Just before the half term break, our year 12 physics students took part in the British Physics Olympiad Online Competition, run by the University of Oxford.  I am delighted to say that they did incredibly well! 50% of the students were awarded gold certificates, compared to 18% nationally. All of our Year 12 physicists achieved either gold, silver or bronze awards which is a fantastic achievement. The gold award winners are featured in the photo this week.

This half term started with a Deep Learning Day, enabling Years 7-11 to engage with important age appropriate topics from the Personal, Social, Citizenship and Health Education curriculum.It was great to have guest speakers back in school, and we welcomed visitors from 'Stand Up to Discrimination', Brook, and motivational speaker Mr. Beezy. My thanks to everyone involved in the day.

Year 12 students had a positive trip to the University of Oxford today, and I had a very enjoyable day on Wednesday interviewing candidates to be our very first Head Student. Mr. Flitcroft, one of our community governors, joined Mr. Stump and me for the interviews, and we were all so impressed at the eloquence of the applicants. The next step in the process is for the candidates to share a video with the school community, enabing all students to hear directly from their potential leaders, before a school wide vote. Exciting times!

Our Geography A level students have been busy this week planting fruit trees. The 'Orchard for Schools' programme has entrusted the school with growing five different fruit trees. Mr Smith , Head of Geography commented that "I think it is important in urban areas that we try to be as environmentally friendly as possible, the trees help reduce the schools carbon footprint and make it more sustainable." You will know that the school were Climate Kick-start prize winners from the Mayor of London in November. These plans are developing well and I look forward to showing you photos of our progress soon.

More sporting success this week, with our Year 7 boys and girls winning the local indoor athletics competition and progressing to represent the whole of Harrow. Many congratulations to all involved.

Students represented the schooI in five different sports this week: basketball, football, netball, badminton and cross country. The Year 7 netballers are unbeaten in the competition so far, and several members of the cross country team will be invited to join the county team on the strength of the competition this week, hosted at Harrow School. More important than the results are the opportunities this provides our students, and I am very grateful to everyone involved in this, students, colleagues, parents and volunteers at our school and others. It is always appreciated.

St. John's College at the University of Oxford hosted our Year 10 English students this week. They had a tour of the Ashmolean Museum, the Bodleian library and an interview skills session with an admissions tutor. Many thanks to St. John's for being so welcoming, and accommodating our Scientists last week as well. Our school motto is 'Inspiring Learning' and students certainly returned inspired by what they had seen.

Our student leadership positions have been shared with students this week, with an opportunity for all year groups to be involved in student government. We will also be electing our very first Head Students. Now that our Trailblazers have reached Year 12 they are ready to take on these additional responsibilities. Candidates have to be part of student government, and will then be interviewed for the posts by me, Mr. Stump our Head of Sixth Form, and a member of the Governing Body. I remember talking to Year 7 in 2016 about appointing our first Head Students in 2022. I don't know where the time has gone and it is exciting have such high levels of interest in these posts. More details are on the dedicated Google Classroom page!

Happy New Year! It is so lovely to have students back in school this week. They have settled back in really quickly, and it is brilliant to see them immediately approach their learning so positively.

Year 12 have been focussed on their mid-year exams this week, and like the Year 11s in their mock GCSEs before the holiday, they have impressed everyone with their dedication and resilience through what is undoubtedly a challenging experience. Of course, those are Pinner High School Values, so this should come as no surprise!

Creativity and collaboration are also Pinner High School Values, as exhibited in the attached new display for the International Peace Poster Prize, sponsored by the Hatch End Lions Club. They are also shown by the 53 students across the school who are involved in our LAMDA programme. 33 students recently received their results, with over three quarters of them at the highest 'Distinction' level. LAMDA is the 'gold standard' performance examination, so this really is an astonishing achievement. Many many congratulations to all the students involved on this stellar achievement. There are just a couple of places remaining on the LAMDA programme this term. Please do contact us if your child would like to be a part of this. Students report a positive impact on their confidence and enthusiasm: also Pinner Values!

We know ‘Inspiring Learning’, our school motto, does not stop at the classroom door or even the school gate. It is lovely to have students out on trips for the last 3 consecutive weeks. Trips for students in Science and Geography over the last couple of weeks, and this week a theatre trip and students taking part in the InterClimate Network summit at Northwood College, as featured in the image this week. This event took place during our Sixth Form led Eco week. This featured assemblies about how we can all make a difference to our environment, including the initiative that won us a Kick-start award from the Mayor of London.

Here is a student reflection on the Year 10 Science event last week: “The Emmanuel Centre in Westminster hosted a group of 20 Year 10 students at their lectures about the new, evolving branches of science. The first speaker talked about material science and how it helped her swim across the English Channel. The second speaker enlightened us about DNA mutations and the next lecturer talked about the drastic changes that will take place in our everyday diet due to the increasing population. The penultimate scientist informed us about how animals survived in the twilight zone using waves. Our final speaker was (in my opinion) the best. He demonstrated how to break blocks of wood using simple physics. He was hilarious and the most entertaining. Overall, I really enjoyed the trip as I learnt about new things.” Trip Leaders have commented on how brilliant the students have been at embracing the opportunities available to them.

A different opportunity was available to Year 12 Maths students, who took part in the UKMT Senior Mathematical Challenge. This is a 90-minute, multiple-choice maths challenge. It encourages mathematical reasoning, precision of thought, and fluency in using basic mathematical techniques to solve interesting problems. Congratulations to all 16 medallists- an amazing achievement- and Tanmay who won Gold!

Congratulations also to our Year 9 boys Badminton team who reached the final of the Harrow Cup.

A particularly action packed round up of a Pinner High School education this week!

Anti-discrimination charity ‘Stand up’ were in school again for their second workshop with Year 9 Philosophy, Religion and Ethics classes for a workshop on anti-discrimination, in particular looking at Islamophobia and anti-Semitism. They also led an assembly for Year 12 as part of their ‘And beyond’ programme on fake news and discrimination which students responded very positively to, as always.

Just before half term in our Deep Learning Day each year group spent time focusing on specific topics. Year 7 looked at eSafety, where they learnt about how to use the internet responsibly and protect themselves online. Year 8 focused on fake news, looking at examples of this, considered how to spot fake news and also made their own news articles, using their new skills to spot which articles were real and which were fake. Year 9 had sessions on drugs and alcohol awareness. A particular highlight from this was externally led workshops on county lines and a talk on alcohol and drugs awareness from the Amy Winehouse Foundation. Both facilitators commented on how fantastic the students were in these sessions and the maturity of the questions students asked. Years 10 and 11 investigated aspects of the ‘Prevent’ programme, and considered what the causal factors behind extremism are as well as what can be done to challenge extremism. They looked at current examples and had opportunities for debates and discussions.

A group of Year 10 students took part in a training day last week to become Wellbeing Ambassadors for Pinner High School. They worked with two trainers, who helped them to develop a number of skills and learn how they can support students in all year groups. After half term, they will begin their work as Wellbeing Ambassadors by delivering assemblies to each year group to introduce themselves. The trainers were so impressed with our students that they wrote to me the day after the training sessions to say what fantastic ambassadors we have, the first time they had every felt compelled to do so in all their years of training.

The English Department recently promoted The Remembrance Sunday Mayor’s Poetry Competition, run by Harrow Council to our Year 9 students. The entries we received were beautifully written and not only did they show the brutal devastation of war, but they also commemorate the brave people who fought for our country. 6 students have been shortlisted, and the winner will be invited to attend the Remembrance Sunday ceremony with their family and read their poem after the period of silence.

The House event was a combined Year 7-9 event this week. Students had to create freestanding towers using only newspaper and 3cm pieces of sellotape. There were some interesting designs and impressive ‘tallest’ structures- as in the image this week.

And as well as all this, this week the Year 8 boys football team won their second game at home!