(The full version of St. Mary's Messenger can be found in the password-protected area of the website)

Dear Parents, Children and Friends,

Welcome back for what is going to be a lovely sunny, warm Summer Term. I am always the optimist! The end of last term was happy, yet sad because not only was Mrs Lloyd leaving but also Mr Claydon. Following a period of sick leave for a number of weeks, it has been agreed that Mr Claydon will resign from his position due to family reasons effective from the end of the Spring Term.  The School and the Governors of course wish him all the very best for the future.

However, such is the pace of life that we have barely time to say goodbye to people before we find that there are about two hundred young people queuing up outside the gates, clamouring to get in to start the new term. You must admit that we are certainly owed some decent weather after the disappointment of last summer. Not that bad weather is always a disaster: going back to Easter Sunday, it was wonderful to wake up to a real carpet of snow and walk out into the great, thick swirls of falling flakes. How marvellously still and atmospheric it was around the cathedral that morning. (It wasn’t so wonderful, though, to have to rescue the first non 4x4 vehicle that braved coming up Pottergate!) The school gardens were beautiful, snowballs were thrown, fingers were frozen and hot chocolate was drunk. Snow that lasts less than a Sunday is perfect. Children may disagree with that thought, but it’s perfect for grown-ups anyway.

This term there is an awful lot going on, but then every term at St. Mary’s is the same. There are the major trips off to Walesby, France and Northumberland which promise to be unforgettable experiences for the children. With a bit of luck I should be able to come along for the ride for some of these because last year there seemed to be such fun going on. The sport is of course dependent on the weather but if we can appease the rain-gods we should be in for a fantastic time with all the cricket, rounders, athletics, tennis and so on to enjoy. Summer terms seem to stick longest in the memory; there are always major events in every term but as we get older and move ever-further away from our schooldays, time dims the memory.  I know that our Y6 children are going to hang on to their treasured personal memories.

However, as I said to the school in our first assembly, this isn’t a holiday camp, there’s a lot of hard work to be done between now and the middle of July. There are tests, exams, SATS and all the other fiendish instruments of torture that teachers use, but judging by the excellent Effort Grades at the end of last term, our pupils are working hard.  I was very pleased to see how much deter-mination the boys and girls are showing. After our in-service training day on teaching Gifted and Talented Children, all the teachers are even better prepared in differentiating work so that each child is tackling work that sets the right challenges. The speaker was a certain Dr David George, who is founder President of the National Association for Able Children and a consultant to the British Council and UNESCO, who gave us a motivational and thought-provoking day. I hope that we can persuade him to come back at some point to speak to all our parents as his thoughts and ideas on education in general are so uplifting and inspiring. There are a lot of great new ideas coming to the boil in St. Mary’s. There is a spring in our step and a real feeling of purpose. Keep reading your Messenger to see what is in the pipeline and to read about all the excitement of what promises be a glorious summer.

Our thanks go to Mrs Heal for sorting out all the problems with the summer dresses. This year’s supply is far better quality all-round (and at the same price as last year), so we should be able to spend a lot less time looking for needle and thread to stitch drooping hems back up! The uniform shop has got a good stock of all sizes at the moment, so if you pop in you can pick up what you need (opening times are on the termly calendar).

Congratulations to Mrs Harrod who is expecting a baby late in August! Everyone is very excited for her and we wish her and her husband Jim all the best for the coming months and years. As she’s been a front-line teacher for a while, having to deal with only one noisy, incessantly wriggling creature will probably prove a pleasant rest for her throughout her forthcoming maternity leave. Good luck!

Apologies – school email down…again!  Over the Easter weekend, the company that provides our internet tinkered with its connections and managed to knock out our, and many other schools, internet. Since then our account has been passed without our prior knowledge to a different company and at the moment neither of these two businesses are accepting the responsibility for re-connecting us. This has meant that we have not received any email since the end of last term, so if you have emailed the school over the holidays, I can only apologise for the non-arrival of your email and say it is down to circumstances beyond our control. I have no possible way of knowing who emailed us, so if you have any matter that needs to be dealt with, please phone or send a letter in order that we can deal with your concerns as swiftly as possible.  Emails did start to arrive at lunchtime on Thursday but it would appear we cannot reply at present.

Andy Salmond Smith