As the festive season accelerates towards us, Queenswood is looking more and more beautiful in these crisp, frosty mornings. The Prefect team are now extremely pleased to have the benefit of their black and purple robes as they welcome the school community to chapel in the mornings. I have even heard mumblings to suggest they should actually be fur lined!

 

Girls in Sport – The GSA View

I attended a three day GSA Heads Conference at the start of last week – an extremely useful opportunity to discuss the issues facing the independent education sector and specifically girls’ schools. Oxford is of course an inspirational place to be and an ideal location to explore and challenge how we are paving the way to educate girls for today and for the future. Areas of focus included girls’ enjoyment and success in sport at single sex schools. It was wonderful to have a number of the Rio Olmypians at the annual GSA dinner. Private schools educate seven per cent of British children, but accounted for 32 per cent of Team GB’s medals at the Rio Olympics of this year: a very impressive statistic.

 

Old Queenswoodian Jodie Williams reached the semi-finals of the Women’s 200m at the Rio Olympics in 2016

The New GCSE Grading System

A second hot topic for discussion at the conference was the new GCSE grading system. It was very reassuring to be able to speak with Heads of other well-known girls’ schools about the need to downplay the importance of the new GCSE grade 9 as we seek to preserve students’ mental health. There was some concern that the shift to numerical grades will place additional pressure on ‘pupils with a tendency towards perfectionism’. At the recent Year 10 Parents’ Evening, Mr Sheldon very clearly explained the new grading system and also expressed our desire to put the well-being of our girls at the forefront of our expectations for the grade 9 at GCSE.

From next summer, A* to G grades at GCSE will be gradually replaced by grades 9 to 1. Under the reforms, just 20 per cent of those who would have achieved A or A* under the existing system will be awarded a grade 9.

UCAS Applications

This has been an extremely busy few weeks for our Upper Sixth students with the final UCAS applications being completed and a number of girls already receiving offers and requests to attend interviews. I would like to take this opportunity to wish our Sixth Formers the best of luck in the university interview process.

Around school

I continue to enjoy welcoming visitors and guests to Q. This week I have been delighted to show a number of other head teachers round the school. It’s a wonderful opportunity for me to interact with girls and staff, and I return to my study brimming with pride after each tour.

 

I am looking forward to attending the Upper School Play on Friday and I am sure that I will see many of you there. With a number of other festive events coming up over the next couple of weeks, it is looking like a very exciting end to the Christmas term. I hope you enjoy the final few weeks of term as much as I know I will.