Celebration Assembly – Parents/Carers Welcome

From next week, any parents/carers that wish to join our Celebration Worship are more than welcome to.

 

These start at 14:45 until 15:10.

 

During these assemblies, we share certificates, such as…

  • Values awards
  • Top 3 pupils on TTRS
  • Highest scoring class on TTRS
  • Top scoring pupils from each class on Spelling Shed
  • Top 3 pupils on Spelling Shed
  • Top 3 pupils on Numbots in each Key Stage

We also share an highlights from the week, including any school trip and sporting events.

 

If time, we also have maths challenges that pupils can opt in for.

 

It would be great to have as many parents/carers as possible in for these.

Wraparound Club Request and Policy

Please see below the school’s wraparound policy:
Wraparound Policy – Autumn ’26

 

We are currently experience a lot of additional administrative load around wraparound – specifically care club.

 

The main aspects, within the above policy, that would lessen this impact for us would be…

  • Wherever possible, bookings being made by the preceding week (i.e. by the Friday before)
    • Please note that emergency bookings made after 3:15pm for the following morning session cannot be guaranteed – as there may not be a care club supervisor available
  • Ensuring invoices for care club are paid within 14 days.
    • If, for whatever reason (as stated on all the invoices), these cannot be paid in time, please get in touch – as we can happily arrange something to help
    • Unfortunately, repeated non-payments (without attempts to explain) may result in an additional administration charge and/or withdrawal of access from wraparound care
  • Ensuring pick off and drop times are provided to Extended Schools Co-ordinator (careclub@brownclee.shropshire) or Office (admin@brownclee.shropshire.sch.uk)
    • If running late, please phone to let school know
    • If pupils have not been picked up on assigned time (without contact), parents/carers will be contacted
    • Care club ends at 6:00pm. If children have not be picked up at this time (without contact), parents/carers will be contacted.
    • If contact has not been reached, alternative contacts will be attempted
    • If, after several attempts of contacts have been made, no contact has been made by 7:00pm, school will need to following safeguarding procedures by contacting the police regarding the potential of missing parent(s)/carer(s)
  • If booking a morning session, these will be charged from the booking time (if earlier than arrival time) – e.g. booked at 07:30 and arrived at 08:00 will be charged from 07:30
    • As we are having situations where staff are arriving expecting children, who do not arrive until later

Parent Feedback Sessions – 8th/13th October

Parent Feedback Sessions will be running this term for all pupils on the following dates…
– 8th October (13:00 – 17:00)
– 13th October (14:00 – 18:00)

 

Bookings will be available nearer the time.

Wraparound Supervisor – Advert Extension

Following our recent advert for a casual care club supervisor, we unfortunately had no applicants for this position.

As a consequence, we will be extended the advert for this position. Please see below:

Careclub Supervisor(s) 2026

 

If anyone is interested, please get in touch with the school office (admin@brownclee.shropshire.sch.uk), and we can help with any questions/queries.

 

Unfortunately, if we are unable to fill this position, it may affect the hours/days that wraparound provision can be provided.

After-School Clubs – Aut ’26

In case you missed it, after-school clubs are now available for pupils. Apologies for the delay with this.

 

This term, the following after-school clubs will be available:

  • Mondays: Football with Mr. Evans (our new P.E. teacher from the Sports Partnership)
    • Available to Years 2 to 6
  • Tuesdays: Netball with Miss Burton
    • Available to Year 3 to 6
  • Wednesdays: PENDING
  • Thursdays: Create Club with Cath
    • Available to the whole school
  • Friday: Science Club with Mr. Harley
    • Available to the whole school

Mr. Smith and Miss Roderick will be potentially running an art clubs around creating a Rememberance Day art piece. We will hopefully have a Wednesday club in place soon too. Further information on these will follow.

 

Afterschool Clubs – Aut (2) 26

 

These are now all bookable on Arbor. As this is a new system, there will understably be some teething problems. Please email (careclub@brownclee.shropshire.sch.uk / admin@brownclee.shropshire.sch.uk) regarding any queries/issues with booking.

Cross Country – Oldbury Wells – Tuesday 15th September

Please see below the attached letter regarding a cross country competition open to all Year 3, 4, 5 and 6 children: Cross Country – 26.

Children that express an interest in taking part in this in in school will be given a letter, and it would be great to see as many children as possible from Brown Clee competing.

 

School Games Award – Platinum ’25/’26 and ’26/’27

We are delighted to announce that we have been awarded the School Games Platinum Mark Award for the academic years ’25/’26 and ’26/’27.

 

The School Games Mark is a Government-led award scheme launched in 2012, facilitated by the Youth Sport Trust to reward schools for their commitment to the development of competition across their school and into the community, and we are delighted to have been recognised for our success.

This will mark the 6th year in a row that Brown Clee has achieved the Platinum Mark Award in recognition of our commitment to providing meaningful opportunities for all children to compete in inter-/intra-competition, opportunities for leadership in sports, utilising the role of sport in supporting physical and mental health and enabling a culture of physical activity across the whole school.

Updated DfE Guidance – School Attendance

Following a series of updates from the DfE (2024, 2025), there has been further updates around statutory guidance for schools, parents and carers.

The latest government guidance can be found here: Working Together to Improve School Attendance 2026.

 

Here is a quick summary of some of the updates:

  • Rules around ensuring registers are taken at the same time of the day for all pupils. For us, this is at 08:45 for the morning session and 13:00 for our afternoon session.
  • Further expectations on schools to analyse and monitor absence trends and proactively support pupils/families when potential patterns are noticed
  • Further tightening around granting leaves of absence in “exceptional circumstances”:
    • These must be made in advance of the leave of absence
    • The DfE does not deem a leave of absence for a holiday, leisure or recreation as exceptional.
    • Leave of absence should not be granted to participate in any form of protest.
  • Further clarification around issuing penalty notices
    • The national threshold for issuing a penalty notice is 10 sessions (note: 1 day = 2 sessions) within a rolling 10 school week period. This could include, as examples, but is not limited to…
      • 5 days for a family holiday
      • 10 arrivals in morning after registers have closed (after 09:15)

 

The school’s policy on attendance can be found here: Attendance Policy – Aut ’26

 

Understanding your Child Workshop – Brown Clee School – 21st September ’26

Following on from information shared before the summer (Shropshire’s Parenting Team: Updates – Brown Clee CE Primary School), this is a quick reminder that Mrs. Godfrey (from school) and Laura Furniss from pre-school are hosting an “Understanding Your Child” Workshop at Brown Clee School this term: PDF Version.

We’d encourage any parents (no matter their child’s age) that would like some time to discuss anything (big or small) regarding parenting, The session is designed to be a friendly, relaxed and open way for us to help with anything you might want to talk about, including communicating and connecting with your child, any issues or concerns around sleep, helping to understand behaviour and emotions and your child developments – as well as anything else you might want discuss with Kerry and Laura (and any others that may be in a similar situation).

Forest Schools Update – All

Forest School will be starting for all children.

 

However, currently, there is a large Oak tree just outside the school grounds (by the Forest School site) that has recently required work due to damage – and we are awaiting for Shropshire Homes (as the tree is within their site) to confirm that this tree has been assessed and deemed risk free.

 

Therefore, we are currently unsure when this will start back up. We will keep you updated with this when we receive any further information.

 

Once back up, the plan will be that Fireflies (Reception and Year 1) will have Forest School once a week. Dragonflies (Year 2/3) will have Forest School every other week. Years 4, 5 and 6 will have Forest School on a rolling programme. Further information will be shared by class teachers once we have a potential starting date for this to resume.

Autumn ’26 – School Meals Menu

School meals for the upcoming half term remain unchanged from last term (https://browncleeschool.org.uk/summer-26-menus/).

As previously shared (https://browncleeschool.org.uk/category/schoolupdates/#post-45652), meals are bookable on both Arbor and ParentPay (with ParentPay to be phased out of use)

 

Any questions, as always ask.
– admin@brownclee.shropshire.sch.uk (School Office)
– davies.l@browncleeshropshire.sch.uk (School Kitchen)

Changes to Allergy Safety Guidance for Schools

Some of you may be aware that new statutory allergy guidance for schools is to be introduced from this September.

You may have heard this referred to as “Benedict’s Law“. The DfE guidance for this can be found here: Allergy Safety in Schools.

 

The significant changes that will be in place:

  • Whole-school Allergy Safety/Management Policy (which, from September ’26, can be found on our Policies Page)
  • Additional training for all staff on allergy awareness, recognising symptoms of mild allergic reactions and severe allergic reactions (e.g. anaphylaxis) and how to treat these
    • A culture of allergy awareness is vitally important with this – which will also involve children’s awareness of allergies (particularly in cases of known allergies)
  • Individual Healthcare Plans for pupils with severe allergies.
    • We already have these and implement them for pupils with any food hypersensitivity (i.e. allergies, intolerances or auto-immune diseases – and not just severe allergies)
    • Parents/carers of these children will be contacted in September regarding their child’s
    • If your child has a food hypersensitivity (allergy, intolerance or auto-immune disease) that school are not aware of, or ever develops one, please let us know as soon as possible so that the correct support can be put in place
  • Spare adrenaline auto-injectors (e.g. EpiPens) are kept in school. These would be used in the following cases:
    • Suspected anaphylaxis in pupils with their own AAIs (only if their own devices are not working)
    • Suspected anaphylaxis in pupils without AAIs
      • Under Regulation 238 of the Human Medicines Regulations (2012) permits a school’s spare adrenaline auto-injector(s) to be used for any pupil or other person not known by the school to be at risk of anaphylaxis in an emergency unforeseen situation. Written permission is not required. (Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency).

Any questions regarding this, as with everything, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Arbor – Guides

Following on from the recent update regarding Arbor, please see below some guides on using this (for those that are not familiar):

 

Topping up accounts and viewing parents in the Parent Portal: https://support.arbor-education.com/hc/en-us/articles/22123135039773-Top-up-accounts-and-viewing-payments-in-the-Parent-Portal#h_01KKH42ABYXD7D3F94QQZNQCFY

 

We have created a quick overview guide on the Parent Portal – which highlights the features currently available and those that will hopefully be available as we transition from SIMS/Parent Pay to Arbor: Parent Portal Guide

 

 

 

Registration Information Request

To streamline the information regarding each child at school, we are requesting that parents/carers for ALL children (i.e. one form per child) fill in the following registration information form:
PDF Version
Word Version

 

This information is pertaining to information about your child, including emergency contact details, permissions and medical information.

 

Please note that a paper version of these (along with this letter will be sent in the first few weeks back to school). However, if you prefer to complete these electronically, the above has been provided.

 

From next year, we will be intending on re-sending the following registration form when pupils turn Year 3 to give parents/carers the opportunities to update the information.

 

For any other changes to this information at any other time, please let us know as soon as you can so that we can ensure this information is kept up to date.

 

The above documents are part of our Welcome Packs, provided for new starters. As these are relatively new, here (Welcome Pack – Brown Clee – 26-27) is a copy for all parents/carers, which you may find the information within useful.

Arbor – Meal Bookings

Ahead of the new term, we have now set up meal bookings via Arbor (please see previous post regarding accessing this: https://browncleeschool.org.uk/arbor-email-invite/).

 

Currently, meals can be booked BOTH via ParentPay and Arbor – and parents can continue to book meals using ParentPay (as previously).

We will eventually be phasing out ParentPay, but this won’t happen immediately – and we will keep you updated ahead of when this will no longer be useable.

Any questions or queries, please don’t hesistate in getting in touch.

Year 6 London Trip ’26

As of last year, we have started taking our Year 6 pupils on an end-of-school trip.

We’ve tried to make this an experience that is enriching – yet different.

 

Last year’s Year 6s went to the Hippodrome Theatre in Birmingham – whilst this year’s Year 6s went to London (by mini-bus to Stafford, train to London Euston and the London Underground to Westminster)- where they were given a personalised tour of the Houses of Parliament by our Local MP (Stuart Anderson) and his assistant (Barnaby), including seeing the chamber in action and walking past, now previous, Prime Minister (Keir Starmer).

 

During our time in London, we also saw Big Ben (Elizabeth Tower), Westminster Bridge, Westminster Abbey, the London Eye, walked through St. James’s Park, Buckingham Palace, Trafalgar Square, Chinatown and the British Museum – before returning back home by train.

 

Click the images below to see our journey:

 

Summer Choir Performance ’26

Following on from their Christmas Performance, several KS2 children took part in a Joint-choir event with “Of One Accord Choir” and “Brown Clee Choir” this term – as well as some individual and joint-performances from Sam and Zac Robinson.

It’s alway so fantastic seeing our children performing in such fantastic community events. It’s especially great seeing how the number of children performing in these events is continue to increase each time.

KS2 Performance – Additional Tickets

As per communication earlier in the week, additional tickets for Tuesday’s Evening Performance (18:00-19:00) and Wednesday’s afternoon performance (13:30-15:00) are available. Those on waiting lists should have been contacted regarding the ticket’s availability.

If anyone wishes to purchase further tickets, please contact the school: admin@brownclee.shropshire.sch.uk.

Leavers’ Service – Change in Time

For those that are not parents of Year 6 pupils (as they have all been informed previously), the Leavers’ Service has changed from 2:15pm to 10:00am on the same day.

This is due to Reverend Joe being unable to lead the service at the church for 2:15pm.

Free-School Meal Update

Please see below an update from Shropshire Council regarding changes to Free-school meals eligibility: FSM Update for Families

 

In summary, FSM is changing this upcoming September, meaning more families are eligible for this funding. There will also be annual eligibility checks carried out by Shropshire Council.

 

If you feel you may qualify for FSM, please do make an application via the link above – as not only will it enable you reductions to additional services (e.g. help towards uniform costs and music lessons, reduced costs for after-school clubs and wraparound, reduction in costs to access residentials), but the more children in school that are registered as FSM at the school will also result in additional funding for the school.

Even if unsure, making an application would be beneifical.

If anyone would like any help in making application, please get in touch as we can assist with this.

Sports Day ’26 – Timings

As shared a couple of weeks ago, Sports Day will be taking place this Tuesday (30th June).

 

As shared, this will be following the same format as preciously – where we will have a station-style competition in the morning, a shared lunch and races in the afternoon. This will allow parents/carers flexibility as to whether they wish to attend the morning, afternoon or whole day.

 

Here are some more specific timings:

  • Parents/carers/grandparents etc. can have access to the school site from 10am, when the gate at reception will be opened.
  • The morning’s activties (stations) will begin at around 10:30am.
  • Lunch will be around 12:00pm.
  • Afternoon activities (races) will take part around 1:00pm until around 2:45pm.

 

Unfortunately, due to last week’s high temperatures, KS2 were unable to complete their usual annual athletics competition. This competition will still be going ahead, and we will be looking for a separate event for paretns/carers to watch the presentation of certificates and medals.

 

Our catering team (Laura and Carla) are planning a BBQ-style lunch for Sports Day:

  • If your child would like a beef burger, please select the mac and cheese option.
  • If your child would like a hotdog, please select tuna pesto pasta.
  • If alternatively you require a veggie option, please email the kitchen davies.l@brownclee.shropshire.sch.uk.

If any parents/carers/grandparents etc. would like a hot dog or burger, please bring cash to sports day, and you will be able to purchase these.

KS2 Performance Letter – Correction

Apologies – as the letter sent out this week regarding the KS2 performance was not the fully updated version.

Children will have been given a slip today regarding tickets (at the correct times/days) – which is…

  • 6:00pm: Tuesday 14th July
  • 13:30pm: Wednesday 15th July

Both performances will be at the village hall.

 

The original letter will contain information regarding your child’s role/costume.

 

If your child has not brought home their slip by the end of this week, and you would like to reserve a place, please contact the school office.

Arbor Email Invite

As previously shared, the school has moved from using SIMS as our Information Management System to Arbor. This will also eventually replace Parent Pay.

This process has taken us far longer than we antipicated due to ongoing issues with SIMS, slowing the transition.

We have, however, begun the process of setting up access to the Arbor Parent Portal. All primary email addresses linked to your child (when they were initially registered) will have received an invite to signed up to the Arbor Parent Portal.

 

Currently, only basic information is available on here – such as attendance data and clubs that your child is has been signed up for by the school. We will, however, be adding additional features, such as the ability to booking clubs and meals – and further information about your child in school, such as assessment data.

We will be lettting parents know as these become available – and will be aiming to introduce the key featrures for the new academic year (i.e. September ’26). However, we felt it could be useful to enable access sooner rather than later.

 

A lot of parents with older siblings will likely be familar with Arbor. For those that are not, a quick introduction on Arbor for Guardians and Parents can be found here: https://support.arbor-education.com/hc/en-us/articles/212097029-A-quick-introduction-to-Arbor-for-guardians-and-parents#h_01HAPC98YPK9K3K74K0CT3M9PH

 

PLEASE NOTE: There has currently been NO changes to booking processes etc. – and access to the portal has been enabled at this point so that features can be introduced to parents/carers steadily and not all at once.

 

 

Weather Preparation – 22nd – 25th June ’26

As you’ll all likely be aware, weather forecasts have high temperature warnings for most of next week.

 

Children are advised to come into school with sun cream and hats. Please name these as it will allow them to easily find it should it get lost.

 

Most importantly, please send your child into school with a water bottle. As always, children will have access to these and be able to fill these up throughout the day. Staff will remind children about ensuring they drink regularly during warmer weather.

Sports Leaders and School Council Fundraising

Following our School Council and Sports Leaders’ (completely independently organised!) successful bake sale, they spent the money that they raised on some new balance bikes, helmets and space hoppers, which will be used during the Sports Leaders’ bikes/scooter breaktime club – as well as a radio for care club. They were also heavily involved in putting together the equipment.

A big thank you to all of those that purchased any of the cakes from their sale!

Blue Tit Chicks

We have been incredibly fortunate to have a group of blue tit chicks in one of our recently added bird boxes. These have very recently all left their nest; however, here is an image captured before they left:

No Celebration Assembly – 19th June

Due to our recent success at a Rounders competition (16th June), we have qualified for the county finals this Friday (19th June) – and therefore there will not be an assembly this week.

CEOP
Music Mark
School Games Virtual
Church of England
Safer School
School Games – Platinum 2023/25
Skills Builder
Woodland Trust Green Tree – Bronze
Ofsted – Good
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