Social media icons                                           April 2025

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Headteacher Welcome and Updates

Dear Parents and Carers

I hope you have had a refreshing Easter break. It has been a positive start to Term 5. Year 11 and 13 have come back focussed on making the absolute most of their lessons and the available support as we approach the home straight towards the summer examinations.

Start of Term Service

We were blessed to be involved in a superb and deeply spiritual start of term service. The service reflected on the post-resurrection events on the ‘Road to Emmaus’ (Luke 24:13-35). It was inspiring to see our school community deeply engaged in the service. My thanks go to Mrs Duzniak, Chaplain Josh, and Mr Davies for their leadership, and to all the staff who contributed.

Exams

We wish all our students and their families the very best for the exam season. There is a robust programme of support in place for students throughout this period. The details will be shared with parents and carers this week. Please also visit the Exams page on our website for useful dates and information.

Summer Uniform

We are moving to summer uniform on Wednesday 30 April. Students may choose not to wear their jumper or blazer.  All other elements of the uniform, including the tie, are compulsory.  If there are financial difficulties with regard to the purchase of a school uniform, please do speak to your child(ren)’s Head of Year, and we will do whatever we can to support you. We have regular second-hand uniform sales, which you can find details of on the school calendar on our website.

Attendance

Thank you for your continued support in ensuring our students attend school as regularly as possible. Our attendance rates continue to be significantly above national and local averages.

We remind parents/carers that they must notify the attendance team (attendance@smrt.bristol.sch.uk or leave a message on 0117 353 2069) by 8:30am regarding any absence that day.  This will support us in carrying out our safeguarding responsibilities.  Please use this link to read more about attendance, and how we can support students and families that might be having issues.

Mobile Phones

I wrote to parents and carers in February 2024 regarding our approach to mobile phones and again in February 2025. During this time, Mr Morgan has been involved in significant research, discussions, and planning to inform our policy and processes regarding mobile phones in school. Mr Morgan will be writing to parents and carers in due course to share the outcome of this process and the changes that we will be introducing.

Sporting Success

Congratulations to our Year 7 and Year 8 boys’ football teams, who were both crowned Bristol champions with wins over St Bede’s and Orchard School respectively at the end of last term.  

Our Year 7 girls’ football team also had an excellent season, and I look forward to reporting on their success in the future.  I’d like to thank all our students for their commitment to extracurricular PE, sports teams and for putting themselves forwards as ambassadors for our school and thank the families and staff who support them. Please do continue to keep the school updated on sporting and extracurricular successes outside of school.

SMRT Social Media

For the last month, we have been steadily building our social media presence through the use of BlueSky, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and X. You may be familiar with at least one of these platforms. Mr Varney, our Learning Technologist and Marketing Manager, who does an excellent job of managing our website, among other things, has been working hard to get lots of information out to users as part of a trial.  We would now like to ‘formally’ launch this to you as parents and carers.  Click the following link to follow SMRT on these platforms should you choose to do so.

Follow Our Socials!

We would be delighted if you’d like to share this information more widely so that we can celebrate all the good things we are doing at SMRT with the wider community. 

Community News

We will be joined by some new members of staff this term.  Ms Watts has joined the Finance Team.  Ms Sancto-Halpin (Social Sciences) will be starting her maternity leave soon, so we will be joined by Mr Swanson, who will be with us until the end of the school year.

Holiday and INSET Day

Please note that we have a Bank Holiday on Monday 5 May, and our last INSET day of the year is on Monday 30 June.

Have a great Bank Holiday weekend when it arrives.

Del Planter

Headteacher

Contents

Curriculum News Pastoral News
Faith Extra Curricular, Events and Contributions
House Points Learning Support
Safeguarding Update Friends of SMRT
Key Dates Community

Curriculum News

GCSE and A-level Exams 

As we start Term 5, we enter exam season.  GCSE and A-Level exams will begin in early May.  Students in year 11 and year 13 are well practiced in the processes around exams.  There is a page on our website dedicated to exams.

Please have a look and if you have any questions, please contact Ms Cottell. 

Faith

Ikoba Update

We are partnered with Ikoba Girls School in Masindi, Uganda.  This is partnership that we have held for nearly 20 years.  In February half-Term, a staff team from SMRT were able to visit the school and spend some time in lessons, with the staff and also with the students.  The students in the school are wonderful and as part of our partnership we share events that are happening in both schools.

Recently, the students in Uganda volunteered to help clean and tidy a local medical centre.  Here are some pictures of them helping in their community. The students and staff at the school are a great inspiration to us here at SMRT as they live out ALIVE values in all they do.

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As part of our visit we identified a need for the school to have an incinerator installed near the toilet block.  The toilets are pit latrines and many students use period products that clog up the latrines.  An incinerator would reduce this problem and help with period product disposal.  We were able to financially support this using donations from SMRT.  Here are some pictures of the process.

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KS3 Prayer Morning 

In the last week of term, we held our annual prayer morning for all students in year 7, 8 and 9.  Every student came to the hall for a 30 minute session where they had the opportunity to explore spirituality through the lenses of:  Art, Sport, Science, Music, Art, Prayer and Community.  Students looked at how you can worship in different ways.  There was a wonderful atmosphere in the hall and a great opportunity to meet together and be a school family just before the Easter holidays. 

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Weekly Worship from this Month

Every week we run a worship session in our tutor groups, and make these available on our website for parents and carers to view.

Each newsletter will feature a Weekly Worship we would like to highlight from the previous month.

A cloth sack with several potatoes tumbling out.
25 Apr 2025
We Are Interdependent 2
Weekly Worship from Chaplain Josh.
Read more

'Gathered' Worship Event

In the last week of term, we held our first ever worship event for students after-school.  It was called 'Gathered' to represent the fact that many of our students attend churches and worship all over the city and yet gather in our school every day.  We wanted them to have an opportunity to worship together.  Over 100 young people stayed behind after school to sing, pray, discuss and eat pizza together.  It was a wonderful event, and we look forward to repeating something similar in Term 6.

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Extra-Curricular, Events and Contributions

Geography Fieldwork 

Around 60 students took part in fieldwork around Temple Quarter and the wider Floating Harbour area. They represented the school brilliantly as they undertook primary fieldwork data collection to try to help them establish if the regeneration of the Harbourside has been successful.

They were especially commended for their brilliance in tracking down members of the public to question during questionnaire surveys. The weather was kind and the students were great. Well done!!!!

Team Geography

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House Points

The house point totals as we reach the end of this month are as follows:

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Learning Support

SEND Parents' and Carers' Support Group

Our final group of the academic year will be held 4pm - 5pm on Tuesday 3 June, here in Learning Support.

All parents and carers of students with SEND are warmly welcomed! 

Please let me know if you would like to attend on: learningsupport@smrt.bristol.sch.uk.

Materials for Activities Week

We will be running alternative activities based in Learning Support for students with SEND who need a quieter alternative in a familiar environment.

We would welcome any contributions of the following, for the activities:

  • Scraps of fabric, for making bunting
  • Scraps of wool, for making pompoms
  • Old white t-shirts and cloth bags, for tie-dying. 

Safeguarding Update

Wake up Wednesday

Each week we send a 'Wake Up Wednesday' ('WuW') safeguarding update to parents and carers. These cover a range of topics and themes that empower and equip parents and carers with the confidence and practical skills to engage in conversations with young people. We also make WuWs available on our website.

Here's the WuW update we are highlighting this month.

Click to WuW!

Friends of SMRT

Next Meeting

The next Friends of SMRT meeting will take place on Thursday 12 June in the library at 7pm. 

If you wish to donate and support the Friends of SMRT please click on the link below:

https://www.goodhub.com/go/friends-of-st-mary-redcliffe-and-temple-school

Key Dates

Events coming up this month from our calendar.

Junior Maths Challenge
All Day
01
May
Muller House Eucharist
8:30am – 10:00am
01
May
Drama Showcase Evening
6:30pm – 9:00pm
01
May
A-Level Fine Art Exam
All Day
from 06 May until 09 May
06
May
Y12 Geography Field Trip
All Day
08
May
Poetry Event - Hobbies
12:25pm – 1:10pm
15
May
Yr13 Last Day
All Day
16
May
End of Term 5
All Day
23
May

Community

Are you a Kinship Carer?

Kinship carers are friends or family who step in to raise a child when their parents may not be able to. This may be temporary or long term. You might be a grandparent whose grandchild has come to live with you, a family friend, or perhaps you are taking care of a younger sibling or niece. There are more than 141,000 children living in kinship care in England and Wales (source: Kinship care charity) and so you are certainly not alone.

If you are a kinship carer, please let us know. This will help us to better support you and your child, and we will be able to signpost you to further help and advice. We will handle any information shared sensitively.

Our Kinship Lead is Gemma Barry and you can contact her by email. Our Kinship Lead has awareness of the particular needs of children in kinship care and the support available for children, carers and families.

You can also access information via: 

The HOPE Virtual School Kinship care

Kinship - The Kinship care charity

The Kinship care charity offer a wide variety of support for kinship carers including online workshops on a range of relevant topics and local coffee mornings.

Disclaimer

We sometimes share details with you of external clubs and non-school lettings, such as sports groups and clubs that are not necessarily affiliated to the school directly. Please note that we do not endorse these products or services and that if you purchase any of the products or services offered by these external third parties, you are purchasing directly from the third parties, and not from SMRT. We are not responsible for the offerings of these third parties and do not assume any responsibility or liability for the actions, products, or services of these third parties. They may have their own terms and policies which you should review carefully.