Welcome to the weekly Newsletter for parents and carers of students attending John Hanson Community School.
Inspire - Care - Succeed
‘HEAD’ Lines
Snow Business!
Dear parents/carers
Thank you for your support with what has been a challenging day. The bright side is 3 and half hours of shoveling snow means I don’t need to go to the gym tomorrow!
I was in contact with the Headteachers of the other 2 Andover secondary schools early this morning and at that point there was minimal snow on the ground at any of our schools and the forecast did not show what we have ended up getting and thus we all agreed that we should open as normal.
It is always a bit of a ‘rock and a hard place’ decision on these occasions, but there was nothing to suggest at that point that the snow would continue all day. By the time we were in receipt of updated weather information most of my staff and many of your children were on their way to school.
Throughout the day we have made sure the school site is a safe learning environment as well as keeping an eye on the weather.
However, we arrived at a point where many of our local primary schools made decisions to close early and this has a significant impact on the number of staff I would have on site.
My overriding responsibility is to keep your children safe and therefore the decision was made to close early.
Enjoy the snowy weekend with your children
Regards
Russell Stevens
Headteacher
I have enjoyed the 3rd PSHE Day of this academic year.
We learned about our options for GCSEs and what job options we have. For one of our lessons, Mr Adams informed us of what choices we have for our GCSEs and how the process is done. The lesson helped to make picking our GSCEs easy and gave us time to think about what we want to pick.
The rest of the lessons were to help pick what we wanted to do for college and after school. We had SUN come in and talk to us about all the apprenticeship options out there and how a lot of businesses offer them.
We also had a lesson on Performing Arts from Andover College. We learned what typically happens if you talk a Performing Arts course at college and we even had a go at acting ourselves!
Ms Richards talked about the different characteristics people have and what best jobs would be best for them. We also took a Buzz Quiz (a characteristic quiz that tells what animal you are most like and what traits you have) and I came out as a Koala Bear!
Then we also had a teacher and former students from John Hanson come from Andover College and helped us find what good traits we have and what courses you can take at college to help in different sectors of the economy (e.g. to be good at marketing, then you need to be good with people and be good at presenting).
Finally, we had people from Andover College to talk about Media and Art courses and about how you don’t have to good at drawing to take the course.
The PSHE Day has helped me confirm what I want to do in the future and what my final choices for my GCSEs will be.
Sarah Joyce 9PBr
Child Development Visit
Mrs Hide organised for one of our ex students, Roseanna, to come into the LRC last week with her 4 month old baby Ophelia and talk to her GCSE Child Development group.
Roseanna talked about the birth, Ophelia’s development and what it’s like to be a parent. The girls asked lots of questions and had a chance to nurse Ophelia. It was a really positive session.
Oxford University visit
“Worldclass”
We were fortunate to secure a visit for a group of Year 11 students to visit St Edmund “Teddy” Hall. After a brief introduction of the university collegiate system, we were off to the Maths Faculty. What a treat – an introduction to Chaos Theory. Our lecturer clearly had a passion and enthusiasm for numbers and problem solving that is hard to match. Fortunately, I was able to keep up with the aid of to our talented students who guided me along the logic. The message here and throughout the day was that it was not about grades or where you go to school/live but do you have a ‘passion’ for learning in your chosen subject.
Third year undergraduate student ambassadors then hosted our students to lunch in the college, gave a guided tour of the college and hosted an informal Q&A before we dashed back to Andover to miss the forecasted snow.
Speaking to Mr Steven’s on their return back to the school some students said, “it has inspired me to apply”.
This was the exact reason for the trip. To breakdown the myths surrounding going to OXBRIDGE and top class universities. Having spent the day with such wonderful, engaging and passionate John Hanson students, I am confident they will be successful if they choose to apply.
Mr Allott
British Airways fly in..!
On Monday, we were lucky to welcome Charlotte from BA, into school for a lunch time drop in to meet with our budding Cabin Crew!
Charlotte talked to the group about only deciding two years ago to work as Cabin Crew. She had gone to Winchester University and studied marketing and media. However, once she had done her exams and got a job, realised that she was not happy and the career wasn’t right for her. Coincidently at this point, she had received some bad news in the family and she realised that life was too short to do something that she didn’t enjoy. She saw an advert in the paper to apply for cabin Crew, so thought she would give it a go and see what happened.
This was a long application process! Including a height test, role playing scenarios, in-house exams, as well as group and 1-2-1 interviews. She has since graduated from training and received her ‘wings’!
She explained that all training is self-funded, in case you are not selected, and that once graduated you pretty much go straight into it.
The most interesting parts of her talk were that you can put ‘bids’ on to a flight, if want to go somewhere in particular you build up points by going to a country many times. There are levels in the cabin crew – you can just be ‘qualified’ meaning that you can just work as normal on the flights, or mostly work in the airports and stay on the ground with only one or two flights. Or you can be ‘World Class’, meaning you can fly anywhere and be the ‘manager’ of that flight.
However, the downsides include that you may only get to stay a few hours in one place, sometimes not getting off the plane at all!
Being a flight attendant, gives you lots of life skills, many of which are transferable. Whether that be one day helping someone give birth, or the next putting out a fire!
She also told us about the Apprenticeships which are starting with BA next year.
Thank you to Charlotte for giving up her day off to talk to our students.
Mrs JVN
John Hanson Community School Production
Rehearsals are well underway for our production of the musical 'Matilda' based on the story by Roald Dahl. Music and Lyrics by Tim Minchin. It is important that all members of the cast and choir attend reherasals each week as required.
Wednesdays - Choir for Matilda - soloists and chorus from 3 - 4 pm PA1
Thursdays - Drama reahearsals - cast from 3 to 4.30 pm
All students are invited to attend if they wish to sing in the show - we are especially keen to involve our new Year 7 students - so please encourage your son/daughter to come along.
No audition - just come along and join in!
The show will be on stage for two nights
May 15th and 16th 2019
Last Thursday John Hanson’s year 7, 5-a-side team represented Eastleigh, Winchester and Andover district at the Southern Area finals, held at Places for Leisure, Eastleigh. John Hanson were placed into a group with other district winners from; Slough, Reading, Aldershot & Farnborough, Portsmouth, Jersey and Oxford.
The team started the tournament in good spirits, unfortunately these high spirits were short lived as we conceded two goals in the opening minute of the first game vs Oxford Academy. In the second half the team found their form getting back to 2-2 before conceding in the dying seconds of the game.
Our second game saw us face Robert Mays from Aldershot. Unfortunately we found ourselves in a similar position, going 2-0 down in the opening minute. However, the team fought back showing great desire, but unfortunately this wasn't enough even though the team controlled the tempo and created numerous opportunities. Our one goal wasn’t quite enough to gain a point. The boys were devastated! 2 games, 2 losses.
Our third game saw us play Ditton Park from Slough, and saw a new set of tactics from the team. Enter Roman Turner! Roman had one job in this game, and that was to not let their 5’10” playmaker get near the ball. It worked! We won 3-1 with great goals from Tommy Nelson and Fergus McMahon. At this point we realised that all the teams were losing against each other, which gave us a chance of qualifying. However we needed to win the three remaining games. A tough feat considering we had now played half of our games and only had three points on the board.
Next up Willink School, who had just beaten Robert Mays. Fortunately for us our new tactics were working, a dominant performance from all in a crushing 4-0 victory! The boys were buzzing and couldn't wait to play another game. Could it be, could we have a chance of qualification?
In our fifth game we played De La Salle from Jersey, another great performance from the team with a commanding 3-1 win, which placed us at the top of our group with other games still to play. Then a surprise win for Willink against Oxford Academy opened the table right up and set up the final round of fixtures with all to play for. Four teams still had a chance to qualify if results went their way.
Our last fixture saw us play Springfield from Portsmouth in a winner takes all game, all 6 teams were inside the sports hall with most cheering for Springfield. The boys loved the situation of playing the villains. They fought hard and played very tactically getting the win that they needed and progressed into the semi-finals, qualifying top of the group meaning we played second place from the other group.
In the semi-finals, the team played Faringdon Community School, from Oxford. The boys got off to a great start getting an early lead, we later added two more quick goals to make it 3-0 at half time. As the second half started the boys were full of confidence knowing they needed a solid defensive performance to seal a place in the final. One mistake was punished meaning the final score was 3-1. The boys had qualified for the finals.
The final awaited, for the winner a place in the national finals in Birmingham and for the losers a day of what if's and maybes? Our opponents Robert Mays, who beat us 2-1 in the group stages. Kick off, a fast goal for John Hanson, 1-0. We then continued to press high up the pitch which had been working for us all day, Noah managed to gain possession of the ball in the final third and slotted Tommy through on goal to make it 2-0. Then another fast goal catching Robert Mays from kick off, 3-0!
All that stood between us and a spot in Birmingham was four minutes of controlled possession. Robert Mays started fast and pressed high, then got a goal back to make it 3-1, you could feel the momentum change in their direction. Nerves started to play a part and some poor decision making allowed them to score another, 3-2. Two minutes left on the clock, which felt like 15, time was definitely moving slower. But when it mattered the most the John Hanson team captained by Kaden Hughes dug deep and scrapped their way to the final whistle.
JOHN HANSON CHAMPIONS!
The team will now go onto represent the Southern Area Counties at the National finals held in Birmingham on the 4th March.
The team will be looking for sponsorship to fund the cost of competing in the National finals. If anyone is interested please email Mr Lewis Nash on lewis.nash@jhanson.hants.sch.uk or alternatively contact the school on 01264 352546.
Community News
We are pleased to announce that we are working alongside Andover Radio to promote success and achievement in Andover.
