Dear Parent / Carer,
Welcome to this week’s Rector’s Log. I hope you and your family are doing well!
The week that’s been…
It was great to be back to school this week and have a full week with all our favourite people here at KHS!
On Monday and Tuesday, we welcomed a team of colleagues into KHS to support us with a review at our approaches to leadership, planning and implementing change within KHS and how we work across the community to ensure that we improve outcomes for all. Included in the team were our Education Manager, 2 HTs from other Fife Secondary schools and colleagues from Auchmuty High School.
Colleagues met with a range of stakeholders including learners, Staff at all levels and members of our Parent and Carers of Kirkcaldy High (PACK) group. They team also visited 22 different classes, our supported learning area and our other support bases.
Key strengths were around the strategic direction, planning and implementing change leading to demonstrably improved outcomes for learners at KHS including improved attendance, improved qualifications and improved positive destinations for learners who leave KHS. This was demonstrated through leadership, across all levels, and the ‘team’ approach that exists in KHS in ensuring that we work together as a community for the benefit of all our young people.
Next steps for us were linked to ensuring that we work with all stakeholders to review and renew our Vision, Values and Aims, develop leadership opportunities for young people across all stages, and to provide a platform and framework for celebrating the success of all young people across the school and session.
A huge thank you to all involved, in particular to our young people who were absolutely outstanding! We are very proud of them and our community.
On Wednesday evening, 2 of our amazing and talented young people in S2 took part in COPFS Public Speaking Competition on Teams.
The topic was “if you owned a social media platform, what rules would you have for users and why?”.
Both Poppy and Lewis were outstanding! Their speeches were prepared and delivered fantastically!! The feedback they received was very positive – both confident, tone and pace good, well researched but they also commented on how they came across as enthusiastic and caring young citizens which was very evident throughout the competition/speeches. The judges said that KHS should be proud to have fostered such young but talented speakers.
They were up against 3 other teams and the judges commented that it was the hardest heat they had been part of for the last couple of years. Unfortunately, this time round, Dunfermline HS just had the edge on KHS, so they did not go through to the next round. Well done to both for such a superb and confident display.
Across the rest of the week, learning continued for all young people with learners in S4-6 working hard to finish courses, complete assignments and practical elements of their courses.
As always, you can read more about all the goings on in our blog.
A wee update from Ms Black and our Supported Learning department:
Another great week and straight back to the learning after our February break. In SLD1 we have learning with Mrs Scott about using yeast to make alcohol. The gas carbon dioxide which is also made was trapped and used to inflate balloons and got amazing results, please check out our photo on Socials. With Mr Broadway we continue our tour of the UK and this week were looking at Welsh towns and cities, identifying their location on a map.
SLD2 are working on Time and have been investigating and challenging each other with stopwatches and timers. In SLD3 we have completed next sections in our Scottish Studies with some very creative Artwork and N3 Media. In our senior phase we have been achieving units in Maths and Literacy. Super proud of the engagement and effort.
House Point totals for the week and session so far are as below:
This weeks total:
Adam Smith – 82
Carlyle – 83
Oswald – 51
Overall total:
Adam Smith – 2451
Carlyle – 2606
Oswald – 2562
Well done to all!
The week ahead…
Next week, there will be House assemblies to share and reflect on the Holocaust on Thursday 27 February. These assemblies should have taken place on Holocaust Memorial Day on 27 January, however, our learners in S5/6 were in the middle of prelims and therefore we were not able to mark this occasion then.
We also have course choice days for S4 and S5 this week and tracking reports will be available to families on Friday 28th February through our Progress / Didbook portal.
I hope you have a great weekend.
Best wishes,
Chris McKay
Rector
21 February 2025
