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James Gillespie’s High School Parent CouncilMinutes of meeting25th November 2014ATTENDANCE AND APOLOGIESPresent : Donald Macdonald (Head Teacher), Neil McCallum (Deputy Head), Cath Downie (co-chair), Paul McLaughlan, Hazel Gough (treasurer), Tanya Potter, Julie-Ann Sime, Audrey Gilmour (co-chair), Lucy Norris, Pam Billina, Sarah Davis, Elke Versmessen – Jeffery, Anna Christal, Robert Cochran, Alison Platts, Havia Orologa – Vouza, Jacky Scott, Alison Macleod (secretary)Apologies : Hazel Kinnear, Anne SteeleMINUTES AND MATTERS ARISINGMinutes of the meeting held on 16th September 2014 were approved. Matters arising : Was the ‘Speed Careers Night’ still going ahead ? DM informed that this was being taken forward by Hazel Kinnear. Action: DM/HK to provide update at next MUNICATIONSNeil McCallum gave a presentation about a new system known as On the Button (OTB) which is currently being used by staff at JGHS. NM gave a presentation on the potential use of OTB for school communication with parents. NM highlighted possible parent uses – eg. accessing individual child timetables, particular teachers of your child, letters sent home, certificates, detentions, clubs. Can be set up so that parents can also see referrals and positive behaviour points. Provides an electronic system for parents evening appointments and will generate an appointment sheet. May potentially be set up to include conversation thread between staff and parents.The app builds a window within Facebook so parent users would need to be on FB but FB only used as a portal i.e. information is not in the public domain. The school would like to do a pilot with a group of parents across different year groups.Discussion followed. Some parents concerned that the app was through FB. OTB representatives explained that this was used as parents would not need to become familiar with yet another media website. There would not be alerts that new material was being added to the website. OTB allows the school to address an invitation letter to parents and initial log in is through a secure route using mobile phone number held by the school and a secure individual PIN number sent via the mobile number. No one else on FB can see what the user is seeing as it is only using FB as a portal. OTB is used by individual schools not by CEC city wide. It is registered with the data commissioner. Feedback from staff has been very positive. The need for data protection with respect to the council being responsible for the data that parents would be accessing was discussed. It was discussed that this would need to be checked with the council before OTB was rolled out. OTB pointed out that it is possible to turn off different aspects of the information. Perhaps it would be best to start with piloting the parents evening timetables through OTB and then add other information following feedback. Action: DM/NM to confirm Data Protection responsibilities with the Council.CfE UPDATE ( feedback and lessons learned from last year’s exams)Neil McCallum presented information on this. The key issues are/were : over assessment of S4 in many curriculum areas; verification procedures; sharing of information; late issuing of assessments; feedback from SQA with respect to the verification process.Next steps in the process involve the following:Schools – in staff development and sharing of good practiceEducation Scotland – developing route maps, development and delivery of course materialsSQA – intelligence gathering about verification and feedback, amending support packs and understanding standards.National Parent Forum for Scotland – excellent up to date information for parents and learners. Has subject by subject guides for N4 and N5 courses.Useful website addresses will be placed on the school website. Action: NMNo external exams for N4 and below is an issue now being reviewed. Pupils continuing to N5 in S5 is being reviewed in partnership with other local high schools as some subjects are not able to be offered at N5 in S5 due to classes being too small for funding criteria.SCHOOL REBUILD / DECANT UPDATEStill aiming to finish phase 1 by 3rd April and transfer over the Easter holidays. If not, then will continue to summer and transfer during summer holidays. Darroch will be available for use until August 2016. Darroch will be open during the Easter holidays for revision classes. It may also be open over the February holiday also. A walk around the site for parents is being planned by Janis Croll. This can only be for 40 – 50 parents. Planning is now under way for phase 2 decant. There will be no car parking at all on site during this phase. This is a real problem , not only for current staff but also for obtaining supply staff. Possible parent contacts re possible parking spaces may be helpful. Action: DM to apply to council re parking dispensation to maintain normal school functioning and advise the PC if any problems.MARCHMONT AND SCIENNES COMMUNITY COUNCILThis local group has a monthly meeting. If anyone would like to attend to represent the parent council please contact jghscouncilcomms@ COUNCIL BUDGET UPDATECD informed by CEC officers that schools have largely been protected in the current climate. There is a link to the budget proposal on the PC website. The PC draft response was distributed. Any suggested changes / additions please e mail jghscouncilcomms@ Parents can also respond personally by e mail on CEC website. DM encouraged parents to give feedback as school librarians were retained as a result of feedback to the last budget proposal.EVENTS GROUPAlmost ?300 was raised at the recent very successful wine tasting event. The next event is the Usher Hall concert on 18th December. Any volunteers to sell raffle tickets on the night please contact Anne Steele.HEADMASTER’S REPORTDM drew our attention to the recent placing of JGHS in the Sunday Times league tables which was a pleasing position.School websiteThe new website is planned to go live on Monday 1st December. It will not be the finished version but will continue to evolve. Parents, staff and pupils are working on this. It is hoped to be finished by August 2016 in time for the opening of the new school.Naming of new buildingsPupils have been actively involved in this and the current suggestions are :Main teaching block – The Malala BuildingPerforming Arts building - The Muriel Spark BuildingSports block – The Eric Lidell BuildingThe name for the sports block is still in debate as it was felt it may cause some confusion due to the school being close to the Eric Lidell Centre. There was also a possibility it would be shortened and linked with a supermarket chain. Wider achievementDM drew attention to some of the many other things happening in school. The John Byrne Award saw Andrew MacDonald in S6 as the overall winner and Miriam Seddon in S6 being highly commended. At a recent Maths competition at the Glasgow Science Museum the JGHS group came 6th out of 61 groups. In debating both the English and Gaelic debating teams have been doing well. Pupil achievements have been shared within year groups through Achievement assemblies. DM mentioned the lack of a prize –giving event and wondered if as a school it should be re-visited.Changing the schoolStaff currently working with researchers at Stirling University exploring ‘Learning rounds’; researchers from Edinburgh University are involved in researching bilingual senior pupils in a project entitled ‘Bilingualism matters’ ; two members of staff will be spending May and June in South Africa looking at how the South African link can be developed and carrying out research into globalisation ( they are working with researchers from Edinburgh University regarding research methods and outcome analysis )The school performed very well last year in external exams and HMI are coming to visit on 4th December to find out what has helped this to happen.DM reminded parents about the Christmas concert in the Usher Hall on 18th December and also about the senior drama production in Darroch on 5th December.AOCBUniversity library tickets for this year’s S6 were requested. Action: DM to progressAn information evening about university applications and timings for parents of S6 pupils was requested for next year. It was thought this would be best at the beginning of the S6 year. Action: DM to progressDATE OF NEXT MEETINGTuesday 13th January 2015 at 7pm in the library at Lauderdale campus. ................
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