Twenty-nine S2 pupils attended the North Lanarkshire Council Celebrating Success day at M & D’s, Strathclyde Park.   They were being rewarded for being the most successful pupils in S2 based on the number of times they topped the monthly merit awards, and for having excellent attendance and timekeeping.   Here are the thoughts of a couple of the pupils regarding the day.

“I thoroughly enjoyed the trip to M & D’s because I got to spend time with five of my friends and go on rides.   We went on the water slides and swings.   We had lunch there and lots of fun and jokes”.   “The day flew in”. – Lewis Purves.

“We had a great day and got to go on all the rides.   It was a great opportunity and a very good way to reward pupils who had done well in school this year”. – Lewis McCallum.

Thanks to Mrs McKenna, Mrs Dalzell and Dr Gardner for supervising the pupils on the trip.

Saturday 21 May was not only a big day for two of Scotland’s top football teams as they competed in the Scottish Cup Final at Hampden, it was also the day and venue for the first year of the SFA Performance Programme graduates.

Fifteen S4 pupils from Braidhurst High School were amongst the 83 graduates from across the 7 performance schools in Scotland, with each receiving their medal and certificate from Scotland National Team Manager, Gordon Strachan.   The group were also treated to a ticket to watch the main event at 3 pm after being presented to the crowd on the Hampden pitch prior to the match.

This was a fantastic culmination to 4 years of hard work and dedication from the pupils involved.

Congratulations to all !

This month some of our budding music pupils took a trip to Edinburgh Playhouse to see Elaine C Smith, who is an ex-pupil of Braidhurst, performing in Annie.   Pupils thoroughly enjoyed themselves and are looking forward to putting all that enthusiasm into our own school show production this year, ‘Sunshine on Leith’.

Braidhurst High School Robotics Club has once again teamed Diamond Dogs from Airdrie Academy so that they could put on an exhibition match at the North Lanarkshire Learning Festival. The robotics club is committed to delivering Scotland’s STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics) future. The club meets on Wednesday and Friday lunchtimes and is supervised by Mr Hussain of the Science department ,the topics covered by the club so far include Logic circuits, robotics and computer software / hardware architecture.

The collection of pictures show pupils from Braidhurst High and from Dalziel High School. One of the club members is pictured delivering a master class to the boys and Girls from Dalziel High school.

In the VEX Competitions, presented by the Robotics Education & Competition Foundation, teams of students are tasked with designing and building a robot to play against other teams from around the world in a game-based engineering challenge. Classroom STEM concepts are put to the test on the playing field as students learn lifelong skills in teamwork, leadership, communications, and more. Tournaments are held year-round at the regional, state, and national levels; local champions go on to compete against the best in the world at VEX Worlds each April.

In another picture girls from the Braidhurst High Robotics club were given an opportunity to meet Bridie Gaynor from Innovation First, who are the main supplier of  the VEX Robotics Design System, as used by the club to nurture creative advancement in robotics and the knowledge of science, technology, engineering, and math education (STEM).  Mr Hussain whose wife is a robotics engineer  commented that he is particularly proud of the addition of females into the robotics club for the new challenge as announced by VEX at the World Championships.

Mr Hussain has a background in science and engineering, having worked as a commissioning engineer for some of the most well known companies around the world, such as NASA in the United States and Mitsubishi in Japan. Robotics runs in the family as his wife works for a Scottish company called Touch Bionics (www.touchbionics.com/ ) based in Livingston, “she’s the real expert in the family”, comments Mr Hussain. The company is a real success story that Scotland should be celebrating and has offices in many countries as well as fabrication facilities in the United Sates.

This year’s annual IDL project: Outdoor Classroom, saw some minor changes to an already successful project.  All S1 pupils were given the opportunity to experience activities organised by a range of departments which had a common theme and focus on developing problem solving skills. This year’s activities were: Habitat Sampling (Biology), Bike Tour (French), Orienteering (Maths), Water Sports & Team Challenge (P.E.), Scavenger Hunt (English) and Bridge Building (Technical). The project took place across three days both in school and at Strathclyde Park.

The pupils had an excellent time and thoroughly enjoyed learning and doing new things that they often wouldn’t have the chance to do.

Karla Luxton (1.4) gave her comments about her experience of the project.

“I really, really enjoyed it. It gave me the chance to talk to and work with people in my year who I wouldn’t normally speak to”

The pupils should also be highly commended for the very good standard of behaviour and conduct that was on display throughout the three days.