Published March 4, 2022
What a week!
The first week back has been absolutely packed full of opportunities and initiatives! We were joined by the Jon Egging Trust earlier this week to work with a number of Year 8 helping to build resilience and self-esteem. There have also been two Wild Wellbeing outings this week, lovely Ash Wednesday services to mark the beginning of Lent, final stages of the Public Speaking competition for Year 10, and World Book Day on Thursday, with some absolutely fantastic costumes and thought-provoking stories relating to homelessness being read in each lesson.
To top off the week, we have 51 pupils and 7 staff doing the Big Sleep tonight at the Cathedral! If you would like to donate to the St Joe’s Big Sleep page, please click here.
Latest Covid Guidance
Following the announcements from the government regarding ‘living with COVID’, we wanted to clarify our approach which has been guided by Wiltshire Local Authority.
Although there is no longer a requirement for twice-weekly testing, if you have symptoms, we do encourage you to test using a lateral flow. If this is positive, please do inform us by emailing attendance@sjcs.org.uk and covid@sjcs.org.uk.
We then recommend that you isolate for 5 days and test on the morning of day 5 and on the morning of day 6. If both tests are negative, your child will be expected to come back to school. If not, keep testing daily until you have 2 consecutive negative tests (please do this for a period of up to 10 days from the initial positive test).
Ukraine
The news is dominated by the conflict in Ukraine at the moment, and there are many distressing and tragic scenarios playing out as a result of the war there. If you are looking for support on how to help your child deal with the upsetting content, then this website will be of help.
As a school we will be supporting humanitarian aid efforts, particularly for the over one million refugees who have had their lives turned upside down. We will be working with local organisations and will arrange for donations of clothes, blankets, hygiene products etc. We will be releasing a separate communication next week letting you know how you can help.
Careers Week & Job of the Week
Next week in school is Careers Week and although every week is careers week here at St. Joseph’s, we want to raise the profile a little by encouraging pupils to discuss previous careers/jobs that our staff have had so they can see the variety of jobs and careers that are on offer in the world of work. Teachers are being encouraged to stick a poster to their door showing previous jobs they did before they joined us at St Joseph’s, and the skills these jobs helped them to develop.
Job of the Week – Every week we will be sharing a Job of the Week with forms groups. These are short films (generally 2-3 minutes) about a huge range of different careers, and we think they are quite engaging and will give the pupils lots of food for thought!
Year 8 Parents Evening
Year 8 Parents’ Evening is fast approaching and will be a virtual parents’ evening. It is the same system used last summer when the pupils were in Year 7, and appointments are available to book from 3pm today via this website.
A separate communication with more detailed instructions on how to book will be sent out early next week.
Progress Reports
Keeping you informed of your child’s progress is an important part of our teamwork with our families and our second progress reports for each pupil will be distributed before the end of this half term.
Achievement Points
It’s been a very positive start to the half term with lots of Achievement Points being earned by the pupils:
- 1st place: Margaret with 33,409 points
- 2nd place: Vincent with 31,402 points
- 3rd place: Teresa with 30,168 points
- 4th place: Francis with 26,950 points
Have a lovely weekend!
Mr Rooney