Dear Parents

Our Christmas celebrations during the past few weeks have been enjoyed by all. The Prep nativity play, ‘Glory, Glory, What a Story’ was a delight and the Prep Christmas Concert was an entertaining mix of voice and poetry. The School Carol Service at All Saints Church, Harewood was full of variety and beautiful singing; although a bit cold, it is a lovely setting!

The High School production of ‘A Christmas Carol’ was a triumph! It was a truly professional and highly technical production. My congratulations go to Miss Taylor on her first production at Gateways and to the girls for their outstanding performances.

Mrs Wilcox and I have enjoyed meeting parents of Lower 3 pupils. Our discussions have been a very positive experience and, as always, we have valued hearing parents’ views. We look forward to welcoming the Lower 3 girls into the High School next September.

I am delighted to report that this year’s UCAS application process has resulted, to date, in an impressive 94% success rate! Our Sixth Form girls clearly impress.

Following our first term of dance on the curriculum, and in the extra-curricular programme, we all enjoyed our Dance Showcase Assembly this week. Congratulations to Miss Fox and the girls for outstanding performances. It was good to see all ages exhibiting their talent.

Lower 4 pupils visited The Grand Opera House, York on Monday to see ‘Aladdin’. A truly traditional pantomime that presented a wonderful afternoon.

We also laughed our way through the Sixth Form Pantomime yesterday; Emma Kennedy’s portrayal of Mr Dutton seemed to raise the broadest smiles. I loved the Head’s crown – what an idea!

All of this was followed by House Drama today where the pupils prepared and then performedin one day. It was a wonderful afternoon, thoroughly enjoyed by everyone.

This year’s LEAP Team has been working hard behind the scenes this term in setting up their company, Embrace, and maximising selling opportunities. The 11 Upper 5 girls in the team have demonstrated their commitment and are ‘fine tuning’ their skills as businesswomen. The trading opportunity last weekend in the Merrion Centre, Leeds, was a positive experience.

We have been successful in our bid to join the ‘Get Set Network’, which is part of the London 2012 education programme. This membership confirms that our teaching, learning and playing echoes the Olympic values. We will be able to use the London 2012 logo, we may tour the Olympic Park, we have submitted a request for Olympic tickets and our pupils playing sport will be broadcast on the ‘live sites’ across cities and communities in the UK. Great news!

Our teams have enjoyed a very busy term of fixtures playing local schools such as St. Mary’s, Menston, Moorfield School, Richmond House School, GSAL, Woodhouse Grove and Tadcaster, as shown in the table below:

Played Won Draw
Under 8 4 2 2
Under 9 8 5 2
Under 10 9 5 1
Under 11 12 4
Under 12 5 5
Under 13 6 6
Under 14 5 4
Under 15 7 6
Senior 6 2 1
Total 62 39 6

Today we said farewell to Mrs Barbara Leeming who retired after many years as a Teaching Assistant in Prep. We are very grateful for all the support she has given to the School, as both a parent and as a member of staff. Miss Sarah Lavery has been appointed to this role and will join us in January.

Mr Keeton remains unwell and, at this moment in time, we are hopeful he will return for the Spring Term. We wish him a speedy and full recovery.

I wish you, and your families, a very happy Christmas and every good wish for 2012. We look forward to welcoming School back on Monday 9th January.

Thank you for your ongoing support for Gateways.

Yours sincerely

Mrs Y Wilkinson
Headmistress