guest speaker on Monday night at our Senior Prizegiving. She couldn’t have summed up better what I hope the High School gives to all our students when she said “all the students who attend this little school in this humble town can have big dreams of spreading their wings out into the wider world”.
Do enjoy a peaceful family Christmas and a happy and healthy start to 2025. Thank you as ever for all your support.
Mrs J Smith
Headteacher
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Officially Ofsted Outstanding!
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Never have I been more proud to be able to celebrate with you our fantastic young people’s achievements and to have staff’s collegiality, expertise and compassion recognised.
The Ofsted Inspection team spent two days in school on 19 and 20 November and judged the school’s provision in 5 key areas. They spoke to students, met with staff in a wide range of roles, collected parental views, visited lessons and observed the school in action.
The inspectors made the following judgements:
The quality of education
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Outstanding
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Behaviour and attitudes
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Outstanding
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Personal development
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Outstanding
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Leadership and management
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Outstanding
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Sixth-form provision
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Outstanding
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Today the full report will be published on the Ofsted reports website. Please do have a read.
Thank you to parents who took time to contribute to the inspection by completing the survey and the lovely comments you shared. There is no better endorsement for a school than recommending the school to another parent and the inspection team commented on how high this survey response was.
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Students from all year groups, the Head Girl, Deputy and Assistant Head Girls and Mrs J Smith, Headteacher celebrate the school’s Outstanding verdict.
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KSHS makes the Top Three!
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Each year in November the Sunday Times creates its ‘Parent Power’ Lists. This takes the form of a supplement in the Sunday paper that ranks schools according to student achievements at GCSE and A level.
Our students' success this year means we are rated as the 3rd highest achieving state school in the East Midlands, up one place from last year. Nationally, we were ranked 135th. On top of our recent Ofsted inspection, which judged us against a much wider set of metrics, this was further excellent news and the icing on the cake of a very successful term.
You can read more here Best schools in the UK 2025 | The Times league table | The Times and The Sunday Times but may need a Sunday Times subscription to do so.
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Our top attenders and top merit earners in each Year 7 tutor group got to decorate the school Christmas tree. Pictured here with Miss Nutt Head of Year 7
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Pictured below is the Student Senior Team with Mrs Smith, Headteacher and Kaitlin Howard, Guest Speaker in the reception of KSHS
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Emke, Deputy Head Student, Eve, Assistant Head Girl, Mrs Smith, Kaitlin Howard, Olivia, Head Girl and Meredith, Assistant Head Girl.
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Head Girl Olivia greeted guests before the ceremony.
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Nick Law, Executive Head, Robert Carre Trust, and Kaitlin Howard (Guest Speaker and ex student of KSHS).
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Meredith, Assistant Head Girl played for the audience,
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On Wednesday 11 December, the KSHS Interact Club once again welcomed senior citizens from the Sleaford area to their annual Christmas Party. We had approximately 40 guests this year and we hope they really enjoyed the afternoon. Mrs Pankhurst’s Food Club and Mrs Parrott in the dining room organised a delicious spread of sandwiches, sausage rolls and a variety of mince pies, cakes and biscuits. Mr Mitchinson and Miss Clark from the music department brought dozens of talented musicians to play for our guests. The Interact students decorated tables with Christmas decorations and lots of chocolates and Christmas jokes and kept our guests well topped-up with food, nibbles, tea and coffee. They were then entertained with a quiz, a raffle and a game of bingo, meaning many went home with armfuls of prizes! Thank you to everyone who helped out and donated prizes.
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Lovely to see all our guests enjoying themselves.
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KSHS musicians entertained the guests.
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Library and Literacy News
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During recent Year 7 library lessons, students have been introduced to the Wheelers eBook resource that our school subscribes to. This is a FREE and specialized electronic library platform for all students at KSHS and is an additional way to access reading material, both fiction and non-fiction. Although many of our students do prefer to read from a physical book, the ebook- which can accessed either from an App or desktop device, is a fantastic alternative way to read; especially useful on the go, or for those students who may benefit from a customized reader experience, are visually impaired or on the dyslexia spectrum.
The eBook can be accessed from here or by scanning the QR code
Every student has their own individual log in for the eBook platform and there are no social features or public access. Classifications and age restrictions are aligned with the physical library collections.
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Recommended reads over the Christmas Holidays
The Murder Most Unladylike series by Robin Stevens is the perfect crime collection for amateur sleuths. Join Daisy Wells and Hazel Wong on their adventures as they form their very own detective agency. These are amongst the most popular and borrowed books from our school library and suitable for Key Stage 3 and upwards.
Fox Light by award-winning novelist Katya Balen is described as ‘An Exceptional book’ by The Sunday Times. Fen and Rey are found curled up small and tight in the fiery fur of the foxes at the very edge of the wildlands. Fen is loud and fierce and free. with a connection to foxes and a calling from the wild that she's desperate to return to. Rey is quiet and shy and an expert on nature. Suitable for Key Stage 3 and upwards.
Echostar is Always Listening by Melinda Salisbury is a 2024 publication from Barrington Stoke, who specialises in books for under confident readers and students with dyslexia. This contemporary tale of tech giants is a thrilling read and suitable for Key Stage 3 students upwards, and particularly for those who benefit from reading shorter stories in a dyslexia friendly format.
Elsewhere by Gabrielle Zevin is a young adult book that is both tragic and uplifting. When 15-year-old Liz is killed in a car accident, she ends up in a place called Elsewhere, where death is only the start of a new journey. From the author of the bestselling Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, this book explores themes of love and loss and is suitable for confident readers who are in year 11 or above.
The Boy, The Mole, The Fox and The Horse by Charlie Mackesy. This relatively new book was considered an instant classic when it was first published in 2019 and is a lovely peaceful exploration of friendship, bravery, kindness and hope. Suitable for all ages, this can be read alone or together.
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Merry Mathsmas
Year 8 had the opportunity to take part in a live problem-solving Maths activity. Hosted by Zoe at Think Maths, students took part in different Christmas themed mathematical activities with pupils across the country and internationally. Pupils were impressed at Zoe’s ability to guess their birthday using clever number patterns. They also learnt about the one cut theorem and how to solve Christmas cracker tricks. A fun time was had by all!
Miss N Byrne
Teacher of Maths
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Wednesday 18 December 2024, saw the 3rd annual Gingerbread Bridge Challenge take place for A-level Physics students at KSHS. In teams of three, students were challenged to design, bake, build, and decorate a bridge made purely of gingerbread.
The teams were judged on the taste of their gingerbread, the design/decoration, and most importantly how much mass it could hold before breaking. The bridge also had to span a gap of 15cm.
The taste test was a close call. But the inclusion of spices saw Bea’s bake surpass Charlie’s cooking.
Next, the bridges were presented to be judged on their design, decoration, and whether it actually looked like a bridge. This round was again close, and after the points had been awarded three teams were tied for first place.
The weight test saw some bridges fair better than others with Ronin's and Matt’s bridge supporting a whopping 18kg without so much as a crack.
But ultimately, the bridge designed by Josh and Adrian has scored consistently well through all rounds, and they were crowned 2024 champions.
A thank-you goes out to Ronin, who acted as photographer for the competition as well as competing himself. Well done to all involved!
Mr S Norris
RCT STEM Leader
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Below - bridges on display.
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Well done to the Year 10 volleyball teams who have been training hard this term to compete in their first tournament. All matches were very close. Team A lost just one match and team B lost two respectively.
Next term we are excited to be using our new Volleyball net one of the new resources funded by some of the proceeds from the whole school sponsored walk which took place last July.
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Staff are invited to nominate students who have demonstrated a Growth Mindset in the past few weeks. This might have been in lessons, in clubs, tutor time or simply around school. Please note we already award bi-annual subject badges and merits for good academic work, effort and improvement. These Growth Mindset nominations recognise those who show resilience (academic or otherwise); who aren’t afraid to get things wrong and learn from it; those who have a go, take themselves out of their comfort zone or show that even if a task is tough, they will persevere.
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Change of date for Year 9 students
A busy time in the school calendar for Year 9 has meant that it would be sensible to move the Year 9 assessment week forward by one week.
Year 9 assessment week will therefore be w/c 5 May rather than w/c 28 April which falls very close to the Duke of Edinburgh expedition dates.
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Uniform
Parents’ support in helping their young person adhere to our unform guidelines is always appreciated. Students are clear that January will see our usual high expectations around uniform in place with the usual sanctions for repeat and deliberate failure to follow clearly shared rules.
Please ensure therefore that any ‘Christmas nails’ are removed along with false lashes, or fake tanning product. There seems to be a vogue for wearing ripped tights too at the moment. Your support in avoiding this is appreciated.
A black V-neck jumper can be worn as an additional layer, but not a sweatshirt, round-necked jumper or a jumper instead of a blazer. Our uniform list can be found here Kesteven & Sleaford High School - Uniform which include clear regulations around jewellery too for your information.
Please don’t forget that parents whose children qualify for Free School meals can also draw down financial support for various school-related expenses including uniform costs. If this applies to you please do contact finance@robertcarretrust.uk for further information and support.
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04 Nov 2024
Permanent Part-time 0.8 FTE Maternity Cover MPS/UPS – February 2025 for one year
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09 Sep 2024
We are looking to appoint Cover Supervisors
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