Friday Bulletin

Dear Parents & Carers,

We have said goodbye to Year 13 today. They have been a tremendous year group and have contributed a significant amount to the ethos and life of the school. They have also dealt with the difficulties caused by the pandemic and were one of the year groups that had to navigate school closures in an exam year, as well as completing their GCSE exams during a national crisis and constantly shifting guidance around how results would be awarded. In their last assembly Mr Wilbraham thanked them and encouraged them to serve the public, challenge inequality and make a positive contribution to society. They have been stoical in the face of real uncertainty. We wish them the best for their exams and their future lives. They are a credit to their families and the school.

Year 11 are also ‘leaving’ today. Like Year 13, the rituals associated with leaving are important, even though they will actually be in school for three more weeks of focused support and revision. Mrs McFadden wrote to the parents and carers of Year 11 students earlier this week to explain what our plans are.

I became acting Headteacher at Durham Johnston in January 2018 and was permanently appointed a year later. Therefore, my time in this role has overlapped with Year 11. Based upon that I have shared the following thoughts in the 2023 Yearbook.

I have a very vivid memory you arriving as Year 7 students in 2018. That was the year in which I became the Headteacher at Durham Johnston. Your first year was my first year too and we were all nervous, just in different ways and about different things. You stood on the yard in uniforms a little too big, a bit scratchy around the collar and looked nervously up at the older, taller students. You are now those students. As an adult, time passes very quickly, but, for many of you. that may seem like a lifetime ago; 5 years of constant change. When you started at Durham Johnston, Boris Johnson had only been Prime Minister for 2 months, Jeremy Corbyn was in charge of Labour and very few people had ever heard or used the phrase ‘Covid.’   

 

You have been an excellent year group and I have had the genuine pleasure of teaching sixty of you and watching you develop from being (slightly irritating) primary school children into mature young adults. I have found you to be considerate, thoughtful and willing to act upon advice. Durham Johnston is a comprehensive school and you have met and worked with people from a variety of backgrounds and with many different viewpoints. You have treated each other kindly in most cases and have developed friendships that will endure for a long time. We will miss you, but I hope to see the majority of you in September as members of the school 6th Form, and wish you success in both your exams and all your future endeavours, wherever you end up and whatever you choose to do. I am proud to have been Durham Johnston’s Headteacher whilst you have been students at the school. 

 

Their final morning in school has also been lovely and I hope that they are not too traumatised by seeing their teachers ‘perform’ in their final assembly with Mr Digby. I will certainly be trying to mentally block out aspects of what I have seen this morning in the years to come.

 

We have shared important timetable changes with all year groups this week. We feel that it is important that Year 11 and Year 12 are in school for revision and additional teaching and that has meant altering break and lunch times accordingly. We have offered additional support for students with a specific need so that they understand how timings have changed and will reiterate our plans on Monday morning in form. The following changes apply for each year group so that parents and carers are aware too:

 

Structure of the Day – 15^th May – 9^th June

Structure of the Day – 12^th June to 21^st July

Last week I wrote about Amanda Pritchard’s visit to the school. Our younger students asked a series of excellent questions about her role, managing stress, imposter syndrome (a theme also referenced by Mr Wilbraham with Year 13 in today’s leavers’ assembly) and interaction with different Prime Ministers. On Tuesday Amanda wrote to the school and I wanted to share her lovely comments about our students: 

 

It was such a pleasure to meet and speak to your students; their confidence, curiosity and ambition is a credit to the positive and supportive culture you and the rest of the staff are clearly fostering…. please do pass on my thanks to all those who contributed to a very energising and enjoyable few hours.

We will share some of the photographs from the visit in a separate news item next week. Historian Martin Sugarman also contacted us this week in relation to another former student of whom we are very proud. Isidore Newman attended the school in the 1930s and, as a talented linguist, worked for the SOE during World War Two. That involved dangerous covert operations in France. Isidore was captured and, as a consequence of his Jewish faith, murdered in Mauthausen Concentration Camp in December 1944. We have shared his story with students and parents before and his bravery has now been formally acknowledged in Durham, with a plaque being added to his former home in Durham City. Martin shared the following update with the school about the memorial:

 

A first memorial to Jewish SOE agent in WW2, Capt. Isidore Newman, MBE, Cr de Gu. who, though born in Leeds, was brought up and went to school in Durham, has been installed at the address where he and his family lived before the War. Although the street name has changed, research by local Council historians confirmed the building location. The plaque was financed by Jerry Klinger of the Jewish American Society for Historic Preservation, and organised by Historian and author Martin Sugarman, Archivist of AJEX, the Jewish War Veterans of the UK.

Isidore's full story can be read online and also in the book, "Fighting Back' by Martin Sugarman (Valentine Mitchell 2017). Son of poor Jewish immigrants from Lithuania, Isidore went on two missions, landing by submarine into enemy territory in France to organise resistance against the Nazis and after his first trip was awarded an MBE for bravery and tenacity.

Sadly, on his second mission, when he was taken by a secret Lysander aircraft, his group was later betrayed, and he was captured. After torture and transporting to various prisons, he ended up at the death camp of Mauthausen in Austria, where he was murdered in Dec 1944 alongside many other captured agents. With no known grave, he is remembered on several memorials in the UK and France, but this is the first public monument to him. France awarded him the Croix de Guerre.

Whilst two very different periods and people, it is positive that we can share the above information about former students and their service. You will also see a variety of wonderful achievements and experiences linked to our current students in this update. We are proud of those students too.

 

Service comes in many forms, and we are keen to support those helping the country, our community, or their families. Could I ask you to contact the school if you are a military service family or if your child is a Young Carer for a family member? We have a detailed list of those individuals but are always keen to check if circumstances have changed or if we are unaware of the roles that some students or their families fulfil away from school. If that does apply to you or your child, could you please contact the school via our usual email so that we can offer additional support.

 

My final request is a consistent one if you read the Friday Bulletin regularly. Could you please ask your child to think about others in our community as they make their way home? In particular, to be considerate when travelling home by public transport and when walking through local residential areas. We are part of a community, and no one has the right to make others feel uncomfortable or worried by behaving in an anti-social manner. Showing respect, for elderly residents in particular, is non-negotiable and I hope that parents and carers will reiterate that important message at home.

 

Have a good weekend and good luck to Years 11, 12 and 13 for the weeks ahead.

 

Mr O’Sullivan

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