Weekly Update – 18 October 2024
The CPS Extra Programme continues next week. Teachers have been carefully planning sessions to support students in preparation for their formal written mock examinations taking place the week after half term. Y11 students can find revision resources in the MS Teams area. A copy of this timetable has been shared with Year 11 students and parents and can be found here.
Our Sri Lanka Team 2024 is getting ready to leave for Sri Lanka next Tuesday. Our partner schools are very excited about the prospect of working with Calthorpe Park students, who have been planning the lessons they are going to lead in these schools during our stay. Thanks to Friday Fundraising and a wealth of initiatives the students have organised themselves, the total they have raised this year exceeds £12,000. This money has supported the building of a new preschool in a remote area of Eastern Province, supported a food programme across preschools funded by Ocean Stars Trust, and supported work in our partner schools in the town of Batticaloa. For the first part of the trip, students participating will be visiting temples, plucking tea leaves at a plantation, seeing elephants, both at an elephant orphanage and in the wild, and exploring the historic city of Kandy, the final kingdom before British rule of then Ceylon. During half term, they will be teaching students the lessons they have prepared in our partner schools in Batticaloa and in Trincomalee, working with mainstream students, special needs students, and students who are hearing impaired. We have already recruited a team of students who will be joining us in Sri Lanka in 2025, but will be starting again the process of opening applications for our 2026 visit in the summer term this year.
Mr Walker and the Sri Lanka Team
Year 7 school photos are being taken next Wednesday – please ensure your children are in the correct uniform.
The Calthorpe Chronicle, our newsletter written by students, is now available to purchase for £1 via Scopay. This covers a range of topics such as an extensive coverage of The Calthorpe Constituency, Open Evening and more!
Please encourage your children to check the lost property area. This is a room off the food tech corridor. There are numerous un-named items in there, including around 25 coats that have been there since the beginning of term. These items will be sent to charity at half term if still unclaimed. We do strongly recommend naming all items that your children bring in or wear to school.
Intermediate Maths Challenge club starts after half term on Wednesdays from 3 to 4pm in X1 and will run until the competition in early February. Invitations to take part in the competition will be sent out in December. We look forward to seeing students in Years 9-11 ready to think outside the box and to work together to challenge their mathematical skills.
College open evenings for Year 11 students over the next two weeks are as follows:
Alton College – 19 October
Farnborough 6th Form – 22, 23 and 24 October
ACM, Guildford – 3 November
These are all listed on the website on this page. Please check the college websites for timings and for booking information.
Year 8 and 9 students had a great time at the HBA Meet the Author event hosted by CPS this week. Some of our top readers in Year 8 joined in to give them a taster for the Hampshire Book Awards open to them later in the year, and our Year 9 readers who chose ‘Electric Life’ to win, met and chatted with Rachel Delahaye, the winning author. We all enjoyed a thought-provoking presentation on the power of technology and how it had inspired the winning novel, and during the question session our students were fantastic – so much engagement and additionally so many great suggestions to Rachel as to the direction of the sequel! A great way to focus on reading for pleasure.
Click here for our usual Library news and Books of the Week.
The Heritage GCSE letter will be sent today to parents, announcing the launch of the GCSE Heritage Language Examinations Program. This program is available to Year 10 and Year 11 students who are either native or fluent in a language that is not currently taught at CPS. Support classes and exam preparation will be facilitated by a bilingual teacher at the school prior to the exams scheduled for next summer; however, students are expected to dedicate additional study time outside of these sessions. A list of the available languages will be included in the letter. For any inquiries, please do not hesitate to contact us via email at EAL@cps.hants.sch.uk.
Check our Term Dates page for regular updates – we finish for the half term break at 3pm on Friday 25 October, returning to school on Monday 4 November.
Click the links below for our recent News:
