Please sign the Home College Agreement as outlined in Dr Hughes' start of term letter by clicking here.

Parents who have any issues with accessing or using SIMS Parent App or Satchel One (Show My Homework) should email Mr Griffin (a.griffin@vcj.sch.je) for support.

Satchel One has an amazing range of support here: https://help.satchelone.com/en/ and we highly recommend checking here for tips and tricks for making the most out of the features available. 

The last week in September is always marked by the celebration of Founders’  Week where we remember the founding of the College and also raise money for the Victoria College Foundation. There are a number of events taking place throughout the week, culminating in our Founders’ Day Assembly and Founders’ Walk.

• Monday: Knight’s Shield House Relay Race
• Tuesday: Inter-House Tug of War
• Wednesday: Dress down day in House Colours (£2 contribution minimum)
• Thursday: Founders’ Day Assembly, 2-2.50pm, where we will be joined by Guy Dunlop, great-grandson of one of the Dunlop brothers who give their name to one of our Houses. You are warmly invited to watch the Assembly using this live link to event.
• Friday: Founders’ Day Walk. Please see the attached letter for details, including timings and dismissal.

You can also make donations using our online fundraising page by clicking here.

Founders' Walk Parent Letter

The College is looking forward to welcoming over 300 visitors for Open Evening. As ever, we are hoping that to make the evening as enjoyable and as informative as possible, they will get to meet lots of our finest ambassadors - our students. Boys in Y7 & Y12 will be asked to take tours around the College site, with boys in Y8-11 asked to volunteer in different subject areas by individual Heads of Department. Please see next week’s newsletter for further details.

As part of our ongoing programme of working in partnership with parents, you are all invited to our Safeguarding and Wellbeing Seminar. The evening will be a chance to discuss the major risks to safeguarding and wellbeing in our students, some of the ways we are seeking to address them within College, and how as the adults in the conversation we can work together. There will also be the chance to ask questions anonymously and break out into smaller year group clusters. Please register your interest here.

Please refer to our new Calendar and Sports Website, detailing all events, fixtures and team selection that are taking place at the College. This calendar can be synced to your own and filtered for ease.

The Sports website details training and fixtures, lists teams and tracks participants. The password for teamsheets on the website is "Langford".

Please find linked here a letter about the Victoria College Co-curricular Award and Citizenship Awards 2022. 

The Co-Curricular Award was set up so that we can celebrate our students’ outstanding efforts in a wide range of areas, both in school and outside of school, under four headings: Sport, physical, arts and academic. Students can also score points in three additional categories: Leadership and service, social responsibility and charity work, and a personal challenge.

Students are invited to fill in an application form accessible via the link above.

Forms should be returned by email to Mr Akers (k.akers@vcj.sch.je) by Friday 23 September.

In the meantime, please follow this link to hear more about the awards from Head of Co-curricular Activities - Kieran Akers – https://youtu.be/l6c7MwSeARo

This week we were visited by two international bestselling authors. Follow College on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn for the latest scoop on what is going on in school day to day. 

Gytha Lodge, a multi-award-winning playwright and bestselling novelist of thrillers has kindly offered our community the opportunity to purchase her books at a discount and with a signed option. Please click on the link for more information. www.gythalodge.com/books

The Year 7 assembly was a wonderful way to formally welcome the Year 7 students. Head Boy, Eden Powell, delivered a powerful speech about life at Victoria College. His advice: you are all now Victorians and part of our family. Good luck, work hard, be kind and enjoy every opportunity that comes your way. Please click on the link to see what else Eden had to say. 

Head Boy Address - Y7 Assembly

The Health and Community Services (HCS) Department are offering your child protection against flu.

Nurses will be visiting school to administer the nasal flu vaccine on Tuesday 11 October. You will shortly receive an envelope containing, a parental letter, a consent form and an information sheet. Please complete the consent form and return it to school before the date nurses will be in to vaccinate. This will save us having to contact you.

There is a video on the Government of Jersey website: gov.je/flu showing how the nasal flu vaccine is given.

The HCS department have asked us to share the following information with parents:

This protection is being offered because flu can be a very unpleasant illness for children, with potentially serious complications such as bronchitis and pneumonia, and may require hospitalisation. In children, the symptoms of flu are more severe and prolonged than in adults. We know that children are the super-spreaders of flu during the winter, so by vaccinating your child, and thereby helping prevent them from catching flu, you will also help prevent them from passing flu onto vulnerable friends and family, such as grandparents.

• Children are 2 to 3 times more likely to catch flu than adults
• Children under 5 are more likely to be admitted to hospital with flu than any other age group
• When children get flu, their symptoms are more severe, last longer and can lead to complications
• The nasal vaccine is painless and easy to have

• The flu vaccine given up a child's nose is 0.1ml (around 1/50th of a teaspoon of fluid) given into each nostril. The fluid is quickly absorbed into a child's nose
• The nasal flu vaccine cannot give your child flu
• The nasal flu vaccine can only work in the temperature of the nose and cannot work in the air. The vaccine does not create an external mist. Others in the room who are unvaccinated are not at risk when the nasal vaccine is given

It is recommended the nasal flu vaccine is given September / October time to protect children ahead of the winter. The vaccine must be given every year to ensure children have up-to-date protection.

If you have questions, you can contact Immunisation Specialist Lead, on 01534 445790 or email: Nneka Nlewedim-Okafor N.NlewedimOkafor@health.gov.je

Further information is also available at www.gov.je/flu

Many thanks to those who managed to attend our online Parent Information Evening last week. It was a pleasure to formally welcome you to Victoria College. For those who missed it please click here.

Please click on the link for the information letter. 

Duke of Edinburgh's Information Letter

Whilst the College is responsible for the maintenance and upkeep of the Sixth Form building and certain facilities, the students have been keen to have a direct input into the incidental enhancement of their own area. To this end we are implementing a one-off £10 subscription which will give them a fund for the two years that they are in Sixth Form. Please find out more in the linked letter.

Sixth Form Common Room Subscription

Please find attached the amazing opportunities that are available to our Year 12 & 13 students. Students in Y12 are expected to choose 2 enrichment options by 23 September, unless they are taking Further Maths where they can opt out of this or just take one. For students in Year 13 this is entirely optional but offers some excellent courses to boost their UCAS points.

Enrichment Opportunities 2022-2023

A reminder that the deadline for any GCSE Marking Reviews is 29 September. If any student still wishes to process a marking review of their grade, they will need to come to the exams office and collect a form which needs to be returned before the 29 September, along with the relevant fee.

Please find linked below the slides from this week's Year 13 Parent Information Evening, along with an accompanying letter and a copy of the absence request form.

Should you have any queries relating to the presentation or Sixth Form matters in general, please do not hesitate to contact  (a.falle@vcj.sch.je).

Parent Presentation

Parent Information Evening Letter

Sixth Form Absence Request Form

On Friday 23rd of September the Year 13 Geography pupils will be conducting their second day of independent data collection to support their NEA (Non-Examined Assessment) element of the Geography A-Level.

This day is designed as an independent data collection day, in which pupils have the day to collect more data to support their project. Having completed an online form, many have suggested they require all day in the field to collect data. This is not an issue, however in the experience of the department data collection is likely to take an hour or two at most.

Can I ask for the support of parents in encouraging pupils to get up early, collect data and come into school (pupils can arrive in home clothes, if they have been out in the morning). The department has booked ICT rooms and laptops all day and my colleagues and I will be on hand to support pupils in writing up their projects. A big effort on Friday could see pupils make significant progress on their NEA and get close to the finish line. At the same time I am concerned that some might use the time on a Friday afternoon unconstructively and waste the opportunity to get supervised help.

If I can ask for your help to ensure that pupils are clear on what they need to do, understand that once finished they should come into school a.s.a.p (all instructions on rooms booked, laptops, etc can be found on their NEA Teams channel) and most importantly if you find your son or daughter at home on Friday 23rd September it is essential that they get into school and start to write up their project.

Thank you in advance for your support

Daniel Hodder - Head of Geography