ADMISSIONS CONSULTATION 2025/26

10th November 2023Mr A Cooke

Consultation on Admissions arrangements for the academic year 2025/26

The Governing Body of All Souls Catholic Primary School are publicly consulting on proposed changes to their admissions arrangements for 2025/26.

The consultation period is running for six school weeks, commencing on Monday 13th November 2023 and ending on Sunday 24th December 2023.

 

A copy of the draft policy can be obtained either from this link or by contacting the school admin team (02476 675 836 / [email protected]) or via the QR code below:

Any comments regarding the admissions policy or proposed changes should be submitted to the school business manager, Linsey Rae either via email ([email protected]) or post (All Souls Catholic Primary School, Abercorn Road, Coventry, CV5 8ED).

 

A summary of the proposed changes to the existing policy, for the academic year 2025/26 are as follows:

  • The inclusion of two addition oversubscription criteria (criteria 5 and 9 in the draft policy) as highlighted below

Oversubscription Criteria

 

  1. Baptised Catholic children who are looked after or previously looked after (See Note 3 below).
  1. Baptised Catholic children living in the parish of The Precious Blood and All Souls who have a brother or sister attending All Souls Catholic Primary School at the time of admission.
  1. Baptised Catholic children living in the parish of The Precious Blood and All Souls
  1. Other Baptised Catholic children who have a brother or sister attending All Souls Catholic Primary School at the time of admission.
  1. Other baptised Catholic children of a member of staff working for All Souls Catholic Primary School (see Note 6 below).
  1. Other Baptised Catholic children.
  1. Non-Catholic children who are looked after or previously looked after.
  1. Non-Catholic children who have a brother or sister attending All Souls Catholic Primary School at the time of admission.
  1. Non-Catholic children of a member of staff working for All Souls Catholic Primary School (see Note 6 below)
  1. Non-Catholic children.

 

  • The inclusion of a note (note 6) which defines ‘a member of staff working for All Souls Catholic Primary School’ as follows:

“… a member of staff working for All Souls Catholic Primary School is defined as an individual who has been employed by All Souls Catholic Primary School for two or more years prior to the application being submitted or where the staff member has been recruited to fill a vacant post for which there is a demonstrable skill shortage.”

 

Support with sleep and sleep routines

12th October 2023Mr A Cooke

We would like to make parents aware of a free service that is available to support children and adults for whom sleep and sleeping routines are a problem.

At any given time up to 40% of adults and 50% of children (this rises to 80% with a SEND diagnosis) have difficulties with their sleep. Yet, surveys suggest that almost 60% of adults feel that there was a lack of support for sleep issues. Sleep problems can leave people feeling isolated and lonely.

The National Sleep Helpline is run by trained sleep advisors, many of whom are specialists in working with SEND. They are able to young people directly, or parents (they can also talk to adults, including older people, about their sleep issues).

The helpline is open 5 times a week, Monday, Tuesday, Thursday evenings 7-9pm, and Monday, Wednesday mornings 9-11am. The number is 03303 530 541.

You can read more here: https://thesleepcharity.org.uk/national-sleep-helpline/

You can click here to download the PDF file. 

 

Anti-Bullying Week 2023: November 13th-17th 2023 – All Souls Pledges Support

1st October 2023Mr A Cooke

All Souls is delighted to have pledged its support to this year’s Anti-Bullying Week, which runs from Monday 13th – Friday 17th November.

 

Anti-Bullying Week 2023 is coordinated in England, Wales and Northern Ireland by the Anti-Bullying Alliance. This year it has the theme ‘Make A Noise About Bullying’ and will take place from Monday 13th to Friday 17th November. The week will be kicked off with Odd Socks Day on Monday 13th November, where adults and children wear odd socks to celebrate what makes us all unique.

We will be sharing more information closer to the time, outlining the ways in which we will be supporting this year’s campaign.

Online Internet Safety Workshops for Parents – organised by WMP

12th September 2023Mr A Cooke

internet-safety

West Midlands Police are once again running online Internet Safety Workshops this term.

Upcoming events are currently scheduled for:

Weds 20th September – 12:00

Thurs 21st September – 18:00

Weds 25th October – 12:00

Thurs 26th October – 18:00

During the workshops, the following content will be shared/dicussed:

• Apps and appropriate ages

• Safety settings

• Grooming, sexting, bullying, radicalisation and extremism

• Gaming

• Introducing house rules

• How to approach conversations and what to do if your child is a victim

 

To book a place, or for more information, please follow the link from the poster below:

You can click here to download the PDF file. 

Studybugs – report absence securely and help improve children’s health

13th March 2023Mr A Cooke

Dear parents/carers,

We’re pleased to announce that All Souls is introducing a new, more efficient and secure system for reporting your child’s absence due to illness, called Studybugs. Over the next few weeks we will be moving from our online Google From based absence reporting to StudyBugs and after the Easter holidays, the current form and link will be removed.

We are therefore asking all parents to download the free Studybugs app, or register on the Studybugs website, and use it to tell us whenever your child’s ill and unable to attend school. In school, over the same period, we will be moving from taking paper registers each day to doing so electronically.

Get the app or register now (https://studybugs.com/about/parents)

Thank you,
All Souls Catholic Primary School

Top 3 reasons to use Studybugs
1. It’s integrated with our systems so we know right away if your child is unaccounted for.
2. It’s quick and easy to register and use and automatically reminds you to keep us posted.
3. You’ll be helping the NHS and other public health organisations improve children’s health. (https://studybugs.com/about/schools)

 

Summer Term Swimming Programme

13th March 2023Mr A Cooke

During the Summer term we offer weekly swimming lessons, during the school day, to children in Upper Key Stage 2 who are yet to reach the National Curriculum expectations for Swimming.  So that we can target the children who will benefit the most from these, we would be grateful if all parents of children in Year 5 and 6 could complete the following form in relation to their child.  We will then be in touch with the parents of those invited to participate in the Summer term lessons before the end of this term. Thank you.

Catholic Social Teaching Home Study Task – Lent 2023

9th March 2023Mr A Cooke

The following letter has been emailed out to parents of children in Years R-6 today (9th March 2023)  To download a copy of the letter, click here.

 

Dear parent(s)/carer(s),

This year we are building upon the fabulous work that children completed around Vocations during the last academic year as we embrace our whole school development priority of embedding the principals of Catholic Social Teaching into all aspects of our school life.

Catholic Social Teaching is about seeking to apply the essence of Christian moral principles into life and society – essentially putting our learning and teachings into action.  Each half-term, as a school, we have focussed on a different principal of Catholic Social Teaching, discussing and unpicking together what this means for us and how we can embrace this further within our lives.  So far we have looked at, Human dignity, Family, community and participation and solidarity. The children have completed various activities within their classrooms to support and further understand these ideas.

On Monday, we shared with the children our theme for this half-term, ‘Care for the Poor and Vulnerable’ and discussed what this means to us and the fact that God calls us to ensure justice in all societies by the way we treat the most poor and vulnerable. This Catholic Social Teaching calls us to listen, see and respond to the cry of the poor through our words and actions. By doing so, we are not making a gift of what is ours to the poor, but we are giving back what is rightfully theirs. We put those affected by poverty first.

We are now asking all children to complete a piece of work at home by thinking about how they can help the poor and vulnerable within our local or global community and carrying out an act to achieve this.  There are many different approaches that they could take, which we discussed during the assembly such as:

  • Raising money for a good cause
  • Raising awareness of charity work and global issues amongst others
  • Giving time to talk to an engage with elderly friends and relatives
  • Encouraging friends and family to support a local foodbank
  • Praying for the poor and vulnerable

These are just some ideas and we are certain that with your support, the children can come up with even more.  Children can work individually or may choose to co-ordinate with friends or siblings.  We would then like the children to share with us what they have done.  Again – this can be done so in many different ways, whether it be a photograph of them carrying out their act, a written explanation or drawing of what they did or something completed digitally – it is completely up to them.  It shouldn’t take them a considerable amount of time as we would like them to primarily focus their efforts on the act itself.

We would like completed pieces of work to be returned to school by Wednesday 19th April.  We recognise that these pieces of work are very personal and, whilst we look forward to seeing or hearing about what the children have done, we will not be showcasing and presenting these works to the whole school as we did with the vocations projects last year.

Thank you for your continued support.

Mrs R McGrath

RE lead / Deputy Headteacher