DearParentsWe haveexperiencedone of themost posi-

tive terms in the historyof college! The Ofstedvisit, as you are nowaware, was graded as‘Outstanding’ and theDCSF (Department forChildren, Schools andFamilies) also assessedthe college this term.The Department’s viewwas very similar toOfsted!

As you can see from thisedition the term has been‘action-packed’, culminat-ing in both Christmas andEid festivities. OurCelebration of AchievementEvening, Carol Services,Senior Citizens’ Party, justto mention a few, havebeen highly successful.

We are all looking forwardto a well-earned break at avery special time of theyear. I hope you, too, havethe opportunity to relaxand enjoy the Christmasbreak.

Thank you for your contin-ued support this term!

principal@deferrers

M A YorkPrincipal

www.deferrers.com

deFerrers.COMmuniquédeFerrers.COMmuniquéNumber 043 Christmas 2008

COMMUNICATING THROUGHOUT DE FERRERS SPECIALIST TECHNOLOGY COLLEGE

A D V E N T U R E R A C E - S E E P A G E 3

CELEBRATIONEVENINGOn Friday 5th December, students celebratedtheir successes at the annual “Celebration ofAchievement” Evening.Over one hundred and fiftyawards were presented forachievement, progress, serv-ice to the college and commu-nity and sporting and musicalachievement.More than three hundred par-ents and guests were wel-comed to the event byChairman of Governors,Robert Fraser. The guest ofhonour was Robert Simpson,Deputy Leader of the CountyCouncil.The evening lasted two hoursand the theme wasInternational Mindedness toreflect the collegeʼs missionstatement. A video preparedby BTec Media students, CarlDavis and Natalie Stone, gavean impressive presentation ofthe international visits that stu-dents at the college had madethroughout the year. Musicalentertainment was provided bytwo of the collegeʼs bands,DeFJO and the Wind Band.The current Head Students,Bethany Shardlow and SamLawton reflected on how thecollege had developed sincethey were in Year 7 and com-mented particularly on theincreasing use of technologywithin lessons. They present-ed County Councillor, RobertSimpson, with Tutbury Crystaltumblers.The College was delighted towelcome back last yearʼs Year13 who also attended the cel-ebration.

Season’sGreetings

fromGovernors,Staff andStudentsof the

College

FFEESSTTIIVVEE FFUUNNFFOORR SSEENNIIOORRCCIITTIIZZEENNSS!!Over two hundred Year 11 stu-dents hosted a wonderfulChristmas Party for SeniorCitizens in our community. Thestudents raised enough money toprovide a delicious spread for allof our guests and to providebingo prizes. To raise funds stu-dents participated in a series ofsponsored events including aSponsored Silence, SponsoredWalks, Sponsored Pyjama Dayand various sponsored sportingevents. During the afternoon students

and staff entertained our guestsby singing, performing magictricks, circus acts and musicalitems. After tea Santa arrived andhosted a marvellous game ofbingo. The guests had a lovelytime and the students benefited agreat deal by contributing to theevent in a variety of ways.

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A group of Year 9 studentshave been involved in a pho-tography competition inassociation with OKI PrintingSolutions and Born Free.

The students have been takingphotographs in the Dove gar-den area and using skillslearnt to capture images outof college. The group decidedon five photographs to enter.Two of these have made it intothe gallery for judging whichtakes place in January.

Featured here are the entrieswhich have made it into thegallery.

Birds In FlightTommy Bailey

Bearded DragonMacauley Fletcher-Carruthers

BURTON FIREFIGHTERS TOTHE RESCUE!!Year 12 students from deFerrers were put throughtheir paces at Burton FireStation during November.Fire Fighter Pete Wildmangave demonstrations of various pieces of equipmentused in emergency situa-tions. Complementing the collegeʼs focuson International mindedness, thisexperience was invaluable to stu-dents, whose current brief in theirAS Product Design course is todesign and manufacture a productsuitable to be used by worldwide

rescue services, following naturaldisasters.Although a wide range of life sav-ing cutting, tracking and breathingequipment were all reviewed, SamSmith from Year 12 proves thatthereʼs nothing quite like dressingup as Fireman Sam!!Our thanks, once again, go to thestaff of Burton Fire Service for theircontinued support of the college.

LIGHTS, CAMERA, ACTION! The Design & Technology GCSE and A level Textile studentswere totally inspired when they attended the Clothes Showexhibition at Birmingham on the 8th December. Not only didstudents have the opportunity to see how the industry worksbut they were also treated to an inspiring professional catwalkand hands on advice from universities and colleges that offerfurther qualifications in this field.

An EnterprisingChristmasA big thank you to everyone whosupported our Young Enterpriseteams (Conscience, Qwerty andGreen Beavers) at the ChristmasFair. All of the team members thoroughlyenjoyed the event and it was a won-derful opportunity for them to gainfirst hand knowledge of trading theirproducts to the public. This experi-ence will help them to prepare for theactual trade fair which is being held inBurton town centre on Saturday,February 7th, where they will be com-peting with other schools from theBurton area. We wish all of the teamssuccess at this event.

Many thanks and a Happy Christmasto the owners of The Butcher, TheBaker and Ice Cream Maker at BartonMarina who have supported theEnterprise Curriculum Area in a vari-ety of different ways over the pastyear. They were kind enough to donatea Christmas ham to one of the YoungEnterprise teams who were then ableto sell tickets and use some of theproceeds to donate to charity.

They also gave a business presenta-tion to our Year 12 Business andEconomics students at college whichfocused on a range of issues that arerelevant to their forthcoming exam. It is this type of business support andcommunity involvement which reallyhelps the students to relate theirstudies to an actual real life business.

INDOOR ROCKCLIMBINGThe Tower, LeicesterOur very own extreme rockclimber, Mr Taylor, hasinvolved twenty studentsfrom Years 10 and 11 in theNational Indoor ClimbingAchievement Scheme(NICAS) at level 1. During the four week coursestudents have developed basicrock climbing skills, safety tech-niques, team work and, mostimportantly, trust. The specialistskills that have been taughtinclude how to wear a climbingharness, attach and use a belaydevice along with differentmethods of climbing such asʻedgingʼ and ʻsmearingʼ.All students have shown perse-verance, determination, physi-cal as well as mental fitness,followed by a great sense ofpersonal achievement. Withmore opportunity to participatethroughout the year, new andfamiliar faces are most wel-come.

DATA PROTECTIONThe new Fair ProcessingNotice for 2008-9 has nowbeen issued by theDepartment for Children,Schools and Families.This year the notice hasbeen split into two parts:� The Summary

� The Full Text (which is available on ourwebsite, www.deferrers.com)The college would like toassure all students and par-ents that we do not pass onpersonal data to commer-cial organisations for mail-shot purposes.

SCIENCEYear 11 Additional exams inJanuary. ONLY applies to

teaching groups11C1 and 11P1.

Biology B2 exam is Monday12th am/ Chemistry C2 is

Thurs 15th pm/Physics P2 is Monday 19th am. Remember torevise for these!

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PSFA

SICKNESSParents MUST

phone college if students are going

to be off ill. On their return students MUST

bring a letter of explanation

Adventure Race On Sunday the 7th December an elite team offourteen students from Year 12 and seven stafffrom across the college took part in the Rab MiniMountain Marathon at Bakewell organised byDark and White events.

Amy Harrison and Zoe Pelech above the Monsall Viaduct,Derbyshire

The event was a three hournavigation race where teamshad to find a series of hiddencheckpoints across theDerbyshire countryside. Eachcheckpoint was given a valueand the team that collectedthe most points and cameback in under the time limitwas declared the winner.

After a very cold start at8:45am, the seven teams setoff and made excellentprogress. Mrs Thomas, aalong with Thomasina Sargentand Louise McLean, was seenseveral miles away from thestart heading for the hardestcheckpoint, while others chose

to concentrate on findingthose nearer to the start thathad a lower value attached. Atthe end of the race, twoteams hadnʼt made it back butwere eventually picked up inBakewell town centre. A greatmany reasons were given fornot making it back on time butgreed and poor map readingwere probably to blame!

The final results were:First– Chris Annett, BethEvans, Miss RobertsSecond – Josh Carr, MoAhmed, Mr TysonThird – Scott Stone, MattBrown, Mr Spencer Smith

FOOD CLUB The Year 7 FantasticFood Club have fin-ished their programmeon a high by invitingparents in to pass on

recipes in a practicalsession. The ten ses-sions were thoroughlyenjoyed with all stu-dents receiving theirActive Kids GetCooking Bronze Award.

This year's Autumn Concert wasa fantastic success with a wholehost of acts giving a sold outTrent Hall audience an evening oftop quality entertainment. Therewere performances from choirs,bands, soloists and dancers;highlights included AmyHarrison's stunning version of'Autumn Leaves', backed byDeFJO and the Wind Band's ren-dition of 'Pirates of theCaribbean', which was a thrillingend to the first half. Technologyplayed its part with a video linkfrom the piano, so that EmmaMargetson's hands could be seenon the big screens during hersolo. It was also the debut outingfor the newly formed Mini DeFJO,run by the Year 12 IBDP students,who did a great job of 'Route 66'and 'Birdland'.

The Brax group recently played car-ols at the Christmas Fayre, and theWind Band and DeFJO both per-formed at Celebration Evening. Thelong term is now reaching its climaxwith many students performing atthe Senior Citizens' Party, beforeour annual traditional Christmasevents. The Carol Concert, in con-junction with five of our PartnerPrimary schools takes place onMonday (15th) and our CarolService is at St John's Church,Rolleston Road on Tuesday 16th.The Service starts at 7.30pm - allare welcome, but we suggest arriv-ing early as this is always a popularevent.

After the success of last year'sappearance, DeFJO are delighted tohave been asked to play again forthe Derby Music Club. They will betaking the stage on Tuesday 13thJanuary at 7.30pm at DerbyGrammar School for a forty minuteset. If you would like to attend thisevent please contact Mr Aston forfurther details.

Look out for our Evening of the Artsand Spring Concert next term, andwe will have news of next July's pro-duction very soon....

May we take this opportunity tothank you for your continuedsupport and wish you all aPeaceful Christmas and a Heathyand Prosperous 2009.

Music NotesThis Autumn term has been abusy one for the Parents, Staffand Friends Association. The Cash Bingo night was held on 20thOctober and was a great success payingout cash for every game and still mak-ing a profit for the PSFA funds. Thankyou to everyone who came along andplayed or helped. We will be holdinganother Cash Bingo night in the NewYear – watch out for the posters orhave a look at our page on the deFerrers website for further details.

On Friday 15th November we were to beseen manning the bar at the AutumnConcert. This, I have to say, is really nochore for PSFA members as we get towatch all the performances whichshowcase some amazing talent withinthe college and are always very enter-taining.

Finally we have just held our annualChristmas Fayre last Thursday. Nearlythree hundred people attended theevent and they were able to see Santain his brightly lit sleigh at the entrancetogether with Mr Wilson performingsome spectacular juggling with fire!Inside there were many stalls andgames to participate in including theChristmas Hamper raffle, the tombo-las, books and games, Hoopla,Decorate a Lolly and much, much more.It was also good to see the three YoungEnterprise teams displaying someremarkably creative items for sale ( Ihave yet to wear my earrings madefrom multi coloured buttons – maybeChristmas Day?). They put a lot ofeffort into their offerings. Many peo-ple got some great bargains at theAuction – where else can you get avoucher for a 14kg turkey for £8? Avery big thank you to staff, studentsand parents who all helped to make theevening a great success. We look for-ward to seeing you all again next year.

So, Up and Coming Events!

We will be holding a QUIZ Night onFriday 30th January at Dove. This isalways a very popular event. Pleaselook out for letters home, posters andnotices in the paper about this at thebeginning of January. There will berefreshments and a licensed bar as wellas lots of prizes so put the date in yourdiary now.

We are always on the lookout for moremembers, particularly from the newYear 7 parents who may have lots ofideas from their experiences at JuniorSchool. If you are interested in findingout more or if you want further infor-mation about any of the events we runplease contact the school or AnitaMcLean on 01283 568201.

All that remains now is for me towish you all a Very Merry Christmasand a Happy and Prosperous NewYear!

Anita McLean, Chair

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Trent CampusSt Mary’s DriveBurton upon TrentDE13 0LLTelephone: 01283 239936Fax: 01283 239950

e-mail: office@deferrers.staffs.sch.uk www.deferrers.com

Dove CampusHarehedge LaneBurton upon TrentDE13 0ASTelephone: 01283 239961Fax: 01283 239971

de FerrersSpecialist Technology CollegePrincipal: Mr M A York BA (Hons) BEd MBA

SPORT

TO SEE A COLOUR VERSION OF THIS NEWSLETTER GO TO www.deferrers.com

YOUNGDESIGNERSDove Campus studentshave once again provedthey are the designers ofthe future with another veryclose Young DesignersCompetition. Every student nominated had pro-duced excellent work and thedecision to shortlist FawnClements (Room forImprovement) and WeronikaStepien (Magnetise) from Year 8and Bethany Haynes (Magnetise)and Tammy Nash (Cyber Café)from Year 9 was very difficult.Between the 19th November andthe 3rd December votes were castby all students in Years 8 and 9and eventually two winners weredecided. Congratulations go to Weronikaand Bethany as well as all theother nominated designers. Thenext competition starts at the endof the next project. If you want tobe a winner, aim for your targetsand make sure your presentationis of the highest standard.

NETBALLBURTON AND DISTRICTVERSATILITY NETBALLTOURNAMENTEach team is made up of threeYear 11 girls, two Year 10 girls andtwo Year 9 girls in remembranceof Margaret Jones Excellent play by all - undefeatedthroughout the tournament andare therefore BURTON AND DISTRICT CHAMPIONS!

Two hundred and fifty Year 7 students have had anoutstanding weekend at the annual PGL activity event.Students were given the opportunity to participate in arange of activities including abseiling, zip wire and thepopular giant swing. Great fun was had by all.

Back row: Kirsty Lane, Emma Henderson, Emily Featherstone, Whitney ClarkeFront Row: Danielle Broster, Louisa Statham, Elouise Freitas, Hannah Ward

DEBATING TEAM WINSAND LOSES ON THESAME NIGHT!On an autumnal night in earlyNovember, de Ferrers returned to thehot bed of political debate withmixed fortunes. With the newlyformed Debating Society barely intoits second month, Daniel Jones (Year10) and Amy Couchman (Year 11)bravely stood up to the plate in theMidlands Schools DebatingCompetition, held at the Institute ofEducation in the centre ofBirmingham.

We picked up the format of the compe-tition during the first debate betweentwo other schools - “This housebelieves that global warming will ben-efit the human race”. We learnt about“indulging in rebuttals” and the finerpoints of public speaking.

Our debate, against Solihull GrammarSchool, involved opposing the motionthat “capitalism is now a discrediteconomic system”. It started offrather strangely – a 10 minute historylesson from Solihull about the creatorof capitalism and a couple of funnyanecdotes but very little in the way of“answering the question”. Alas, thiswas setting the scene for landingsome heavy punches later on. Danielopposed the proposal superbly, tick-ing off the points raised by Solihull,and Amy put the icing on the cake bycompleting our argument.

Whilst the audience vote went our way(15-9 I think), the judges went withSolihull, in my view more based ontheir public speaking attributes(which were excellent) rather thantheir talent at debating. With this inmind, The English Speaking Union willbe holding a day’s workshop later nextyear for twenty lucky students to honetheir debating and public speakingskills. We will also be entering theStudent Question Time Competitionnext year.

Gifted and Talented Stop Press:Congratulations to Charlie Sarson onwinning a place on the 'Sketch' resi-dential course which takes place inJanuary.

MathematiciansOn Their Way To LondonA team of four of our finestSixth Form mathematicianstook part and won the region-al final of the UK Maths TrustSenior Team Challenge.Competing at the BT TrainingCentre at Yarnfield, the deFerrers team of Charlotte

FOOTBALLThere have been two cup match-es played under floodlights sincehalf term for de Ferrers and bothhave proved disappointing results.The Year 7 team went down 3-2to Paget in the first round. Thiswas disappointing as de Ferrersbeat Paget 5-0 earlier in the sea-son in a league match. The Year 8team also failed to progress toround 2 as they lost on penaltiesafter a 5-5 thriller of a game. The Year 11 football team mem-bers made it through to the semi-final of the County cup, but wereunable to progress any furtherafter a substandard performancemeant their being comfortablybeaten 6-2 by John Fisher HighSchool from Stoke.

BASKETBALLThe building of the new SportsHall has had a very positive effecton Basketball this year. Key Stage3, 4 and 5 have had opportunitiesfor training and it has certainlyreflected in the results so far thisseason. The Year 10 students arecurrently undefeated in all compe-titions so far this season.Sixth FormLeague:de Ferrers 87-26 Thomas AlleynesYear 11League:de Ferrers 37-40 Pauletde Ferrers 60-41 William AllitYear 10League:de Ferrers 36-33 Thomas Alleynesde Ferrers 81-46 John Taylorde Ferrers 121-7 William AllitCounty Cup (1st round)de Ferrers 81-46 John TaylorYear 9League:de Ferrers 26-8 Thomas Alleynesde Ferrers 28-6 William AllitCounty Cup (1st round)de Ferrers 26-8 Thomas AlleynesYear 11 GirlsCounty Cup (1st round)de Ferrers 18-27 John Fisher

Well done to all involved insport so far this year and keepup the excellent commitment!!

Mowforth, Paul Stanyon,Zakk Borton and Henry Greertook first place over manyother Staffordshire schools.The competition is verydemanding, comprising ofthree rounds of questionsthat would challenge any ALevel Maths student.The team will now travel toLondon in February to com-pete in the National Final.

NETBALLCHAMPIONS

PGL Adventure Weekend