Issue 1041: 19th April 2024 – Sweyne Park School

HEADLINES

Welcome Back

I hope you all had a lovely Easter holiday and enjoyed spending time with your families and friends. I am sure that our Year 11 pupils and Year 13 students will have used the break constructively in preparation for the external exams. With these already underway, I would like to take the opportunity to wish them all the very best of luck and the success they deserve over the coming weeks.

Ski Trip

During the Easter break 40 of our pupils and students accompanied by 6 members of staff enjoyed a fantastic ski trip to Quebec.

Everyone had a wonderful time and thoroughly enjoyed the experience. I am extremely proud to say that our staff received numerous compliments on the behaviour, attitude and maturity of all of our pupils and students.

Mr Garrod, who worked tirelessly to organise and lead the trip has provided a more detailed account of what really was a once in a lifetime experience, please see his report below with some brilliant photos included.

Thank you also to Mr Edwards, Miss Banks, Ms Goodey, Mr Jackson and Mrs Lockhart for giving up a week of their Easter break to accompany the pupils and students.

The 2025 ski trip will take place in February half-term, visiting Madesimo in Italy, the cost of which will be £1,980. If you are interested in finding out more, please contact Mr Andrew, Head of PE.”

Use of an AV1 Device

I would like to inform you that as of next week an AV1 will be being used in some lessons in order to support one of our pupils. An AV1 is a device which is placed in the classroom and livestreams lessons back to a pupil in a location outside of school, for example to their home or in hospital.

It acts as a pupil’s presence in the classroom to enable them to participate in lessons if they are unable to come into school for medical reasons and in other specific circumstances.

Please rest assured that it is not possible for the pupil to record or screenshot using the device, and it will be placed at the front of classrooms so that other pupils are not visible.

London Landmarks Half Marathon

Last Saturday saw 5 of our Sixth Form students, Abby, Layla, Josh, Jamie and Owen run the London Landmarks Half Marathon.

Between them they managed to raise and incredible £2,490 for Prost8, a UK based prostrate cancer charity.

They all trained extremely hard, the result of which were some truly impressive race times. Huge congratulations to them all.

And Finally….

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The SweynePark School

Easter Ski Trip: Mr Garrod Reporting……

After a pause of 4 years, we are delighted to have resumed annual ski trips! Competitive quotes revealed that taking 40 pupils to Canada would actually be quite achievable, so Mont Tremblant, Quebec became the focus of my planning. A “snow sure” destination, even at the end of the season, with every expectation of there being at least a couple of foot of snow on the ground around the village. Climate change had other designs, but we made the most of what we had!

The journey went incredibly smoothly, with the whole party being sat together on the plane and several Year 11s taking advantage of the opportunity to do some trans-Atlantic revision!

Arrival in Mont Tremblant saw us take up residence in the Marriott Hotel, with pupils being delighted at their rooms and the pedestrianised village around us. We very much enjoyed taking the gondola from in front of the hotel, up and over the hotel, to the other end of the village. Here we found the ski hire shop, the ski school, the nursery slope and the lifts to the summit. This really was the most incredibly convenient – luxurious – arrangement you could imagine!

All pupils started on the nursery slopes, with those that had skied before being assessed and then taken straight to the summit. Everybody else stayed on the nursery slopes until confident. Those with poorly fitting boots were able to step over to the ski shop to exchange them.

We were advised that we would have to stop skiing early on the Monday, due to the Solar Eclipse. Of course, we didn’t mind – blue sky, warm weather and a rare celestial event right in the middle of our ski trip… So lucky!

Within a day or two, everybody was up to the summit, progressing their ability by enjoying tuition and encouragement from the wonderful ski instructors. We all met up at the summit rest area for lunch each day, to eat and share stories of our experiences.

Meals were wonderful, with buffet breakfasts (several pupils eating Kilos of bacon and egg each day). In the evenings, we ate at some of the local restaurants – the food was great and everyone ate well. On the Thursday, we went to the most stylish restaurant in the village, to celebrate the birthday of one of our pupils.

We had great fun with our apres-ski, with a couple of evenings together playing indoor games, having a village-wide exploration game (including “Where’s Wally”), a birthday party and a trip in a yellow school bus to see an Ice-Hockey match.

On Friday, we unfortunately had heavy rain forecast. This would ordinarily have fallen as snow, but due to the incredibly unusual warm weather, it meant that the pistes would turn to slush and the skiers would have been soaked. Instead we went to an underground shopping complex in Montreal for the day, where everyone enjoyed shopping for a few hours.

Throughout the trip, praise was received for our pupils from the hotel, the instructors, the ski shop, the restaurant staff, hotel guests, airport staff and members of the public. The six of us that staffed the trip came away from the experience just incredibly proud of each and every one of them. Lifetime memories for all 46 of us for sure!