Welcome from the Headteacher, I find it hard to believe that this is my 4th Christmas newsletter as Headteacher in Morriston, and I am delighted and proud of the progress we have made. This September we welcomed 200 pupils into year 7, our highest intake for over a decade. We achieved our highest ever attendance of 93.9%, this put us in the top 25% of similar schools and reflects the work put in by the pastoral team in promoting excellent attendance.

At GCSE, Welsh government compare similar schools against a range of performance measures and place us in quar-tiles. In almost all indicators we are in the top 25% of schools, We are in the top quartile for English, Science, Mathematics, The Level 2 inclusive (5 GCSEs A*-C including English and Maths), the capped 9 (the students best 9 GCSE scores), the WBQ skills challenge and pupils gaining at least 5 A*-A grades.

We have worked very hard to improve the performance of our A level students. This year we have achieved our best ever A level results, over 27% of A level grades were A*-A, 77% of grades were A*-C and we had only one U grade in the whole of Year 13. In context this puts us in the top two schools in Swansea at A level and the level of improvement is recognised as one of the biggest in Wales. We can now rightfully say we offer a sixth form that compares favourably with anyone and demonstrates the high standard of A Level teaching going on in Morriston. It is also pleasing to note that an increasing number of students from neighbouring 11-16 schools are looking to come to our sixth form.

A good school is not just about academic success; after receiving rave reviews for last year’s performance of ‘Hairspray’, pupils and staff are already rehearsing hard for our production of Joseph in March. In sport our pupils continue to excel, 6th form rugby team have won there senior league winning all 9 games. Captained by Ryan Carpenter and Callum Maddocks It has been a fantastic year for girls football in the school with both our U13 and U15 teams winning their respective league titles. Notable individual successes include Holly Jones, part of the Wales senior team at the commonwealth games, 4th place in the vault overall, Jacob Cook- Year 7 Swans Academy , Evie Tipler- World Dance Championships, Rhys Mabe - Karate Championships in Portugal, Bradley Hearne, European

Jujitsu Champion for 2018 for his weight age and belt category and Maisie Miller also recently made her debut for the Welsh U15 football team.

In Morriston We endeavour to provide our students with rich experiences that bring their learning to life, We were very honoured to welcome Joanna Milan to our school, a ninety year old the holocaust survivor who captivated our students, Whilst Year 9 and some MAT pupils from our feeder primaries attended Phil Williams’ rainforest workshop, finding out about the importance of environmental conservation. They also met Javier, an Ecuadorean Indian from the Amazon and found out about his way of life. Our highest achieving Yr 11s took part in the SEREN Bach - working to inspire and advice them on their university choices. Whilst the MFL department took part again in Cardiff University's award-winning Student Mentoring Programme - to inspire our yr 9 linguists to make choices for their future.

None of this would be possible without the continued hard work of our staff, who go above and beyond for our children, and I thank them all for their work.

Thank you for your continued support of our school, I wish you all a very merry Christmas a happy and successful new year.

Regards M Franklin

Christmas Newsletter 2018

In October a hugely successful school concert took place in our theatre featuring our extremely talented performers and the popular local band 'The Riff'. Not only was the event hugely enjoyable it also served as a platform to celebrate the talent of the pupils of Morriston Comprehensive School. We were delight-ed with the professionalism of the pupils and also the support we received from parents and the local com-munity. We are now focused on our School Produc-tion ''A Night of the Musicals'' which will take place in April next year. We sincerely hope to have your continued support to allow our pupils another chance to shine.

Merry Christmas from Morriston! Pupils from Mr Banbury's 9B class and Miss Ste-phens' 7A class have been involved in designing and making Christmas Cards for the MCS Pension-er's Party. They came up with several original de-signs and batch produced over 80 cards! All had individual, hand-written comments inside wishing the pensioners from the region a fabu-lous Christmas from all here at Morriston Compre-hensive School. The pupil's gave up some of their own free time to finish the cards.

Surfing News The Morriston Comprehensive Surf School had its last outing for 2018 at Llangennith be-fore winter roles in and the water turns icy cold. With 26 pupils, all with excellence attendance for the first half term, enthusiasm was high for a great day out! On arrival at the beach, the sun was shining and 1-2ft waves were rolling into the beach. The waves were perfect for beginners, with a few bigger waves on offer for the more experienced surfers. Pupils were put into two groups; one for the newbies in Year 7, and one for our more veteran surfers in Year 10. The newbies went through all the basics, whereas the returnees just practised their pop ups and then when straight in. After 2 hours of endless fun, everybody was shattered, having successfully managed to stand up and catch a good wave!

Thanks to Mrs Brooks, Mr Todd and Mrs Evans for their help and support in running this successful day. And a special thanks to our awesome surf dudes in year 7 and 10! They are a testament to Morriston Comprehensive Surf School! Our surf school goes from strength

to strength and will return next year for big and better accomplishments!

In December we hosted our annual prestigious night , It Is an evening about the Students of Morriston comprehensive school, when we take the opportunity to come together to celebrate the very best achievements of our young people and appreciate the range, diversity and depth of talent .

We were delighted to offer a particularly warm welcome to our guest speaker this evening Mr Rob Terry,

Rob is a former pupil of Morriston, his twitter page describes him as a Former WWE & Impact Pro Wrestler• Lifetime Natural Bodybuild-er •Firefighter •Body Transformation Pro • 2 times INBA/PNBA Mr Olym-pia.

He is also an inspirational character, someone who followed his dream, was determined to be successful and test those talents in the USA, where he now lives. Rob spoke passionately about his life and his experiences that resonated with our young people.

Former Morriston pupil proves an inspirational role model at our Presentation Evening

Bradley going for Gold! Congratulation to Bradley Hearne in Year 9, European Jujitsu Champion for 2018 for his weight age and belt category. Bradley has only took up the sport a year ago and this was the first competition he has entered. He won Gold, beating people from all over Europe. He went on a month later to attend another competition in Cardiff where he won Gold again and had another title of Welsh Champi-on for his category, age, belt and weight.

Sixth Form news The VI Form have been working very hard with charity events this term. We have organised a Christmas Party for the OAP's of Morriston and arranged a visit to Morriston Hospital to deliver presents. We have also organised parcels for OAP's in Morriston who couldn't make the Party. On the academic side the students in Year 13 have been applying for University and are starting to receive offers and interviews. The students in the Sixth Form have received talks about job opportunities in the NHS and apprenticeships in Swansea. Some of our Year 12 students have also had the opportunity to work with medical students and a few have attended a Politics course at the University of Swansea. The Seren course has finished this year but will resume in January.

Platinum eco-schools status re-awarded! Members of eco club met with Matt Bunt from Keep Wales Tidy on the morning of Tues 4th Decem-ber. They shared examples of their work from the past year, includ-ing the school’s eco-code, environmental review as well as their suc-cesses carrying out a beach clean at Llangennith, weekly recycling and an ongoing school litter clean-up. Eco-club members also shared their plans for the coming year: rais-ing money for fair trade; increasing biodiversity in the school grounds; and, raising awareness of plastic pollution. Many thanks to Evee, Jack, Connor and Erin for their in-volvement.

Amazing Maisie!

Huge congratulations to Maisie Miller who has been

capped for Wales U15 School girls. Maisie has played Scot-

land twice and is now in Portugal. Well done Maisie, a

great achievement.

LEGO Champions! We are current-ly FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) LEGO League regional champions!

FIRST LEGO League challenges kids to think like scientists and engineers. During the INTO ORBIT season, teams will choose and solve a real-world problem in the Project. They will also build, test, and program an autonomous robot using LEGO® MINDSTORMS® technology to solve a set of missions in

Parentmail—Please sign up! You will be able to: Get messages Make online payments Find out events and

meetings Book parent evening

appointments https://www.parentmail.co.uk/help/schoolhelp/posters-and-graphics/newsletter-graphics/

Important date for your diary!

January Monday 7th First day of term (staff & pupils) Thursday 10th Sixth Form Open Evening Friday 11th Llangrannog Residential trip, Year 7 Thursday 17th Imperial War Museum, Years 11, 12 & 13 Friday 18th INSET DAY Thursday 24th Year 10 Progress Evening, 3.30pm-6pm February Thursday 7th Geography Fieldtrip, Year 12 Wednesday 13th Year 9 Progress Evening & Option Evening, 3.30pm-6pm Tuesday 19th Transition Yr 5 Football Tournament Friday 22nd Eisteddfod - All Years From 25th HALF TERM Italy Ski Trip March Thursday 14th Year 7 Progress Evening, 3.30pm-6pm April TBC School Production Tuesday 9th Year 8 Progress Evening, 3.30pm-6pm Thursday 11th Iceland 13th – 20th Fuerteventura Surf Trip

Headteacher’ s Surgery 1st Monday of every month

Reminder to all parents that Mr Franklin holds a surgery on the first Monday of every month from 3.15—5.30pm for any parent who wants to discuss any issue regarding their child or the school. Please phone the school reception to make an appointment.

The Morriston Touch (rugby) team goes from strength to strength. Com-prised of boys and girls from KS4 and KS5 they have put a marker down in the recent ’A Touch of Frost’ Winter Leagues hosted in LLandarcy Academy by the Osprey’s Development team. Mr. Jenkins has put together a fear-some bunch of highly skilled players many of whom have played for the Rebels regional team and/or Wales. The Touch team at Morriston has gone from an idea to a team that reg-ularly beats high quality adult opposi-tion. They are a credit to the school on and off the pitch

Fourteen of our brightest netball stars took part in a training day to qualify as a netball umpire. Knowledge of the laws of any game is crucial to success, so it is great to see our girls trying to take on that knowledge in order to make them better players.

Mr. Maynard’s Cross country teams have really excelled and surpassed expectation this year. They achieved an overall 3rd in the Senior boys Welsh Championship. The enthusi-asm for running amongst our pupils is extremely exciting. We hope ath-letics will be a success in the sum-mer on the back of this fantastic

The 6th form rugby team have won their senior league winning all 9 games. Captained by Ryan Carpenter and Callum Maddocks. All the pupils that have been a part of the team have been outstanding - Dylan Rees Davies, Henry Bowen, Dillon Grindrod and Aston Grindod to name a few. The standard of rugby has been impressive from all.

PE NEWS!