The Spanish department has come together with the school and wider community to put together a 'danza', which embraces the sense of fun and togetherness that such a project inspires. Ms Navarro's TY students chose the song and created the choreography. As part of our 'community links' project, TY students have been going to the convent every Monday, where they sang Spanish and Irish songs with the Sisters, and this provided a great opportunity to involve them in the 'danza Kuduro' video. Many members of the staff have shown an interest in the language, some teach it , others learnt it in school and others are learning it now. So it was great to have them take part. TY students enjoyed the dance while walking El Camino, and their joy when teaching it to a fellow pilgrim celebrates how language learning goes far beyond the classroom and allows people of different cultures and experiences to unite.

https://youtu.be/CRm4BW9DgRU

Please feel free to drop off bags of unwanted clothes to the school for the Parents’ Association fundraiser tomorrow Saturday (18th May) from 9.30 am- 12.30pm.

Remember, if this time doesn’t suit - bags can be dropped off to the school reception any other day that the school is open.

 HFSS Parents Association Committee

A Note for Parents, Guardians and Community

We are delighted to let you know that our school has been accepted into the Yellow Flag Programme. This programme will enable the students, staff and the wider school community;

• to learn more about their own and others’ culture
• to value and celebrate the cultural diversity that is in the school
• to learn more about treating people fairly

If the school can complete 8 steps, we will receive our Yellow Flag. The Yellow Flag will show everyone that HFSS is a school that values cultural diversity.

Involving parents, families and communities is one of the steps – your help is needed to earn a yellow flag.

What will be happening?

Over the next two years, students and teachers will be asked to learn more about each other’s culture.You will have an important role to play, as you can talk to your child about their culture, heritage and history.

We want every student to be proud of themselves, their community and culture. You will be finding out what students and parents think about our school, and how their culture is valued – share your views with the school or fill out the school survey later this year. 

Our school will be celebrating the cultural diversity in the school and having events for parents and families, please come along and get involved.

The school will be inviting people into class to talk to us about their culture – maybe you or somebody you know would like to give a talk?

A Diversity Committee of students, teachers, parents and community leaders will be set up to help guide our school towards our Yellow Flag. Parents from diverse backgrounds are encouraged to get involved.

We will have much more information to share in August. 

http://yellowflag.ie/

Finish Strong

Dear parents/ guardians,

We are in the last 3 weeks of the school term and we would ask you all to encourage the students to FINISH STRONG.

So to FINISH STRONG students need to continue to follow all school rules :

-Focus on your schoolwork and exam preparation

-Wear  full correct uniform

-Remove any nose piercing or large earrings

- Keep all books in the lockers

- Be punctual to school and class

-Finish all outstanding schoolwork/ projects

- Remove any Art / Music / PE gear/ lunchboxes/Home Ec equipment from racks and start to bring home before the school term ends.

Good luck & enjoy the last few weeks of this academic year by FINISHING STRONG!

We have a Department of Education Maths Subject Inspection in school this week on Tuesday (7th May) and Thursday (9th May). This is another great opportunity for our students and teachers to share in feedback about learning. 

The annual School Captain's Day is today (Wednesday) and follows the Captain-led reflection morning on the student centred themes of Inclusion and Diversity. This will be followed by the school's second Colour Run. This year all funds raised are to support Insync Newbridge, a wonderful local service for youth and community.

Our annual Sports Day is this Friday, 10th May and we are all very excited to enjoy the sporting events as coordinated by the PE team and to see the HFSS traditional 6th years dress-up themed parade with their English teachers.

As always, all of these activities are thanks to the creativity and commitment of the HFSS staff.

Many congrats to Ava Rock (3rd Yr) who achieved qualification times in 8 events at last weekend's Leinster Swimming Championships for the Irish Open Swimming Championships in 2 weeks time.

Dear Parent/Guardian, 

We are currently completing year three of our school plan in HFSS. Our school plan sets out many targets for us to achieve by 2026, many of which we have already successfully implemented. Our full plan is found on our school website and in the link below. 

https://www.holyfamily.ie/wp-assets-holyfamily/uploads/2021/09/HFSS-School-Strategic-Development-Plan-2021-2026.pdf

 As part of tracking our progress we would like to invite you to complete a survey evaluating our performance across some key areas we endeavour to improve during our current school plan (curriculum offered, facilities available, student voice, our sustainability and our engagement with the community). The data from this survey will help guide us to address area’s in need of greater attention and furthermore as a metric to chart our progress. This is part of our School Self Evaluation process in HFSS and a large sample of students are also surveyed for their contribution.

School Self Evaluation at HFSS is collaborative, inclusive, and reflective process of internal school review. The process of School Self Evaluation involves gathering information from a range of sources about our school, measuring our progress and using the data collected to make decisions and action further improvements.

Your input is extremely important. We would greatly appreciate it if you could take two minutes to complete the survey found at the below link. The survey will close on the 9th May at 5pm so the data can be collated and analysed. 

https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=3sEcWdMHvUekevUmUBe2E1USIOlyaa1JtlAHeGpxmOhUOE9QUlZSOUxLTFgyRkdXUERMWkFKOFg4Ty4u

For the information, we collect to best represent the needs of our students and direct us towards impactful action we welcome your engagement in this survey. There is an annual presentation of the findings of the SSE annual survey at the Parents Association AGM in September.

 Kind regards, Aisling Jordan

School Self Evaluation Coordinator

A big well done to Cavina in 5th year, who was one of the finalists in the Heathy Chef Competition. Cavina cooked a delicious Vegetable Satay Style Noodles served with a fried egg. Cavina was one of 16 students to make the final out of hundreds of candidates in Ireland.
A huge congratulations to Cavina and to her Home Economics teacher Ms Keenan.
Thanks, Ms Byrne :)

Great news, Meadbh Hartnett (3s) received second prize in the all Ireland Healthy Chef cookery competition today in Sligo The competition was judged by a panel of experts from St. Angela’s College including award winning chef and Home Economics Ambassador Nevin Maguire. Many thanks to Meadbh's Home Economics teacher Ms J. Byrne.

www.stangelas.ie/healthyhomechef2024/#:~:text=The%20All%2DIsland%20Cook%20Off,Prizes%20to%20be%20confirmed!&text=cooking%20talent.. Superb achievement!
Go Holy Family Secondary School.