Castle Hill Blog, 09.12.2022

Ho! Ho! Ho!
Many thanks to all of you who attended our Christmas Fayre last Saturday. It was a fantastic event with a great turnout, including the big man himself, assisted by a couple of cheeky elves! We raised just over £2000 for our School Fund, which is used to subsidise trips, residentials and our rewards initiative.

Winter has certainly arrived this week and it seems timely to outline our procedures for having to close school in the event of heavy snow.

If overnight snow means that school cannot open in the morning

We will notify you by text message and post a message on the school website. We will also notify local authority transport. 

If snow during the school day forces a closure

This is a little more complicated, but our priority is to get pupils, and then staff, home as quickly and safely as possible.

If your child is an independent traveller we will send you a text message advising that school is closing and asking you to phone school to confirm that they can travel home immediately.

If you collect your child from school we will send you a text message asking you to collect your child immediately.

If your child is on local authority transport we will send you a text message advising that their usual taxi minibus is on its way to school to collect them.

Once closed, further updates will then be posted on the school website and sent out via text message.

It is clearly vital that we have the most up to date phone number for all parents and carers. If you think we may not have this please notify the school office.

Car parking

As any of you who have visited the school at the start or end of the day will know, car parking space is limited. Unfortunately, as of next Monday, the situation will worsen as we are losing 11 parking spaces to allow access for trucks involved in the Lisburne School build. Whilst this is very frustrating, it can't be avoided. We're therefore asking that parents and carers who drop their children off in the morning do just that, ie. pull up, drop your child off and leave, rather than parking up and waiting for the school bell to ring before letting your child out of the car. By doing so, as many spaces as possible will be available to our staff. We greatly appreciate your cooperation with this.

Parking issues in and around school are likely to become even more challenging when the new Lisburne School opens next September. One solution that some parents and carers use is to park at the far end of The Fairway, or even in Aldi car park, and either walk their child to and from school from there, or get their child to walk to and from their car independently. Whilst we appreciate that this isn't appropriate for all pupils, it can be a great introduction to independent travel for older and more confident pupils. 

Christmas dinner and jumper day

We'll be serving Christmas Dinner on Tuesday 20th December and to make the event extra festive, this will also be our Christmas Jumper (and non-uniform) Day. We're asking for a donation of £1 which will be given to 'Save the Children'. 

I'm off to put the sprouts on and knit something suitably festive!

Have a great weekend and keep warm!!!