This Week's News from Alison Cobbin, Head of School

Dear Parents

Each half term a group of parents and staff members meet to discuss current issues and strategic plans of the school. The group I am referring to is the School Consultative Group (SCG). Whilst confidentiality is an important tenant of the group, we want to be open and approachable and so, on their behalf, I would like to take this opportunity to share with you a bit more about the group.

The purpose of the group is to provide support to the leadership of the school by assisting in strategic decision making, bringing new ideas and inspiration to school planning and providing special expertise to assist in specific projects. In our meetings we have updates on the academic programmes, safeguarding and well-being, marketing, admissions, finance and other topics relevant to the functioning and direction of the school. The SCG is purely an advisory group and does not participate in governance, which is the responsibility of the proprietors in conjunction with the school leadership. Over the past two years I have been very grateful for the safe space of the SCG to discuss issues within the school, external pressures and the future direction of the school.

I am pleased to announce that this year Deepak Khanna agreed to take on the role of co-chairing the group.

The current members of SCG are:

Alison Cobbin – Chair

Deepak Khanna – Co-chair, parent representative

Karen Strickland – Secretary

Thomas Jensen – Safeguarding and parent representative

Juliet Reingold – Parent representative

Gerghana Valova – Parent representative

Fiona Kennedy – Upper school staff representative

Kate Hornshaw – Lower School staff representative

This year the SCG is saying farewell to two longstanding members:

Louise Keane has been a parent representative on the group for more than 6 years and for many years chaired the group. Her energy and commitment to the school have been greatly appreciated by all in the group, and myself in particular. When I re-joined Dwight in 2016 Louise's friendly and pragmatic support helped me to settle in quickly.

Gabriele Weber has been a staff representative for the Lower School for more than three years. Gabriele's extensive experience and expertise in EYFS and primary education has been a great benefit to the group. All the group members have valued Gabriel's thoughtful and wise presence in the group.

I would like to express my thanks to both Louise and Gabriele for giving up so much of their time and energy for the benefit of the school. They have both quietly and humbly given of themselves to support the school and we have been very fortunate to have individuals of their calibre and commitment willing to contribute to the school.

One of the aims of the group is to be more visible in the school community, so that other parents and staff members can approach members of the SCG if they have suggestions they would like to share with the school leadership. I hope this newsletter will whet your appetite sufficiently to go to the SCG page of the school website, where you can find more information about the individual members of the group and the purpose and organisation of the group. We also have some fun activities planned for parent association and school events that will help you get to know the members of the group.

I look forward to working with Deepak and the SCG to continue our journey of school improvement in line with our values and vision.

Wishing you all a wonderful half term break.

Kind regards

Alison Cobbin

Head of School