On Friday 16th November we were delighted to welcome into school a group of invited guests for the official opening of our new Reception and Teaching block. The block hosts a new Reception and Visitor area, together with nine fully equipped teaching classrooms for the delivery of English, Modern Foreign Languages and Religion, Ethics and Philosophy.

Guests included representatives from Warwickshire County Council, Glancy Nicholls Architects, Ridge & Partners Property Consultants, Shipston Town Council and School Governors, with the Guest of Honour being Nadhim Zahawi MP, Parliamentary under Secretary of State for the Department of Education who described us as an “outstanding school with a passionate team of teachers and exceptional students”.

It was a great pleasure to be able to share our pride in our new facilities and to show our local community that Shipston High School is well placed to serve the town and its surrounding community.

We are very pleased to congratulate our Year 11 student Abigail Slatter on being elected the Youth Ambassador for Shipston Town Council. Abi was sworn into the Council at the Town Council meeting on Monday 12th November and will be instrumental in bringing the opinions of the youth of the Town to the Council. Abi is currently Head Girl in our school and we are sure that she will contribute a lot to the workings of the Council.

Our annual remembrance assembly took place on Friday 9th November when the whole school fell silent to remember those who lost their lives in the service of our country.

Students’ interest and awareness of the commemoration of 100 years since the end of the First World War had been heightened during the history lessons of Years 7, 8 and 9 where Miss McElroy had been studying with her students the story of some of the Shipston fallen. With reference to the book “Shipston Remembers” each student in the group had prepared their own individual poppy with a personal message to a named soldier – or an unknown soldier – and these poppies were used to decorate the whole of the back wall of the assembly hall, along with the Royal British Legion “Tommy” figure. The effect of the red poppies on the white wall was amazing and provided a very suitable backdrop to the assembly. It was very interesting to learn that one of the soldiers remembered was, in fact, the great, great, great Grandfather of our student Connor Begley, who is the current Standard Bearer for the British Legion.

We are grateful to the members of the Shipston branch of the Royal British Legion for taking time out during their busy Poppy Appeal fortnight to join us, especially Legion Chairman Richard Adams for leading the assembly.

Careers and skills for life have recently been promoted through some exciting activities in the Art department. Our Head of Art, Ms Costello, is collaborating with artists at Compton Verney Art Gallery and Park to inspire students and raise the profile of Art in education. The creative industries are the fastest growing economic sector in the UK, responsible for 5.6% of jobs and worth £76.9bn to the UK economy. Arts based careers are thriving in the UK and the skills assessed in the subject reward students in the development of ideas, exploration and experimentation, analysis of art forms and skills and responding to experiences and observations.
The link for students with Compton Verney Art Gallery and Park enables our students to develop these skills through working with artists and creating a live installation, “The March of the Imagination”. The artists known as “Musson + Retallik” have worked with the students to create the installation at Compton Verney. The installation will allow the public to become part of the art, shining a torch onto 4000 reflective shapes that lead visitors through the park. Our students have relished the opportunity to explore different ways of expressing themselves through this project.
We will also be working with Bex Art who will be visiting the school to work with our Year 11 students. Bex focusses on high contrast charcoal animal portraiture, a skill our students will certainly enjoy developing, along with understanding how a young artist can build a viable career.

Open Evening for Year 6 pupils and their parents took place on Thursday 27th September. We were thrilled to welcome so many visitors to school so that they could experience for themselves the special “Shipston Spirit” that runs through all our departments. Visitors spoke very highly of the range of activities on offer, the departmental displays, the politeness and maturity of their student guides and the school facilities, including the recently opened new teaching and reception block. Many parents were interviewed by the English department’s roving reporters who collected enough information during the evening to produce their very own Newspaper! A highlight of the evening took place in the Library where Dave Matthews from “The Magic Alley” in Stratford-upon-Avon hosted a storytelling session.

Parents should note that the closing date for on-time applications for entry to Shipston High School in September 2019 is 31st October 2018. We have 120 places available. Our admissions process is managed by the Warwickshire Local Authority Admissions department, but you are welcome to address any general queries to the Headteacher’s Secretary at the school.

With our new intake of Year 7 students settling well into life at Shipston High School, our attention turns to preparing for the September 2019 intake.

Our annual Open Evening for year 6 pupils and their parents takes place on Thursday 27th September from 6.00 p.m. to 8.00 p.m. The Headteacher, Mr Gavin Saunders, will address parents at 6.00 p.m. in the main school Hall and again at 7.30 p.m. Open Evening is a great opportunity to come and see what Shipston High School has to offer. There will be displays, demonstrations and interactive activities in all departments throughout the school, with plenty of opportunity to speak with members of staff and students about life at Shipston High School. It is also a chance to have a look at our newly opened classroom and reception block completed in June of this year.

Open Evening is our last major event for parents to look around the school before the Warwickshire closing date for in-time applications of 31st October. Parents may be surprised to learn that it has been possible to apply for a place for Year 7 in September 2019 since the beginning of July this year and there has already been a substantial number of applications received.

We think we have something unique and special here and we would very much like to share it with you.

Shipston High School students have achieved some fantastic GCSE results this year. Students in year 11 worked extremely hard studying for their exams, and work has been rewarded with strong individual performances and impressive results across the school. They should all be very proud.

These results show the excellent progress students make at the school and I am delighted that they can now go on to fulfil their ambitions in education, training and employment.

2018 is the first year of a new grading system for many subjects, and Shipston students have excelled with these new and challenging exams. Shipston continues its record of strong results in core subjects. In Maths for example, 31% of the year group achieved a grade 7, 8 or 9 – equivalent to A & A* – a fantastic result. Overall in Maths, 81% of students secured grades between 4 and 9.

In English, approximately 80% of students gained a grade 4 to 9 in English Language, significantly ahead of the national average, with nearly a quarter of the year group achieving a grade 7, 8 or 9.

Shipston’s results include students achieving notable success in subjects with completely new exams this year. Drama secured 94% grades 9 to 4, with Biology and Chemistry both at 96%. Physics students achieved 100% grades 9 to 4.

Top grades have been secured across all subjects, including students with every grade at 7, 8 and 9. Progress has been excellent, with students often exceeding their expected outcomes.

The school has a strong and consistent record of achievement. This year’s results will enable students to succeed with further study, training and employment. 2018 results further evidence the strong academic focus of Shipston High School. All students should be congratulated. Families and teaching staff actively support our young people, and we all celebrate their success today. Well done to everyone.

Shipston High School’s work is centred on our students, and we are delighted to see so many strong results; they are a testimony to the ethos of the school and the dedication of our young people. Congratulations.

At the end of this term we said farewell to Mr Phil Leather after 38 years of service to Shipston High School. Mr Leather joined the school in 1980 as a Teacher of Physics, moving onto teaching Information Technology and latterly Computer Science. During this time he also took on the role of Network Manager and set up the original school website.
Mr Leather was given a fond farewell at the Sheldon House assembly on the last day of term where he listened to many tributes from students past and present. He recalled that in his early days at Shipston the school had around 250 students and at one time risked closure by the Local Authority, a very different scenario from the present.
The staff and student body alike would like to wish Mr Leather a long, happy and healthy retirement and all our good wishes for the future.

The uptake of hockey in school has seen a tremendous increase over the last couple of school years. The after school hockey club originally set up by Mrs Smith and now overseen by Miss Davies and Mrs Squance is going from strength to strength with lots of students regularly turning out for practice sessions and playing both in school and club teams. Plans are already well underway for next year’s hockey club tour to Rotterdam.
To end what has been a very successful season, students competed in a Hawaiian themed hockey tournament with team “Coconuts” finishing in the top slot.

During the last 6 weeks of the Summer Term several of our students from across the KS3 age-range have worked on an exciting new design and technology STEM project which considered what the car of the future will be like. The project was supported by the Design and Technology Association (DATA) and Jaguar Land Rover (JLR). It provided students with the opportunity to investigate the application for microprocessors within cars of the future and provided them with the skills to make use of programmable control. As part of the DATA’s Skills for Industry programme, it also gave young people an insight into working in industry and specifically the car industry.
In response to this challenge, students first had to consider what aspect(s) of cars would benefit from being controlled by a micro-processor (for this they would use the ‘Crumble’ programmable micro-controller, manufactured by Mindsets (UK) Ltd https://mindsetsonline.co.uk/ ). Ideas included integral roof boxes which could be expanded / collapsed as required and Car-to-car communications which might respond to each other e.g. if they approached with full-beam headlights, to automatically switch the lights to ‘dipped’. After discussion of all the possibilities the students settled on the challenge to create a boot-space storage device which uses a vacuum bag to securely hold the contents of the boot and prevent them from falling / rolling around and breaking.
Students planned the work and designed and developed several prototypes of the storage system, which included the use of 3D printing. They also developed the program code which would operate the system. All work was documented to show the record of the student’s progression.
On Monday 16th July, five students selected by the group, attended Stratford High School to display their control solution to representatives from DATA and the other schools taking part. James and Matthew Barrett, Atom Gill, Laurence Barnes and Ellie Bonny gave a detailed presentation of their work and demonstrated their prototype solution.
The students spoke clearly and confidently – a testament to the School’s Public Speaking programme – showing good knowledge and understanding of their product.
Overall the presentation evening was a great success and all students felt they’d achieved a great deal from the whole range of activities undertaken. The other members of the design teams were: Oscar Cooper; Lauren Aubrey; Harrison Stone; Albie Murtagh; Jedrezj Jakielski; Alex Gillitt and Sam Howard. Congratulations to all, for a good job, well done.

Many congratulations to Isabella Benfield who, along with her pony Cookie, was crowned National Champion at the Riding for the Disabled Association National Championships held at Hartpury College recently.
Isabella collected a massive amount of accolades including coming first in the Dressage competition, second in Showjumping and being judged Best Turned Out.
An amazing achievement over a very busy weekend.

This year’s Year 11 Prom was held at Heythrop Park Resort, Enstone, Near Chipping Norton.
Although they had only left school a week before, it was lovely to see all our Year 11s back together looking very smart ready to enjoy a well deserved meal and disco together. As in previous years, students didn’t disappoint in the many and varied modes of transport used to arrive at the Hotel!
Thanks to Mrs Peebles for all her hard work in making the Prom such a success.

Year 10 Work Experience took place during week beginning 2nd July.
This gave the whole of Year 10 the chance to find out what it’s like in the world of work and to experience possible career choices for the future. With the help of Ms Moorman, students arranged their visits to a wide range of differing placements both near and far, through hotels, schools, offices, retail and other establishments. Pictured here is Georgina who visited a local livery yard.
We are always grateful to the many local businesses who are willing to accommodate our students to give them such a valuable experience.

We were very saddened by the sudden death of Mike Dobbin, a stalwart of the Royal British Legion Shipston on Stour branch and former Governor of this school.
We were recently approached by Richard Adams, President of the Shipston branch, asking the school to give some thought to a memorial gift that the Legion wished to make in Mike’s memory. It was decided that a wooden bench in the school garden would be a fitting and useful gift that could be shared by staff and students alike.
The bench has now been installed in the garden and we would like to thank members of the Shipston on Stour Royal British Legion for this very thoughtful gift which will invoke some strong memories of Mike and his association with the school over many years.

Two groups of students and staff took part in this year’s GCSE Geography fieldtrip to Borrowdale in the Lake District.
During the course of a very hot and humid week, students were involved in a river study (there was some water!), a tourism study in nearby Keswick, a trip down the Honister Slate Mine and an ascent of the famous Cat Bells.
A great trip with some very useful and detailed information the students can now bring back to use in their GCSE studies.
Many thanks to Miss Davies and Mr Moyle for another very successful trip.

Once again this year, we were happy to be involved with the 20th Shipston Proms music festival.
Students from across the school took part in various events over the Proms fortnight, either representing the school or in their own right.
Our own school concert which was very well attended took place on the evening of 21st June including performances by the Year 7 Choir, the Jazz, Brass and Wind bands and many talented soloists, with the Jazz Band performing in Shipston Town Centre on the “Last Night”.
Thanks to Mr Hunt for all his work this year with some very talented musicians.

Our annual Shipston Award and Pixl (Partners in Excellence) Edge presentations took place on Friday 6th July where over 120 students received their Awards. The ceremony was the culmination of a year’s hard work to achieve either the Pixl or Shipston Award Gold level. Each student received a badge and certificate celebrating their achievement, watched by family and friends. Congratulations to all of our successful students.