SMPC Newsletter March 2020
Hello and welcome to our March update!
We had our second Parent Council meeting of 2020 on Monday night and it was great to have another good turnout with lots of non-parent council members attending and hearing what’s happening in our school community.
🏴 Scottish National Standardised Assessments (SNSA)
Mrs Moore gave us a talk about these assessments which happen in P1, P4 and P7. They are part of the National Improvement Framework and aim to achieve excellence and equity. They are one part of a wide range of ongoing assessments which the teachers are constantly monitoring such as day to day observations, class work, learning conversations, holistic assessments, and end of unit assessments. They are adaptive and the experience of the teaching staff is that they are generally well received by the learners. The information gathered is used by the school to help support and direct the children’s learning.
For more information have a look at the official website.
💰 Fundraising Subgroup
Our fundraising team has been working hard behind the scenes brainstorming new ideas to help raise funds for the parent council to allow us to continue supporting our children’s experience at school and eventually a Multi-Use Games Area (MUGA) for the main school.
Please save Friday 24th April in your diary (or school calendar!) for a quiz night at the Braid Hills Hotel hosted by Dougie Robertson. More information regarding tickets to come out soon!
They are looking for auction prizes and an auctioneer so if anyone has any contacts and would like to help support this event please get in touch with the fundraising team via fundraising@sm-pc.org.
There’s a tentative date for the school Summer Fair for 6th June but this will be confirmed nearer the time. We have our fingers crossed that the building works at the main school will be finished by then and the fair will be back on home turf!
👫 After school use of the main hall at Comiston Road
Well this was a humdinger of a discussion! Since the last Parent Council meeting, a three way meeting was held with the After School Care Club (SMASCC), the Clubs sub group (SMPC Clubs) and Edinburgh Council Active Schools. The Parent Council has been asked to make a decision in two parts. Firstly, whether we agree with the compromise agreed at the meeting that SMASCC should have use of the hall on two of the four evenings from Monday to Thursday from the beginning of the new school year in August.
If this is accepted, the second decision is regarding which clubs should be stopped. This is a difficult decision so we asked for your opinions too with the recently advertised questionnaire. Thank you to all who took the time to complete it. We had a good response rate and 86% agreed with the compromise allowing SMASCC to use the hall on two of the suggested days each week and 14% disagreed.
As the vote was about to go ahead a new piece of information came to light from Mr Urquhart that the school would need to have the halls for parent teacher consultations on certain nights through the year (namely Tuesday and Thursday). It was felt that the Care Inspectorate would be unlikely to allow SMACC to change venue for random days depending on the parent teacher nights.
After much discussion it was felt that we need to consider this new information and the potential implications on clubs not on these days before going ahead with the vote. We will be asking the parent body to participate in another survey very soon as this may impact on your decision.
🏫 Deanbank Works Update
Good news! Communication with the construction company and the Parent Council has improved greatly. Our Accommodation team and co-chair met with the contractor and council representative to discuss all the concerns raised. The project is to be registered on the considerate constructor’s scheme which means there will be QR codes on billboards around the site where you can easily and directly message the project manager with any concerns.
Soon there will be a new access point to Deanbank which will be permanent for the duration of the build. Now that the nursing home has been demolished the real work will start and the site will become much busier.
The contractors are still set on a final completion date of May 2021.
For a more detailed run through please keep an eye on our website for when the minutes of the meeting become available.
🚦Transport Update
Have you seen the consultation that’s out regarding the new design for Braidburn Terrace? Braidburn Terrace will be a one way system, with improved pavements, new traffic lights and crossing for pedestrians and cyclists at Comiston road and redesign of the roundabout on Braid Road and signal crossing for the Hermitage. This will be particularly beneficial for local residents and will offer an improved route for the school walking children up to the Hermitage.
https://www.edinburgh.gov.uk/trafficorders
🚌🚶🏽♀️ Walking buses
A pilot is hopefully going to start soon. The delay has been because of numbers of parents able to volunteer and PVG checks. If you are interested in finding out more, please email transport@sm-pc.org.
📝 Great new opportunities on the Parent Council!
Our wonderful Secretary has almost completed her 3 years as a Parent Council member and so we are looking for someone who would like to take over her position. It involves attending the 6 PC meetings and the AGM each year, taking minutes and producing meeting packs and generally being invaluable and omniscient!
Our Co-Chairs will be moving on at the end of the next school year (June 2021) when their children move up to high school. To make the handover as orderly as possible we’re looking for a Vice Chair to shadow Brendan and Olly from September this year to learn the ropes!
If you’d like to volunteer or find out more, please email secretary@sm-pc.org.
🗓 Next SMPC Meeting
Our next meeting is on Monday 27th April, 18:45 – 20:20.
As always we welcome as many parents as possible to attend! Our Parent Council is run by volunteer parents who do their best to try and help enrich our children’s lives. If you think you could help at all, or would like to know more about our subgroups, then please don’t hesitate to get in touch, via email, Facebook, or via our website at https://sm-pc.org.