NEWSLETTERFebruary 2017

DATES FOR YOUR DIARY

Mon 13th - Fri 17th Feb Half Term Holiday

Thursday 2nd March Year 8 Parents’ Evening

Thursday 23rd March 6th Form Parents’ Evening

FOLLOW US ON TWITTER FOR INSTANT UPDATES

@blandfordschool

Into The Woods Update

All new ‘Sports Watch’

Presentation Evening Success

FEATURING

EX TBS STUDENT SET TO RELEASE DEBUT SINGLE

A REQUEST TO VISITORS ON SITE IN VEHICLES

We have seen an increasing number of near accidents due to the number of vehicles on site, particularly at the beginning and end of the school day. As we are such a busy site, could we please ask parents delivering or collecting students to park in the car park shared with the leisure centre rather than come onto the main school site.  If your child has mobility issues, or if you need to visit Reception, then please do continue to access the limited parking in front of Reception. May we also please remind all visitors in vehicles of the 5mph speed limit on the internal roadway.

The safety of students, staff and visitors is our main concern, and your assistance in helping us keep our school community safe is most appreciated.

Former Blandford School student Lili White is about to release her very first single. Lili attended The Blandford School from Year 7 to Year 11 and was involved in our very successful production of Les Miserables at The Tivoli Theatre in 2011. She has recently come out of the recording studios with an ex Elton John producer, Stuart Epps, who has worked with artists such as Oasis, Robbie Williams, Led Zeppelin and Chris Rea and recorded her new single “Skyline Pigeon”. Within this single she had some of Elton’s original legendary musicians involved. Lili has also filmed her music video for the track, “Skyline Pigeon” with award winning video director and photographer, Vasilisa Forbes. The video was filmed in Kingston Maurward’s beautiful and famous gardens using the autumn light and leaves.

When she was thirteen, Lili was chosen by Heart FM to perform on the main stage at the Bournemouth Air Festival. “I was honoured”, said Lili, “as I sang a cover of Jessie J’s ‘Price Tag’. She had been my idol for many years and still is to this day, I admire her and her vocals.”

As Lili progressed into her teenage years, along with her vocal coach, she found the style that suited her voice best. From there on, she has been inspired by artists such as Norah Jones, Katie Melua and Nina Nesbitt. To help in the development and experiment with this style, she went busking in Bournemouth. “Just me and my music, the response I got from members of the public made me realise that this was the road I wanted to take.”

This single is being released on Friday 17Th February 2017 and will be available to buy and download online.

For more news head to her Facebook page “Lili White”.

CAREERS CORNER Is your son/daughter considering an apprenticeship starting summer 2017? Now is the time to start looking and registering an interest. Most local colleges offer apprenticeship opportunities, information is available on their websites or in prospectuses available from the school library and you can also look at findapprenticeship.service.gov.uk which is a national database of all current apprenticeship opportunities.

Mrs Norris - Careers Advisor

A group of Year 9 and 10 technology students travelled to Southampton recently to take part in the new project open to approximately 150 students from various schools in the South. The project is designed to develop students’ entrepreneurial spirit, get them thinking like a business and encourage them to work together as a team.

The launch event involved staff from FatFace talking about their different roles and responsibilities within the company, how an idea makes it from paper to the store as well as the launch of the task to students. It demonstrated the wide variety of potential careers available in the ‘Fashion and Creative Industries’. Our students were given the opportunity to talk to different staff members through a Q&A session.

The session was very inspirational. Our students will now begin the task of developing a product in groups which could be marketed in FatFace stores this summer.

STUDENTS ATTEND LAUNCH OF FAT FACE PROJECT

BU Aspire Revision Session Success

On the 23rd and 24th January The Blandford School teamed up with Bournemouth Universities BU Aspire programme to deliver a revision skills session for all Year 10 and Year 11 students and a session after school for their parents. The booklet of resources from the

session can be found on our website, www.blandfordschool.org.uk

GENEROUS DONATION TO YEAR 12 RWANDA TRIP

Blandford Rotary have very kindly paid £500 towards the travel costs of 4 year 12 students who are going to Rwanda in half term.  While there, they will work in a street children’s project, a range of different schools, lead games activities, teach lessons, and learn about the genocide which devastated the country in 1994.  They are going with the Amakuru Trust.  If you would like to donate anything towards supporting the work the charity is doing, you will find more details at amakuru.org.

SPORTS WATCHFor our latest sporting news, follow us

on Twitter! @TBS_PE

NETBALL A massive thank you to Damory Garage and Owain Hughes for the generous £300 donation to The Blandford School for netball equipment. The money will enable us to buy post protectors and a crazy catch net. Thank you.

Year 7/8 Netball beat Shaftesbury in 3 out of 4 games

U16 Netball lost a nail biting game 30-29 to Bryanston A, Mrs Bailey was impressed with the all round team performance throughout, and chose Meg Davies as her Player of the Match.

FOOTBALL Year 9 Boys won the North Dorset Football Tournament, remaining unbeaten throughout the tournament. Other schools complimented the team on their style of football and their attitude. Both the semi final and final were won in dramatic fashion on penalties. Stand out performers were Callum Foster, Aaron Roberts and Owain Cork.

Year 10 Boys Football were unlucky to  be knocked out in the group stages of the Gillingham Tournament, they dominated possession and had many chances in all 3 group games but could not convert their chances into goals.

TBS Netball players pictured with Owain and Ian Hughes, owner of Damory Garage.

STUDENT SPOTLIGHT A huge congratulations to Michael Johnson (Year 11) who recently qualified for the English School’s National Cross Country Trials. Michael entered the Dorset Trials event with TBS and subsequently qualified for the South West Trials, where he has since competed and qualified for a place at the English School’s Final. A massive well done from us all at The Blandford School. 

OTHER SPORTS Year 11 Boys Basketball lost 16-10 to Gillingham A, managing to win the second half 10-6 after a slow start to the game. Player of the match for TBS was Jay Farrar.

Year 9 and 10 girls went to Leaf Academy to compete in the county badminton finals. They came up against some superb players but did us proud. Year 10 girls finished 5th in the county and Year 9 girls finished 4th in the county.

TBS held its annual Presentation Evening on Thursday 15th December which was exceptionally well attended.  The evening was compèred by the delightful Jasmine Hancock and Tom Ansell of Year 13 and numerous current and ex students received awards as well as GCSE, A Level and BTEC certificates. Throughout the evening the audience were entertained by various talented performers, including Jasmine Upward’s (Year 7) solo dance performance and beautiful renditions of ‘In The Bleak Midwinter’ and ‘Amazing Grace’ by the Sixth Form Choir. We would like to congratulate and celebrate the successes of the following students:

The Friends of Blandford Community Hospital Award for:“The student who has done the most to promote healthy living at The Blandford School” - Alex Oldfield

Blandford Town Council Award for Services to the Wider Community - Bethan Amey

Catherine Thomas Award for Contributions to the Performing Arts - Rachel Jennings

The Danny Coker Economics Award for Outstanding Contributions in Class - Jack Manners

Dave Farley Memorial Cricket Trophy - Ryan White

Blandford Lions Community Service Award - Nicolas Hofmann

Elliot Edwards Award for Contribution to School Life - Elena Whale

Nora Dakin Maths Award - James Butler

Mr W J Paulley MBE Attendance Award - Masmi Gurung

The Blandfordians Award for Service to the School Community - Matthew Hart

Miss Simmons Award for Outstanding Contribution to History - Matthew Guyler

Sally Wilson Award for Outstanding Representation of the Student Voice - Faisal Giwa

Stuart Greenfield Award for Service to Sport - Florence Bailey

The TBS Sports Club Award for Outstanding Achievement - Jaydee Burchell

The Taylor Award for Modern Foreign Languages - Jack Manners

Symonds & Sampson Award for Academic Excellence in National Business - Bree Duncan

PRESENTATION EVENING SUCCESS

E-SAFETY COMPETITIONAt the end of last term students were tasked as part of the school’s house competition to design an original resource to teach Yr 6 students about online safety. Students had to consider what they would want to tell Yr 6 students to keep them safe and how best to communicate it. They could do this either in artwork form, through creative writing or as a performance. Congratulations to all students who entered. A special congratulations to Neele Buthmann in Yr 9 who won the competition, gaining 30 house points for Lacey. Other special mentions go to Amelia Handford, Lily Risborough and Courtney Coombs in Yr 7 who gained their house Montfort 20 points by coming in 2nd place. A final congratulations to Sam Barnes in Yr 9 who won 10 points for Lancaster, coming in 3rd place.

Neele Buthmann’s (9KEL) winning poster

Sam Barnes (9GRE)

WAR MEMORIAL PLAQUE RELOCATED TO TBS RECEPTION

Amelia Handford, Lily Risborough and Courtney Coombs (7DAS)

After the First World War, the names of the pupils and staff of Blandford Grammar who died in the Great War were commemorated on 2 bronze plaques that were attached to either side of the gates of the school. When The Blandford School opened and the Grammar School closed, the plaques were repositioned on the end wall of Block 3. Two stone plaques were also added, one commemorating those who died in the Second World War and one for a pupil who died during the Falklands War.

With the 100th Anniversary of WW1, the Governors decided that it would be a good time to reposition all the plaques to the new main entrance to the School, replacing the 2 stone plaques with a new bronze one, manufactured in the same style, as well as carrying out some minor repairs to the old bronze plaques at the same time. This work took place over the summer of 2016 with the plaques being rehung in time for Remembrance Day.

THE ARTS

We are delighted to announce that this year’s school musical rehearsals have begun in preparation for the show in July. Over 100 students auditioned to be a part of the production and Mrs Lucy Bowerman Ellis, Director, can’t wait to get started. “I am delighted  that this year we will be creating our own original production concept for Into the Woods, inspired by Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream and Kneehigh Theatre Company.” Tickets will be available soon for the production of Into The Woods, please keep an eye on our website for more information when it becomes available.

INTO THE WOODS REHEARSALS BEGIN

Archie Vanden Dool, Year 7 Art Student

Kai Stewart, Year 10 Art Student

YEAR 6 STUDENTS ART VISIT

Year 6 students from Durweston and Dunbury School have visited TBS to take part in an Art Workshop run by Ms Bibby. Held over two separate workshops, the students began by tracing pictures of items relevant to the studies they were undertaking at school; Europe for Durweston and animals in danger of extinction for Dunbury. Students were then taught the advanced skill of paper lithography by Ms Bibby before printing their final products with the assistance of our A Level Art students.

For our latest Arts news, follow us on

Twitter! @TBSPCA

SSCT Parents Online Safety Newsletter Spring 2017

This newsletter may be distributed electronically and on paper

See more at https://www.dorset.police.uk/neighbourhood-policing/safe-schools-team/

Safer Internet Day 2017 This year’s Safer Internet Day 2017 is on Tue 7th Feb. More information can be accessed at http://www.saferinternet.org.uk/safer-internet-day/2017. The theme is Be the change: unite for a

better internet. Find out what your child’s school is doing for Safer Internet Day

Sexting: changes to schools and police

guidance The government has recently updated the guidance for both schools and police in dealing with incidents of youth-produced sexual imagery (commonly known as sexting), which involve the taking and sharing of sexual images of children, often by other children.

The change to police guidance is that where an incident is reported to the police, they must now create a crime record in relation to it. This is not the same as a criminal record but could under some circumstances be disclosed on an enhanced Disclosure and Barring Check in the future. Procedures have been put into place to ensure disclosure will not happen routinely and only where necessary.

Where schools have incidents of sexting reported to them, they will need to decide whether to report this

to the police. Where appropriate the incident can be managed by schools, including the deleting of imagery from devices. Parents should be aware that headteachers of schools do have a right to seize and search devices believed to contain harmful content.

The NSPCC have an excellent website explaining how parents can support their children and talk to them about the risks.

https://www.nspcc.org.uk/preventing-abuse/keeping-children-safe/sexting/

Talking to children about terrorism The NSPCC has highlighted children’s fears about terrorism, with 660 counselling sessions on the topic having been provided by Childline between November 2015 and November 2016. Tips for talking to children worried about terrorism include: listen and ask them what they know and how they feel about it; reassure them that adults are doing everything they can to keep them safe; avoid complicated explanations that could leave a child confused and frightened.

NSPCC have also produced a video giving tips from other parents available from https://www.nspcc.org.uk/fighting-for-childhood/news-opinion/increase-calls-childline-paris-attacks/

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