22/01/2022
Morning everyone,

We hope you’ve had a good week and are looking forward to a relaxing weekend ahead. We are halfway through this half-term already, so keep up the good work, the time will fly by! In sport, well done to the girls 1st rugby team who had their opening fixture of the season; as well as this the dance show has been in full swing with some incredible performances. Also, well done to the juniors and the seniors for getting stuck in with house swimming.

Thank you to the Yr9 boarding houses for having us this week. We really enjoyed meeting you all and listening to what you had to say. We are currently collating everything you have said to us and are planning to have meetings next week with Mr Sawrey-Cookson, Mr Whatling and Mr Middleton so that we can try and take action on your points and feedback to you next week. Ivythorn, we look forward to meeting you all on Monday morning!

We wanted to feed back to you on what we have been doing this week so you can see that we are taking action on what you say to us and also to let you know about any developments that may have arisen thanks to your suggestions.

Supplements Policy:
We have been speaking with Dr Drawer about the school’s supplement policy and he is in agreement that there is plenty of development that can be made to increase education and usage of supplements to improve nutrition for athletes. As soon as the new nutritionist has settled into the school we will be looking to create a focus group to bring in the changes that are being asked for.

Apollo:
You may or may not know that we have a co-curricular webpage called ‘Apollo’ (its similar to its academic counterpart ‘Minerva’). If you don’t already have it saved on your Home Screen we highly recommend you do so you can access lots of information about the MBA programme and other extra-curricular activities happening around school

The link to the webpage can be found here: https://millfieldschool.sharepoint.com/sites/minCoCurric

Girl Up:
We are very excited to announce that ‘Girl Up’ will be becoming a part of the MBA programme. This is going to be a really exciting opportunity for students from every year group to develop leadership skills, advocacy and much more! Ourselves and Mrs Bicknell are just waiting for the ‘green light’ from IT and then more information will be up on the MBA noticeboard. But in the meantime you can check out the official organisation’s website here: https://girlup.org

What should I say?:
Many of you might remember the sexual violence/ sexual assault rally that took place last term which was followed by SLT coming into assemblies and houses. Afterwards, many students wanted to be able to support people better and to know what to say about SV and what not to say. Therefore, we are in the preliminary stages of organising a discussion/dinner with Mrs Weston to give people the opportunity to come along and have an open forum to ask questions surrounding SV/SA without feeling any kind of judgement.

Possible Pilot for P1 and P2 in House:
This one is for our fellow uppers! Following further discussions with Mr Horgan their is a possibility to run a pilot in Butleigh and Shapwick for uppers to have P1 and P2 in house and if that goes well, there should hopefully be a strong case for allowing the same to happen in all houses.

The Street Inn:
This again is only relevant to the 18yr olds in Uppers. School is looking at the possibility of the Street Inn becoming another option for students on a Saturday night, so that there is another place to go for a pint and not just Wetherspoons. Please feed back if this would be something you’d be interested in.

Signs in the Dining Hall:
Some people came to us following last week’s email saying they didn’t feel comfortable having the signs back in the dining hall. Therefore, we have tried to find a middle ground on this issue. They are no longer up on the screens as you walk into the dining hall and are much more discrete. However, if you still feel uncomfortable with having the signs up please let us know so we can do something about it!

Lockers:
We had a meeting with the Head of Estates, Mr Chapillon, yesterday and are making a plan. In the meantime try and keep your Apple Pens and AirPods in your pockets instead of in the cubby holes so that they aren’t quite so easily nicked!

Year Group Councils:
Reminder that it is year group council next Monday at 1pm. This is your opportunity to bring things up so that we can do something about it. Currently we are working with Mr Whatling and Mr Middleton on parity (equality) between boarding houses and improving the campus night system. If you have any suggestions please let your council rep know so they can raise it in council and it can be fed back to us to bring up in meetings later in the week.

Year 10 and 11 Quiz Night:
Following the success of the weekly sixth form quiz we are keen to host a middle school quiz starting next Wednesday. It would be great to see lots of you there and, of course, prizes will be available. As well as this, we are keen to chat with anyone who has any issues they might like raised or any issues that you wish for further clarity on. We hope to see you there!

Finally, from now on teachers are also going to get a copy of this email. This means you have a great opportunity to be able to discuss the contents of this email in group tutor on a Saturday morning!

As ever, please come and talk to us or send us an email. We want to hear from you.

Your Heads of School,
Sam and Anabelle