Dear Parents/Guardians,
*This message was previously sent June 26th and is available on our website. Key dates in the attachment*
Please find attached our Information Sheet and Financial Information for 2023/2024 school year. Summer reports are also available on VS Ware. Any difficulty with VS Ware login, please contact our school office by email info@stanhopesecondary.ie.
During the course of the year we continued to invest significantly in our school and your daughter’s education. We continue to upgrade our school. This year we got our first shipment of new school furniture, almost 500 new student tables and chairs were purchased. This has revitalised our classrooms, improving our students wellbeing and learning environment. We also purchased a new Art room kiln for pottery. We look forward to seeing all our student’s wonderful creations.
This coming year new basketball equipment will be installed on our outdoor courts. This investment will greatly improve our sports offering. Our new school roof has been delayed by the department but we expect this to proceed later in the school year. We will continue to invest heavily to ensure our community has the most pleasant of environments in which to teach and learn.
We are committed to provide students with the opportunities and the tools to succeed in modern life. To this end, we are committed to ensuring our students are digitally and ICT literate. Further ICT classes are being added and we are introducing a new subject at Junior Cycle i.e. ‘Digital Media Literacy’. As our school continues to grow, we are delighted to further announce we are expanding our curriculum at senior cycle to include Accountancy.
We have also focused on developing our communication channels within our school community. We have further developed VS Ware adding and embedding student behaviour reports for parents to view. These improvements are focused on promoting positive student behaviour and communication with our school community. In addition to this, we have further enhanced our School App and our school website. Parents and students can use the calendar section for live updates of school events, closures, holidays etc. This year we will continue to improve the quality of communication to you and the teaching and learning to your daughter.
As teachers, our main focus this year has been improving teaching and learning in our school. We continue to invest heavily in our teaching staff through continuous professional development, resulting in improving teaching and learning and better student outcome. Our teacher training this year has focused on the Junior cycle, subject specific collaboration, and restorative practice.
During the course of the coming year, we enter our final year of restorative practice training. You will continue to hear more about how Restorative Practice is transforming our school practice for the benefit of our school community. I hope your daughter has shared some of her positive experiences with you.
Don’t forget to check out our social media pages on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Our pages are:
www.facebook.com/StanhopeSecondarySchool
www.instagram/StanhopeSecondary
Finally, I want to thank you for the trust that you have placed in us as teachers and mentors of your children. I wish you and your family a very happy and safe summer break. I look forward to working with you as we watch our school grow and flourish into the future.
Kind regards,
Mr. J. O’Brien
Principal
