It’s been great to welcome all members of the school community back to school this week and to wish them a Happy New Year.

I have spoken this week in assemblies about New Year’s resolutions. Often these can seem quite trivial – eat less chocolate, walk the dog more often, wash the car weekly; this doesn’t mean that they are totally unimportant and their good intentions certainly signal something very positive about us – even when we break them!

What I have emphasised to students this week is that perhaps their New Year’s resolutions should be about something bigger and more significant. I have said to them that each of them has something which they excel at, are passionate about and really enjoy. This could be within school or outside of school but it is something which is important to them and which they want to achieve something in. Perhaps their New Year’s resolution should be to set themselves a goal, to think big, to aspire to be even better in this area; if there is a moment to do it, it is now, at the start of a new year, for this year a new decade. I have said that they should be really ambitious and not be embarrassed about having a dream. They may get there and that is wonderful; they may get close and there is so much they will take from this; they may find that they are taken in a completely different direction and that can be just as rewarding and form them in to the adult they will become. Whatever, it will be worth it and as young people they should be optimistic and not afraid to think big.

As a body of staff our New Year’s resolution has been to keep telling our students just how great they are. We have been explaining a few changes we have made to our system of rewards across the school as part of these assemblies and students have seemed really enthusiastic about them. I will not go in to too much detail as it is for the students to explain but there should be lots of house points being given out in the coming weeks to recognise achievement and parents of older students may find that there is something from school coming in the post as time progresses – all to be revealed.