Although a short week due to the bank holiday on Monday, it has been a busy week for Avanti Fields School.  

On Tuesday night we welcomed approximately 800 people to our school for our Secondary Open Evening. Having moved to our permanent site, it was lovely to see interest in the school growing and we received some lovely feedback from visitors about our staff and students.  

“We attended the open evening and were so impressed. The presentation was engaging and informative. The students this evening were fantastic and reflect the schools ethos.” 

Next week we will be hosting Secondary Open Morning Tours, so if you know of anyone who would be interested in applying for a Year 7 place for September 2023, please have them book a tour.  

On Saturday 1st and Saturday 8th October, we will be jointly hosting our Primary Open Days alongside Krishna Avanti Primary School. On Saturday 1st, parents can visit KAPS between 9:30am – 11:00am and then come over to visit Avanti Fields from 11:30am – 1:00pm. On Saturday 8th, we will be hosting in reverse, where parents can visit Avanti Fields between 9:30am – 11:00am and then head over to KAPS. Limited tickets for our Primary Open Days are still available for families interested in joining our Nursery or Reception.  

On Wednesday evening, the school hosted an online e-safety evening. It was well attended and provided parents with a top-10 list of ways to help keep their children safe online. You can find the slides from the presentation here.

The school would like to offer bespoke sessions to support parents with e-safety. If you have any feedback from the evening or an area of e-safety that you would like support with, please complete this form. 

As part of the evening, I shared a short update that links our e-safety advice to the concerns around the ongoing public disturbances happening within Leicester. Please read an extract from the evening: 

The escalation of these disturbances has often been fuelled by social media messaging and live streaming on TikTok. Many of the videos shared are not recent or have been filmed in locations not within Leicester. The almost continuous stream of videos showing violence creates an overwhelming sense that it is very common, however the reality is that through editing and resharing your children are most likely seeing the same disturbance but from multiple sources.  All schools across Leicester have been working closely with the police and our message remains the same: 

• Avoid spreading misinformation on social media. There is no need to repost a video you have seen. If it’s not your content, don’t post it! 
• Stay away from trouble. Being a bystander and filming a disturbance could still see you get in trouble. 
• Think before you post – is it truthful, is it helpful, is it inspiring, is it necessary, is it kind? 
• Do not make things up with might incite others. The police do consider this an offence and may take action.  

In addition to this, I want to remind parents about their conduct within any parent chat groups. As a school, we are aware that parents often form year group based chats, mainly in WhatsApp, that have the school’s name linked to the title of the group. Although the school does not set these groups up, they do still form part of the school’s reputation within the community. Please be careful with what you share in such groups. To support the de-escalation of the ongoing community tension, we are asking that parents do not share videos, links to media articles or anything related to the unrest within these groups. The school has been proactive in our communication with parents and students about how they can remain safe.  

In addition to the above, we have begun to work with secondary students who may live the areas of concern within the city to ensure they know how to remain safe and what to do if they have a concern. If you believe that your child would benefit from such support, please do not hesitate to contact Miss Bigginton.  

Miss V Bardsley

The city council is again working with Samworth Brothers to support families with food over the October half term.  There will be six pop up venues across the city that will give parents of free school meal children and those needing additional support, the opportunity to collect food for the half term. 

If you believe that you are entitled to access the October half term food support please read the following information sheet and visit the website October half term food offer – Leicester City Council. To be eligible for the food support you must meet the criteria below: 

• receive benefits-related free school meals 
• who are in full time school (4 to 16 years) 
• live in Leicester City or attend a city school if they live outside of Leicester 
• those families needing additional support i.e. vulnerable children 

 Parents must register for a venue by Tuesday 4 October, using the online form found within the information sheet.   The registration window closes early to allow Samworth Brothers enough time to arrange supplies for the events.  

Places at the food pop up shops are limited and will be offered on a first come first served basis.  

Food vouchers will not be issued for free school meal children this half term. 

The Pupil Premium is additional funding the government gives to schools to raise the achievement of disadvantaged pupils. The amount of funding a school receives depends on the number of pupils eligible for free school meals. Parents are encouraged to register their children even if they do not want to eat school meals or they already receive universal infant free school meals. This is in order to raise extra money for the school which can be used towards extra tuition, learning assistants, after school clubs or uniform/enrichment activity contributions.  

Families that have no recourse to public funds are also eligible to apply but will need to complete a separate application and meet different criteria.  

Please use the following links to access the free school meals application form or the free school meals for families with no recourse to public funds application form.  

A reminder that the school runs a continuous uniform drive to collect and redistribute uniform items to some of our more vulnerable families. If you have any ties, blazers or pieces of PE kit that no longer fit your child, please donate them to the school. Our admin office staff would be happy to collect items bought into the school by students.  

If any parents are interested in signing your child up for 1-1 tuition please complete the initial interest form on the link below.

https://avanti.wufoo.com/forms/afs-secondary-music-tuition-202223/

Once we have an idea of the number of students interested, we will be back in touch with next steps. 

The school nursing service is run by the NHS and is available for young people across Leicester City and is run by Healthy Together. You can access health support and advice directly from your school nurse regarding many issues: 

• Emotional health concerns 
• Sleep issues 
• Anxiety and other worries 
• Relationships 
• Exam stress 
• Any much more 

If you would like to make an appointment to see the school nurse in school, please contact Miss Bigginton or Mr Tailby. 

If students wish to contact the school nurse directly then a drop-in session is available every Thursday 10.40 – 11.00 in room 1-25.  

Parents or students can also contact the school nurse through the secure, confidential text messaging service, Chat Health text 07520 615386. 

Reception  

Reception children went home with their first reading book/ words this week. We are so proud of how the children have grasped phonics and are already fully engaged with the scheme. Do not forget to use your child’s Read, Write Inc sound mat to help them when learning new sounds and when writing.  

Nursery  

Nursery children have had a great week looking at habitats and learning about sharing and being kind through the story of Rainbow fish. Remember to log on to your child’s Espresso page to explore their launchpad.  

Uniform  

A gentle reminder to all parents to please ensure all uniform is labelled. We have had some uniform which has gone missing; please can you check your child has not taken someone’s uniform by mistake. Thank you for your support in this!  

Up and coming events  

Please click on our school calendar to check out our up-and-coming events. We have our first Diwali workshops Wk bg  10th October which we are all very excited about!  

Calendar – Avanti Fields School  

Parents evening  

We have sent out an email to you all this week to sign up for parents evening. They will take place face to face in classrooms. On the day of your child’s parents evening please enter through the Breakfast/ Afterschool club door where you will register prior to your allotted time slot.  

Communications – Wherever possible please use the contact form on our website to get in touch. This is detailed on the website at https://avanti.org.uk/avantifields/contact-us/. The appropriate member of staff will pick up the message and get back to you as soon as possible.

Absence

To report an absence to the school, parents should contact us by 8:00am (primary) and 8.30am (secondary) 

Email: [email protected]
Phone: 0116 326 6813 (Option 1 to leave a voicemail) 

Please remember to state your child’s full name, tutor group and reason for absence. If your child is unwell, please could you give a brief description of the symptoms. 

All education research highlights how crucial it is to a child’s academic progress and wellbeing they attend school , on time, all of the time. Therefore, a reminder that it is important that families organise events or holidays outside of school time to ensure that their child is at school as often as possible.   

The school works closely with the Education Welfare Officer at LCC, and we do seek to ensure that any requests for authorised absence are dealt with on a case-by-case basis, in a sensitive manner. However, the school can never authorise a family holiday or a trip abroad to visit family members during term time.   

This academic year, families will have two weeks at the October half-term, three weeks at Christmas and two weeks at Easter for extended family holidays. Please do ensure that if booking holidays, they fall within the holiday periods.