Daily Bulletin – Thursday 25 November
Could all the Senior Exec and the Senior Prefects attend a short meeting in the theatre today from 2.10pm please.
S3 Career Expo – November 2021
On Tuesday 23rd November, all S3 pupils took part in a virtual Career Expo, which was organised in partnership with The Wood Foundation. Pupils from Alford, Banff, Portlethen and Kemnay Academies interviewed national, regional and local employers across 12 different sectors to help share information which would be beneficial to young people who may wish to enter that career. Out of the 12 sectors, pupils chose 3 sectors which were of interest to them to explore further.
The event was designed for S3 pupils to encourage thinking about possible career pathways and in turn begin to think about course choices for next year.
On the day, pupils were engaged in the event and initial feedback from pupils and staff was positive, providing vital information about the careers within each sector.
S1 and S2 Social Subjects
Recently, S1 have been working hard at home for their Social Subjects lessons. They have been learning about early settlers in Scotland from the Palaeolithic to the Neolithic and were asked to use their knowledge of stone age shelters to create their own. Some chose to build them out of natural materials and many designed their shelters using Minecraft. An example of some of these are on display in the Humanities Department, but here are some photographs as a taster.
S2 have also been working hard in Social Subjects. They recently completed a topic on Disease, where they were learning about The Black Death and Ebola. For their topic assessment they were asked to produce a historical Scotsman news report on the arrival of the Plague in Edinburgh. These are displayed in the department – please see photograph below. The pupils worked hard to make the news reports look old by staining them and burning the edges.
Daily Bulletin – Tuesday 23 November
S6 Mental Health Ambassadors
There is a meeting on Thursday 25th November, Period 6 (14.00-14.50), to discuss how we can raise the profile of Mental health and offer relevant support in our school community. You have been sent an email to you GLOW address with full details.
Senior Girl’s Football
All girls going to Turriff on Thursday 25th can you please attend a very short meeting at break on Wednesday.
Art Club
An art club for S1 – S3s will be starting on Tuesdays at lunchtime. You can work on existing skills or we can learn new ones. If you would like to come along, it will be held in Mr McCance’s art room (E1-59). Packed lunch can be eaten in class. In the first week we will be looking at continuous line drawing and activities from then on will be explored and decided by all existing and new members. Thank you.
Daily Bulletin – Monday 22 November
YPI Finalists
Your YPI Mentors have been listed in your Google Classrooms but in case you’ve missed it here is the list of the YPI mentors and the group they have been assigned. If you haven’t already, please make contact with them so that they can help you with your final presentations. Remember, the videos need to be submitted by Friday 3rd December. Good luck!
Blood Cancer UK – Mr Cahill
Calico – Ms Bertin
Home Start – Mr Trueman
Lend a Hand Kemnay – Mrs Munro
Needs – Miss Watts
Charlie House – Mrs Taylor
Thinking about College in 2022? NESCOL Virtual Open Day – Wednesday 1st December2021
Virtual Open Day – 1 December
Our next virtual open day for full-time courses starting in 2022 will take place on Wednesday 1 December from 3pm – 7pm. The online event is an ideal place for interested pupils to find out everything they need to know about college life, including information on courses, the application process, funding and support.
More information and the link to register can be found on our website.
Applications for 2022-23
Wednesday 1 December is also an important date for the diary for another reason – it is the day full time applications open for courses starting in August 2022. Our Student Advice Team will be available to help with any application enquiries: studentadvice@nescol.ac.uk.
February-start courses
For pupils who may be considering leaving school over winter, we have places available on nine full-time courses across our three main campuses in February 2022. These include courses in sport, science, photography, media and journalism, computing, engineering, business and automotive, and will give students a qualification before summer that allows them to progress to the next level of study in August.
In addition, we have launched an exciting new taster course called Get Ready for College, which is designed for those unsure what they want to study. This unique course, which is SCQF level 4, gives students the opportunity to sample different College subjects and to experience the transition into further education at College. It introduces a range of learning activities in areas such as Care, Sport, Social Studies, Enterprise, Wellbeing and Personal Development.
More information is available on our website.
S6 Horizons: Virtual Mock Interviews
Our S6 pupils took part in a Virtual Mock Interview with employers as part of their Horizon programme. We were delighted to virtually host employers from Neptune Oil and Gas, SubSea7, Mackie’s of Scotland and Acumen Financial who kindly gave up their time to interview our young people.
The event ran successfully and there was a real “buzz” when pupils came out of the virtual interview. The feedback from the pupils was extremely positive:
- The experience was really good and it helped me prepare for a real interview. I was nervous at first but they didn’t make it awkward and I felt at ease.
- They were really friendly and they gave me great feedback to work on. This was a really useful experience.
- He was nice, calm and quiet, it was a useful experience because of the feedback and the environment of an interview. I was told to expand on my answers and talk about what I do at school more but really valuable to do as a practice.
- The interview felt natural and they gave good advice.
- The feedback I received was to draw more from my experiences and talk about my passions more. They made me feel really comfortable and less nervous. I will definitely use their advice when being interviewed in the future.
- I found the whole process interesting and effective. It helped me get over my nervousness and I was able to get feedback on how to improve in a real interview.
- I found this really useful because it gave me an insight into what a real interview would be like. I now feel a lot more confident and feel I would be much less nervous now I know what they are like and what employers are looking for.
- It was good. I felt as if I was in a real interview and I felt relaxed. It is a good experience.
My thanks to all the employers who gave up their time to accommodate this valuable experience today. We are planning to repeat this event for our S5 pupils during Horizons and more information will be shared in due course. This will also be open to any S6 pupil who did not manage to take part today.
Daily Bulletin – Tuesday 16 November
Robert Gordons University Taster Sessions
Robert Gordons University are holding some on-campus taster sessions in December and January, specifically for S5 and S6 pupils to provide you with the opportunity to come on to campus and get some practical experience which might help you decide your next steps. We are planning on offering these in all subjects but we would like to host events for the following schools prior to Christmas, provided there is sufficient interest;
Scott Sutherland School of Architecture and the Built Environment
School of Engineering
School of Computing
School of Pharmacy and Life Sciences
If you are thinking of applying to these schools within the university, please come and get more information from Mrs Rees-Jenkins and we will plan the rest.
Eco Group
The Eco Group are raising money for our chosen charity ‘Team Seas’, a charity that aims to remove waste from our oceans and rivers for every £0.75 made. You can find out more by visiting #TeamSeas
To raise the money the pupils in the Eco-Group are going vegetarian for one week from Monday 22nd November until Monday 29th November. Mrs Niven will be going vegan for one month from Monday 15th November until Monday 6th November. The pupils have sponsorship forms to raise their own money, but you can also donate through our Just Giving Page at https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/emily-niven?utm_term=aVAW5y3MY
Any donations would be gratefully appreciated.
Alford Academy Eco Group.
Daily Bulletin – Friday 12 November
Book Week Scotland
As part of Book Week Scotland next week, we will be doing DEAR (Drop Everything and Read) sessions at various points across Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Please can you make sure you have a book (fiction or non-fiction), magazine, graphic novel…) with you every day so that you can take part.