Dear Parents/Carers,
At Longfield Academy, we promote and reward positive behaviour in many different ways, including: letters to parents, lunch with the Principal, pizza parties, rewards assemblies and end of year celebration events.
Reward Trips
At the start of the last module in January, I wrote to you to inform you of our plans for the rewards trips that will be taking place during the course of this module. I am pleased to inform you that plans are well advanced and that we will shortly be informing you if your child has been selected to participate in any of the trips.
As a reminder, the schedule for the trips are as follows:
- Monday 27th March, Year 10 – Thorpe Park
- Tuesday 28th March, Year 9 – Thorpe Park
- Wednesday 29th March, Year 8 – Chessington
- Thursday 30th March, Year 7 – Chessington
As mentioned in my letter to you on 2 January 2023, for all trips for all year groups, only students with a good record of attendance and behaviour, from module three onwards, will be allowed to participate. Students whose attendance or behaviour fall short of our high expectations will not be taken on any reward trips.
For Year 11 students, they will be invited to a prom after their summer exams in June to celebrate their time at the academy. As in previous years, we hope that this will be a memorable event for the students and that all Year 11 students will ensure that their behaviour and attendance do not jeopardise their chances of participating in what has always been a wonderful ceremony.
Sanctions
As well as celebrating positive behaviour, there also has to be sanctions for poor behaviour which falls short of our expected standards, including the non-completion of homework. We normally use after school detentions as sanctions for poor behaviour. I realise that after school detentions and days in the IER until 16:00 may be inconvenient for parents who work or who have child care issues. However, we cannot allow unacceptable behaviour which is incompatible with the school policy to go unchallenged.
I would therefore like to remind all parents and carers that failure to attend an after school detention will result in the student being issued with a Senior Leadership Team detention, and failure to attend this would result in a day in the Internal Exclusion Room (IER). This information can be found in Clause 12.2 of our Behaviour Policy which is accessible on our website and to which I have provided this link for your convenience:
Longfield Academy Behaviour Policy 2022-23
Should your child be issued with an after-school detention, you will receive an automated text message to inform you. This gives parents/carers prior notice about the detention which will be sat the following day so that suitable arrangements can be made for your child to be collected from school. Further details about the reasons for the detention can be found on the My Child At School application.
The usual sanction for failing to either attend or complete a day in the IER is a one-day suspension. This is not a decision I take lightly, however I am sure that you would agree with me that I cannot be making special arrangements for students in relation to this. We have over 1,050 students on our roll, all of who deserve high quality education and training that will equip them to become responsible and successful citizens. The vast majority of our students make the right choices all the time and I cannot allow a very small minority of students to disrupt or undermine the quality of education we provide at the academy.
I trust that I can count on the support of all parents and carers to ensure that all our students are as successful as possible.
Yours faithfully,
Dr Felix Donkor
Principal
Longfield Academy
