Message from the Headteacher
Dear parents,
It’s the last day of the school year, and what a fantastic year we have had. I was so pleased to see so many of you at Prizegiving last week, to join us in celebrating the many achievements made. I hope you enjoyed the evening and gained a little insight into life at Alfriston.
We have had such an eventful term, with lots of activities and adventures. Our highlights included: The Summer Show, when the girls performed dances and songs from famous shows. We also held the Prom for our year 11 and Post 16 students, when the girls arrived in their gorgeous outfits and high heels, and celebrated their friendships and memories of Alfriston. Another highlight was Sports Day which this year was extended to include a wider range of sports and skills.
We had great plans for the final week, but hadn’t planned for the heatwave! However, we quickly made a few adaptations and changes, and made the most of the opportunity. On the hottest day on record, our girls were sliding down a water slide, swimming in our amazing pool and watching a film in our lovely air-conditioned performing arts building. It was like being on holiday!
We have enjoyed the fun events this term, as well as the learning in the classrooms and beyond.
You can read about some of our events in this newsletter, which is only a small sample of the great achievements that our girls make on a regular basis.
Wishing you all a very happy holiday,
Jinna Male
Staffing Updates
Staff Leaving:
Mrs Dean – After 37 glorious years at Alfriston School Mrs Dean is retiring. She has been an absolute inspiration to pupils and staff alike and her can-do attitude to tackling any issue or supporting anyone she works with has meant that pupils past and present hold her in very high regard. One past pupil calling into the office yesterday with a card worded ‘wonderful Mrs Dean’ sums up quite perfectly what we all think of her. We will miss her dearly and wish her the very best in her retirement. Thank you to parents for their generous donations – for a gift Mrs Dean has received a bespoke pewter frame with Alfriston memories and afternoon tea for 4 at The Cliveden Hotel. Mrs Dean has also very kindly gifted the school with a friendship bench for outside the new wellbeing cabin.
Miss Bale leaves us after 2 years, she started at Alfriston as a support assistant in dance and PE and for the last year has been covering a maternity post for PE. She is leaving to train to be a PE and Dance teacher. We wish her every success in her career.
Miss Kulanathan leaves us after her one year placement as the wellbeing student. Miss K has thrown herself into Alfriston life and, alongside her research projects, she has been a great support to the girls on an individual level. We wish her well with her continued studies.
Miss Millins leaves us after 3 years, her role at Alfriston has been a mix of support assistant, SALT teaching and working in boarding. No matter where Miss Millins is in the school she can always be relied on to provide a happy and supportive smile. She will be missed immensely but we wish her every success in her new career.
Mrs Lenton leaves us after she has been covering a maternity post in the admin team. She has very quickly got to grips with the Alfriston systems and processes and has provided reassuring cover whilst Mrs Pearce has been away.
Returning Staff and New Starters:
Mrs Stevens will be returning to the PE department in September following her maternity leave.
Mrs Pearce will be returning to the admin team following her maternity leave.
Mrs Akhtar will be starting as an English support assistant.
Mrs Cleaver will be starting as a support assistant within the music department.
Miss Kerr will be starting as our new wellbeing student placement.
Pre Loved Uniform Sale
Thursday 21st July 2022 10.00am – 12.00pm
Please see flyer for full details
Sports Day
Sports Day 2022 was back with a difference! Using the Commonwealth Games, which will be hosted by Birmingham this summer our aim was to recreate the experience within Alfriston, with the ‘traditional meeting the alternative’. As a result, pupils were encouraged to select a range of athletics events they’d like to compete in alongside an alternative activity, chosen from; Trampolining, Cycling, Archery and Table Tennis. Throughout the morning not only were there some excellent skills and techniques on show throughout all disciplines, there was also great encouragement and motivation from the pupils to each other, whilst ensuring a competitive spirit remained.
We hope you enjoyed watching the various events and witnessing the pupils collected endeavour and effort to achieve. All the effort and determination to succeed resulted in a host of house points being won. The house declared Sports Day champions 2022 were…….Oak with a massive 935 points.
Thank you for all your support on the day, hope to see you all again next year.
Yr. 9 Leadership at Farnham Common Junior School
On Monday June 20th and July 4th, we spent all afternoon at Farnham Common Junior School, helping the Yr. 3 with their Orienteering skills. As a group we led a warm up and I felt nervous as I thought I would mess it up. However as soon as it started I felt ok as it was going smooth and great. After the warm up we then had a small group of children we were helping to read their maps and find certain control markers around the school site. When they found the correct control marker, we had to make sure they wrote down the correct information, which could’ve been a letter or number. They then need this information to form a word or work out a math’s problem. The purpose of the trip was not only to help us develop our leadership skills but also introduce younger pupils to a different physical activity.
Year 9
Yr. 7 Residential
On the 30th June we got to spend the night in boarding and stay over at school for the night as part of our first residential at Alfriston. For some of us it was the first time we had spent time away overnight from our homes and families. However, we had so many fun activities to fill our days that we were soon ready for bed.
On the Thursday we had a morning full of Forest School fun with Lee down in the woods, the best activity was the water rockets and trying to get Mrs Potts wet. At lunchtime we then headed off to Cliveden for a walk around the grounds and a picnic lunch. They had an awesome water feature and very big fish to look at. On the Fri we went to Longridge activity centre and all got to go on the river Bell boating before picking Aero Ball or Laser Tag in the afternoon.
It was a great experience and I hope we get to go on more trips.
By 7P & 7B
Women’s Euro Match Spain v Finland
On Friday 8th July some of us were lucky enough to watch a live football match at the MK Dons stadium; Stadium MK. We watched Spain v Finland in the group stages of the Euro 2022.
Finland scored within 2 minutes and the crowd went wild but not as wild as when Spain scored. Mrs. Bentley was supporting Finland because everyone else was supporting Spain and she wanted to annoy us .
We ate our dinner at half time which was weird as we have never eaten at a football stadium before. The crowd was amazing – there were over 16000 supporters there which is the most MK Dons have ever had!!
We loved annoying Mrs. Bentley every time Spain scored – which was really easy to do as we were sat right in front of her.
We want to thank Miss Leahy for organizing such a fun evening and to Miss James for coming along and helping on the night and Mrs Bentley as well, even though she was supporting Finland!!
We can’t wait to go to more.
By Ell, Sarah and Connie
Silver Practice and Assessed DofE Expeditions
After completing a successful practice expeditions using paths local to school and camping on the field for 2 nights, we felt ready to tackle the unknown location of the New Forest for our assessed expedition.
On our first night in the New Forest, we were delighted with a night in a Scout hut, making sure that we were ready for the next 3 days. Day 1 and the weather was not looking great; however, we met our assessors and began walking through the forest. We made timely progress during the day and made it to camp where we pitched our tents and cooked tons of pasta ready for the next day. Day 2 was warmer and drier with little motivation from our assessors, we were off once more, this time walking to a different part of the forest for our second night’s camp. This camp site was not as luxury, the showers were cold and washing up was difficult with a single tap. Day 3 was nice and sunny and the best day for walking. At the end of our expeditions our assessors were extremely impressed with how we had done over the 3 days and how much support we had shown each other. We were rewarded with an ice cream before the long journey home.
Bronze DofE Practice and Assessed Expedition
JAAACE – DofE
Hello and welcome we are jaaace – our names are Jen, Ameli, Amy, A, Chloe, and Esha. This is our blog about our bronze dofe adventure.
Our practice dofe took place on May 5th and 6th. On May 5th
We started off at Marlow and walked to Beaconsfield via the Chiltern Way, we were very confident at first until there were lots of hills. BIG MASSIVE HILLS! On the second day we did a loop around Beaconsfield.
Our assessed dofe took place on June 9th and 10th
On the first day we started off in Winsor, passed the castle and then followed the river Thames all the way to maidenhead, on the second day we Hurley to Maidenhead.
Our assessor told us that our group was one of the best she had ever assessed because of how caring we are towards each other. Next year we are 100% going to go for our silver as a team.
Annabel, Ravina, Tiggy, Jess and Hannah – DofE
On our D of E some of us felt excited after we felt very tired. On our practice walk day one we went from school to Chalfont St Peter, then we came back to school and cooked our dinner which was pasta. On day two practice we put up tents in the morning on the school field and then did our walk around school and did a loop. On our real DofE we used the river Thames on both days. On day one we came back and cooked our dinner which was pasta. On day two we put our tents up when we came back from the walk.
Ravina and Annabel would like to do silver. Annabel is feeling scared and excited to do her silver. Ravina is feelings like she can take on the Extra Challenge.
By Annabel, Ravina, Tiggy, Jess and Hannah
Small Animal Care with Stony Dean School
This past year, several students in a block group have enjoyed Small Animal Care at Stony Dean School with a group of their students. All the students learnt about the care of various pets and we had several animals visiting the group over the course of the year. There were two Guinea Pigs, a Tortoise, a Cat and several dogs. As well as learning facts about the animals, the students interacted with each other playing various games such as Dog Bingo.
P16 Horse Riding Group
This last school year, some Post 16 pupils have had the opportunity to attend Horseriding lessons in Lane End on a Wednesday afternoon. Some had previously ridden with the RDA and some were complete novices. The girls rode in the indoor school during the winter months and then more recently used the outdoor arena. We were able to invite parents to come and watch their daughters perform some synchronised manoeuvres recently. The pupils were presented with achievement rosettes.
2022-2023 Term Dates
Autumn Term 2022
| Starts | Tuesday 6th September 2022 (Y7,11,P16) |
| Half Term | Monday 24th October to Friday 28th October 2022 |
| Ends | Tuesday 20th December 2022 at 2.30pm |
Training Days: Friday 2nd September, Monday 5th September & Wednesday 30th November 2022
All pupils back to school on Wednesday 7th September 2023
Spring Term 2023
| Starts | Thursday 5th January 2023 |
| Half Term | Monday 13th February to Friday 17th February 2023 |
| Ends | Friday 31st March 2023 at 2.30pm |
Training Days: Wednesday 4th January 2023
Summer Term 2023
| Starts | Tuesday 18th April 2023 |
| Half Term | Monday 29th May to Friday 2nd June 2023 |
| Ends | Friday 21st July 2023 at 2.30pm |
Training Days: Monday 17th April 2023
Bank Holidays: Friday 7th April, Monday 10th April, Monday 1st May, Thursday 29th May, Monday 28th August 2023