This week began with the AST INSET day for the Leicester hub. Krishna Avanti Primary and Avanti Fields staff came together for a culture and ethos day, with a focus on the Avanti Way. With a growing school staff, it is so important that new staff get an insight into the Avanti Way early on and that they begin to see how our unique vision for education filters into the school.

Avanti Schools support each person’s life journey along three parallel paths: Educational excellence; Character formation; and Spiritual insight. During the INSET day staff got to explore questions such as “What is love?”, “What does spirituality mean for you?” and “How are you promoting the Avanti Way within the school?”. In the spring term the school will be holding a similar session for parents around the Avanti Way, so look out for further details in the new year. If you haven’t read the Avanti Way, you can download it here.

Continuing on from the community wide warnings from last week, I can confirm that the individual linked to the stranger danger warning has been apprehended and is now on bail until January 2023, with restrictions on their movements around school sites and with young people.

Twitter learning journey:

I am very excited to be announcing we have launched our very own AFS primary Twitter page. Please join us on @AFSPrimary to follow your child’s class learning journey. We will also be using this to promote and remind you all of key events.

New outdoors Trim Trail:

The children have really enjoyed exploring our new Trim trail this week. Gross motor skills, courage and perseverance all rolled in one!

This is the Avanti Fields Recommended Reads and encourages students to read more suitable and challenging books for their age. We shared it last year but wanted to promote it again this year. It would  be great if parents could see to encourage reading during the week, even if only for 10 minutes two or three times a week. We have allocated reading time for secondary pupils during tutor time, but the importance of reading for pleasure outside of school should be emphasised. Students have access to the Recommended Reads via their English Google Classrooms.

We have 12 students representing Avanti Fields School at a National STEM competition which is being hosted by Wreake Valley Academy this year. Please wish them well in this competition.

• Tia Bapodra
• Zoya Chatterjee
• Nayan Chauhan
• Shivam Kotecha
• Nidhi Pankhania
• Bhushan Seesunkur

• Anika Dharamshi
• Upananda Dubey
• Manush Mistry
• Parth Pancholi
• Vishwa Patel
• Sarenna Shah

Well done to the following pupils for being selected from the school heats to represent Avanti Fields School in this virtual Chemistry competition. We are very proud of the drive and determination these pupils showed:

Year 9 Pupils:

• Prarthana S
• Jahnavi K
• Prabhleen K
• Meisha P
• Jency C
• Dhiya B
• Durgadevi U
• Didhiti P

Year 10 & Year 11 Pupils:

• Hinal S & Vrishti M
• Harshi P & Kshamta R
• Kiya P & Aksayan U
• Keyuri A & Veda P

The top scoring 4 pupils (bold) have made it through to the Regional Finals hosted at Derby University on 28^th January 2023.

• Thursday 1st December: Year 11 Arts Award theatre trip
• Monday 5th December: IET Faraday Trip (secondary science)
• Wednesday 7th December: Secondary drama performance

Avanti Fields is looking to expand our extra-curricular club offer from January by introducing paid clubs run by external providers. If you run any activities that would be suitable for our secondary students and would be interested in running an after school club one day a week between 3:30pm – 4:30pm, please complete the following form to express an interest.

As well as electing/re-electing the Key Committee posts we are looking to expand the team with both additional committee members and active ad-hoc volunteers. We are keen to have representation from all year groups, including Primary and Nursery, as well as some school staff and would like to encourage you all to consider joining our successful group.

PTFA AGM Letter 3 Nov 22

If you would like to discuss further or require some more details about what is involved, please email us on [email protected].

We hope to see you at the AGM.

Many Thanks

Avanti Fields PTFA Committee

Reg Charity No. 1183148

The Winter Holiday Activities and Food Programme (HAF) will be available for children eligible for benefits-related free school meals.

This HAF round we will be sending out a letter to parents/carers of children who were receiving benefits-related free school meals on 7 November 2022.  The letter confirms a child’s eligibility and gives unique HAF Code for the parent to use when registering for a place.

We hope that this letter will widen participation from families.  However, we continue to ask for your help to reach children who may benefit from this programme.

Eligible children can register to attend one HAF programme over winter holiday and they will also receive a healthy lunch each day that they attend.

There are over 60 programmes taking place across the city for parents to choose from.  The dates, times and age suitability will differ by provider.

Spaces will be allocated on a first come first served basis to children and young people who meet all of the following criteria:

• live in Leicester City
• are receiving benefits related free school meals
• are in the age range for that programme

Please distribute the list of programme providers to parents/carers.  Parents/carers can also find details directly from families.leicester.gov.uk/haf.

We are pleased to announce the council is now accepting Household Support Fund applications.

The local authority has received funding of £3.4 million which we plan to distribute to the most vulnerable households within the City.  Our focus in this scheme is to support those who have not received financial support from the Government Cost of Living payments and the previous grant period of this scheme between April and September 2022 – therefore awards to households who have already received both of these will be limited to food only, unless there are vulnerabilities or risk factors identified in the household.  Please note, all support received is a contribution, and not a replacement for the applicant’s entire budget.

The fund will be used to support households most in need with:

• Food
• Gas and electricity (billed and pre-paid)
• Water bills
• White goods (via referral only)
• In exceptional cases of genuine emergency, it may also be used to support housing costs where existing housing support/discretionary schemes do not meet this need

A reminder that this is not a crisis service.

Funding has also been used to support various food banks around the city and to fund the Pop-Up Pantry Scheme available to those receiving free school meals in October 2022 and February 2023.

Supporting your vulnerable families

For this round of the Household Support Fund, support can be accessed by:

1. Application submitted directly by the family
2. Professional referrer form submitted by the school

Schools are not expected to act as professional referrers, this is optional dependant on your capacity.

Option 1 – Application submitted directly by the family

Families can apply directly if they need help with:

• Food
• Gas and electricity (billed and pre-paid)
• Water bills

Applications can be submitted by families, however, this will be live based on one week on and two weeks off (subject to demand).  The dates below show when the form will be live:

• 14 November – 21 November 2022 (please note form maintenance is planned from 10pm Friday 18 November to approx. 6pm on Sunday 20 November)
• 5 December – 12 December 2022
• 3 January – 9 January 2023
• 23 January – 30 January 2023
• 13 February – 5 March 2023

Full details can be found at leicester.gov.uk/householdsupportfund.

Option 2 – Professional referrer form submitted by the school (*school use only)

Schools are able to support their most vulnerable families by making an application on the families behalf via the professional referrer form.

Support available through the professional referral form includes:

• Food
• Gas and electricity (billed and pre-paid)
• Water bills
• White goods (via referral only)
• In exceptional cases of genuine emergency, it may also be used to support housing costs where existing housing support/discretionary schemes do not meet this need

Avanti Fields will be reaching out to vulnerable families prior to the holidays to offer support. If you believe you need the support of a school referral, please contact our admin team at [email protected]

Avanti Fields school is proposing to change our admissions policy for 2024-25. To engage in the consultation, please visit the Avanti Schools Trust consultation page here.

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.