DHS Fortnightly update - 13th January 2023

Happy New Year! We hope you all had a lovely break over the festive period. A huge thank you for your kind donations to our Christmas Hampers and stockings appeal this year. This really made a huge difference to our community and perfectly epitomises The Durrington Way.

We have some exciting news. Towards the end of last term, the DMAT Board approved an exciting new building project for our school. We are going to build a brand new, state of the art ‘Performing Arts centre’ at the school. This will provide our students with an amazing new theatre, complete with tiered seating, for all future productions. Building work is due to start next month and we’ll keep you posted on the progress of the project.

Next week our Y11 students will receive their mock results. This is a pivotal time for them and marks the beginning of the final run-in to their final exams in the summer. There is much to do, but we know that with your support, they will do us proud in the summer.

Shaun Allison & Chris Woodcock

Company news

Shelley KAPP Cup winners autumn term 2022!

Congratulations Shelley Company, winners of the KAPP Cup last half term! Well done to you all.

#Kindness #Aspiration #Perseverance #Pride

Update from Coubertin

I continue to be so proud of Coubertin and all we achieved in the Autumn term. A great deal of you represented the school in sports teams and took part in a wide range of extra-curricular opportunities. The quality and quantity of the Christmas hampers and stockings truly embodied ‘The Durrington Way’ by showing such kindness to our community. A very big well done to 9LWk who won the whole school overall design. The Christmas concert was a real highlight of mine, with so many Coubertin students taking part within the choir and readings. A special mention must go to Alicia Butler who performed a self-composed solo.

I hope you all managed to have a restful Christmas holiday and I look forward to seeing all the amazing things Coubertin can do going into the spring term.

Mrs Poole – Company Leader Coubertin

Update from Da Vinci

I am extremely proud of the start to year that all students in Da Vinci have had. Before Christmas we had a brilliant term finishing as the 3^rd highest company for attendance, receiving over 200 KAPP badges and finishing 2^nd in the MTMM challenge. We also had the winning tutor group in 9JOw, well done to all of you.

I hope you have all set yourselves targets for the new term, our focus in Da Vinci is to improve our attendance, attend as many extra-curricular clubs as possible and increase the amount of KAPP badges we receive. I am really excited about what Da Vinci company can achieve this term.

Mr Poole – Company Leader Da Vinci

Year group events

Year 11

Student’s will receive their mock exam results during the special assembly on Tuesday 17th January. The final parent/carer evening will be held on Thursday 2nd February between 4.30 and 7.30pm. Further details can be found here:

Year 11 parent/carer evening

Bookings for the evening will open on Monday 16^th January at 10am.

This is the last parents’ evening for year 11 so it is vital parents/carers and students attend so we can best support your child as we approach their final exams.

If you have any queries please contact your child’s company team.

Year 9

The year 9 options process will be launched with students on Tuesday 31st January and the subject choices booklet will be sent home during that week. This will be followed by the parent/carer options evening on Thursday 9th February and further information will be sent home in due course.

Department updates

On the Thursday before we broke up for Christmas the Y8 basketball teams finished 1^st and runners up in the district basketball tournament which was held at Durrington High. All 12 of the boys involved represented the school superbly and both teams played some excellent basketball.

The U14 girls football team beat Warden Park School 5-1 in the last 16 of the County Cup to progress to the quarter-finals. An excellent team performance including a hat trick from Esme Harris and some fantastic saves from Maddie Langdell in goal. We will play either Millais or the Regis School in the quarter finals.

There were a few other fixtures that were closely fought by Durrington in both football and basketball. In football the year 7 boys were narrowly defeated 4-3 in the county game making a surging comeback after being 3-0 down at half time. The U16 girls lost 3-2 in the County Cup quarter-final, sadly not progressing into the semi-final. Finally, the year 9 basketball team put in a valiant effort against Angmering, losing 31-35.

Good luck to all the Durrington teams across many sports in the next couple of weeks including cross country, basketball and netball.

Mr Brombley – PE Teacher

Computing

The computing department has led the assemblies this past week, we have inspired the year groups to the future of Artificial intelligence and how AI will be used in the world around us. The UK is putting itself at the forefront of these changes and the students were taught about how AI will be developed to solve some of the world’s problems.

This short video was also played in assembly:

Students in year 9 – 11 have then had a series of lessons to learn more about AI back in the classroom.

The clubs continue to be very busy, we have welcomed some new faces since Christmas which has been great, and we will share some of the club creations over the next coming weeks.

Mrs Taylor – Director of Business/Computing

Science

This week year 7s in science club got the chance to write their own secret messages after seeing a teacher demo of writing with fire. They could use lemon juice or other chemicals as invisible ink with different ways to decipher them such as wafting the paper over a Bunsen burner, or using other chemicals to unveil the hidden message. Deborah and Katie created this code using lemon juice which when heated over the Bunsen burner turned brown. Using a numerical alphabet system (A=1, B=2, etc.) they created their message:

“8, 9 6, 12, 15, 23, 5, 18 16, 15, 23, 5, 18 2, 25, 5”

which reads “Hi, Flower Power, Bye”.

Science Club is on every Wednesday after school in G10S. All year 7s are welcome!

Miss Leeming – Science Teacher

Maths

This academic year in maths we have introduced the students to Sparx, a homework platform. Sparx provides personalised tasks based on a mathematical topic and provides short videos to aid students if they are unsure. With every piece of work completed on Sparx, students gain Sparx Experience Points called XPs. For each compulsory homework students can gain between 240 and 420 XPs. Points can also be gained by completing XP Boost homework 405 XPs and Target homework 135 XPs. Each time a student reaches 10,000 XPs they receive a levelled certificate. Over the Autumn term these students received an amazing 20,000 XPs – reaching level 2, in year 7 Savannah Tall and Delal Tawil, and in Year 9 Sianna Hearn. Well done. These students have also gone above and beyond reaching 10,000 XPs – Elijar Gair (Y7), Emma Fox, Coby James, Dawud Ahmed (all Y8), Monty Phipps, Heidi Robins, Isabel Cunningham, Alec Smitheman, Clissy Mujikeni, Olivia Maine (all Y9) and Darian Houslop, Kaytee Hawkes, Kristian Vasilev (all Y10). Congratulations to all of these students.

Mrs Buchanan – Maths Teacher

Careers

Year 7, 8 & 9 careers club

This week saw the start of this term’s Careers Club where students can come and talk about their ideas for the future, discuss different job ideas and learn from guest speakers about the work that goes on all around them. This week we discussed stereotyping in jobs and how we can challenge biases. We have previously featured guests from the police, animal-care, architecture and beauty industries and we are set to hear from the transport and haulage sector in the next few weeks. If you’re passionate about what you do and would like to share it with young people, please get in touch via careers@durring.com

Year 11 next steps

Worthing College will be opening its doors again to prospective students and their families on Tuesday 24th January. This is a good opportunity for year 11 students who have yet to apply, or for those who want to consider all the options available to them. Book your place here: Open Events | Worthing College

If you are still thinking about a career involving all aspects of the land and environment why not go along to Plumpton College open day to find out more. You will get a chance to see their amazing facilities first hand, speak to course tutors and discover the exciting career prospects available: Open Events Plumpton College

Priority applications for this year’s entry should be made by 31^st January.

Mr Henry – Careers Leader

Recruitment

Student Learning Support – 32.5 hours per week term time 8.30am – 3.30pm Monday to Friday

Cover supervisor – 37 hours per week term time 8.30am – 4.30pm Monday to Thursday and 8.30am – 4pm on Friday

If you feel that you can bring something special to our school and Trust, we want to hear from you now! Please complete the online application form and if you would like more information please email Aggie Gemel on agemel@durring.com

Closing date for both posts: 9am on Monday 23 January 2023