It has been a short but incredibly busy term.

Even so, we still managed to get everything done before the Easter Break. Events such as Year 11

Mocks, Year 9 Options, Year 11 GCSE Drama Showcase, Debating Competitions and the Ice-

land trip to name just a few. Snow of course

made it even more of a challenge, as I am sure it did for everyone. Interestingly, there was very

little snow in Iceland: pupils and staff basked in the 8o temperatures: I think it was a bit of a

shock to the system when they returned to find that school was closed due to the snow, as was

most of the High Peak. I would like to pay tribute

to the fantastic work of the Tour Operator WST and Andrew’s Coaches, who managed to get pu-

pils and staff home safely from Iceland, and more specifically, from Manchester Airport. I

would also like to thank the school staff who ran

the trip, as well as all other staff and governors who have worked so hard these last few jam-

packed weeks. Thank you all for your hard work. We look forward to doing it all again after the

Easter break. Thank you all for your support and have a wonderfully peaceful and holy Easter. God

Bless!

Some Dates for Your Diary

Monday 9th April-School re-opens for pupils

Tues 17th April-Art Controlled Assessments all day Wed 18th April—Skills for Life Residential

Thurs 19th April—Year 8 Parents Evening Thurs 19th April—Visiting Author

Mon 23rd April—Y8 Holocaust Centre Trip Tues 24th April—Art Controlled Assessments all day

Thurs 26th April—UK Junior Maths Challenge

Weekend of 28th/29th April—Bronze DofE Practice Week beg 30th April—Year 8 Exam week

Mon 14th May—Main GCSE Written Exams start Tues 15th May Y8 and Y9 Vaccinations

Friday 18th May—Election of new House Captains

Week beginning Mon 21st May—Y10 Work Experience Mon 28th May to Fri 1st June—Half-term

Monday 4th June—school re-opens Wed 6th June—Raising Achievement Programme (RAP)

Parents’ Meeting Mon 11th June—Salter’s Chemistry Festival

Wed 13th June to Tues 19th June—Year 7 Exam Week

Thurs 14th June—Y6 Taster Day 1 (St Anne’s) Wed 20th June—Year 7 RE Trip

Thurs 21st June—Year 8 Full Report Home Thurs 21st—Year 9 Science and Tech Activity Morning

22nd/24th June—Bronze and Silver

Duke of Edinburgh Final Expedition 25th June—Aquinas Festival of Sport Y10 (tbc)

Wed 27th June—Year 6 Taster Day 2 (St Mary’s & other schools)

Thurs 28th June—Activity Day

Fri 29th June—INSET Day—School Closed for Pupils Fri 29th June–Year 11 Prom

Mon 2nd July—Year 7 Interim Reports home Tues 3rd July—Sports Day

Thurs 5th July—Year 6 Induction Day Thurs 5th July—Year 7 Parents’ Evening

Fri 6th July—Year 9 interim report sent home

Wed 11th July—Skills for Life at Whitehall Thurs 12th July—Year 10 Full Report sent home

Tues 17th July— Summer Fair Fri 20th July—School Closes for the Summer

Thurs 23rd August GCSE Results Day For more dates and events including next year’s

calendar please visit our website

Easter Newsletter 2018

Nuala and Eve on the Iceland Trip

Short but Incredibly Busy

Anxiously, we sat at a table in the corner of

Chapel-en-le-Frith Golf Club, nervously shuffling our cue cards. Mouths dry, fingers tapping…

were we ready? We were called to our seats at the front of the room to talk about rules and

safety regulations. The speeches given by the

other schools seemed to fly by and the standard was high. We were entertained by a very hu-

morous speech on ‘Dependance on Technology is making humanity less intelligent’. Before long

we were asked to take our places in front of the audience. It was time to speak.

Our cards were shaking faster than our minds

could count. As we took our seats and began to say the words which we had spent months working on we knew it was all going to be fine. As well as a rush of

adrenaline that made our hearts pound faster than ever before, we also felt exhilarated that we had done it and from the look on Mrs Newton’s face, we had done it well!

Edwina Currie ( M.P. 1983-97) and Mike Travis, Chair of the New Mills and District Rotary Club, gave everyone

feedback on their performance. Disaster struck as we found out that we had received time penalties and we prepared ourselves for the worst. It was time… the judges stood up to announce the scores “Chapel-en-le-Frith

High School - 212 points” The fear built up inside us “St Thomas More Catholic School with… 213 points!” We couldn’t believe it! We were all holding in the screams as we stood up for the photo and were awarded our tro-

phy with wide smiles on our faces. By Orla Doyle, Connie Skitt, Erin Babington, Phoebe Mitchell (reserve) Mrs Newton added: “They have a natural talent for public speaking. Orla’s speech ‘The Definition of Normal’

dealt with the subject of gender stereotypes. She delivered it with the conviction and confidence of someone

beyond her years. Connie and Erin’s responses to the speech were spontaneous and far better than some pro-fessionals. Thanks go to Caitlin MacNamara, Charlie Whitehouse, Ellie Shaw and Anthony Hall for their help

with coaching the team”

Year 7 Rotary Club Debating Champions 2018

GCSE Drama Showcase 2018

The Year 11 GCSE Drama Group recently did a public performance of extracts

from the play ‘The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time’. This was a prelude to and dress rehearsal for their actual examination performance. As

one parent said “ All the girls gave fantastic performances, the extracts were

engaging, moving and be-

lievable. The extra effort put in by both the students

and Ms Hardcastle was evident and I was really

impressed”. We hope that

the group can replicate this excellent performance in

their exam. Well done!

Edwina Curry presents the Rotary club trophy to the Year 7 debating team with Mrs Newton and Mr Mike Travis

50 pupils and 5 staff from St Thomas More Catholic School visited Iceland. After spending a fantastic

week in Iceland with temperatures reaching 8oC and very little snow in sight (except on the high hills) and after visiting a range of locations including the Secret Lagoon, Vik, Reykjavik, Pearlan Centre, Laugardalur

valley, Thingvellir National Park, Gullfloss waterfall, the Geysir Center, Kerið Crater, Seljalandsfoss water-fall, Skógafoss Waterfall and Sólheimajökull Glacier, they landed at Manchester Airport to a very windy

and snowy welcome. It was touch and go if they would make it back to Buxton on Thursday afternoon,

but with the expert driving of Joe from Andrews Coaches, they made it back safe and sound. St Thomas More Catholic School would like to thank WST travel who organised the trip and were on standby to book

the 50 pupils and 5 staff into a Manchester hotel if they could not make it back to Buxton. Also, to An-drews Coaches who went above and beyond to ensure that all the children arrived home safe and sound.

Here’s to Iceland 2020!

Iceland 2018

Chess Club At a recent chess club

tournament, Keir Clark of Year 11 managed to

beat all opponents to be crowned STM Chess

Champion.

Why not come and join us, whatever your

s t a n d a r d . E v e r y Wednesday lunchtime

in room 203 Luke presenting Keir with his prize

Year 10 Maths Feast

Year 10 were recently undertook a marathon maths

challenge where everyone was put into groups and tasked with pitting their wits against each other, testing mathematical, team-working and communication skills. A whole range of maths questions were thrown at

the groups including recreational mathematics and some of a more traditional nature. Lauren Pooley, Abi Rosser, Sofia Turiano, Jack Ochalek, Imogen Porter came out as eventual winners. Food was provided dur-ing the event which truly was a maths feast!

More Sports High Peak 6-A-Side Competition for Year 10

STM had a small squad but managed to play extremely well against the other High Peak schools. Goals were tight in all games. The STM team managed to keep a good shape throughout and defended well. In

the end our record was played 5, won 1, draw 3 and lost 1 which was good enough for equal 3rd place. Well done to Reece Taylor, James Heywood, Toby Evans, Dan Hyland, Charlie Hodgkinson and Josh Stow.

CBRE All Schools Rugby Programme.

The school chose me to go to Twickenham to watch the England v Wales rugby match and to be the flag bearer.

We had a talk from some of the players and then went onto the pitch. We also met some of the under 21 play-

ers who explained how they got into the sport. It was the best thing I have ever done in my life . I hope to go

again. I felt very honoured to be there and I learnt lots

of new things about rugby as well as lots of new songs. The game was very close which made it even bet-

ter. By Tom Birchenough. Derbyshire Schools Cross Country Championships (Chesterfield)

Well done to all those runners who managed to qualify for this prestigious event this year. The field is al-

ways full of quality runners and the pace is high and this year was no exception. Lucus Parker was selected to represent Derbyshire at the English Schools Cross-country Championships.

Basketball News .

The Year 11 boys team played two games last term, against Derby Moor in the County Cup Semi-Final

and then a final pool game against Ashfield Academy from Mansfield. Derby Moor proved to be extremely strong opponents. They made good use of their height advantage. Despite this our boys persevered but

unfortunately went down 43-104. Derby Moor are expected to win the County Cup this year. The Ashfield game was different. STM were much stronger from the off and quickly got into their stride. A

strong performance from Ben Hollick gave STM a comfortable lead by half time. However, when Ben had to

sit out the entire third quarter for a foul, this allowed Ashfield a chance to creep back into the game. How-ever, STM managed to finish winners by 82 – 57. There were strong team performances from Ben Hollick,

Jack Clemmey, Josh Williams, Isaac Brown, Josh Lomas, Benedict Elliott and Bartosz Kwec. A special men-tion to Owen Connell in Year 9 who also played despite being 2 years below. The Year 8 Boys played a

tough game in Round 2 of the County Cup v Noel Baker (Derby). This was a very one sided affair as Noel

Baker had an extremely tall team. I am pleased to say that our boys showed a good attitude despite the obvious disadvantages and kept battling away to lose 7–101. .

The Year 9 Girls played Belper in the semi-final of the Derbyshire Cup. This was a very close match with STM demonstrating superior skills. However, they eventually lost out to Belper who came back strongly in

the last quarter to win by 12 points.

High Peak Schools Sports Hall Athletics The Year 7 Boys and Girls event took place at Buxton

Community School. Pupils take part in a variety of both Field and Track events, and points are awarded for each.

Our pupils did exceptionally well. A special mention to Maddie Hayles who did a lot of running races for the girls.

The Boys finished in 3rd place and the Girls finished in

4th place overall. Well done to all those participants.

Year 11 Swimathon Success

William Stanway 16th Junior Boys

Euan Freeman 25th Junior Boys

Matt Schofield 29th Junior Boys

Joey Hollamby 31st Junior Boys Lucas Parker 7th Inter Boys

Luke Mamczur 18th Inter Boys

Tom with the new school Rugby Kit

Y7 Mascot at International Netball

Two Year 7 girls were chosen as mascots at a

recent International Netball Event. Erin Babington and Ella Gouldburn pictured in the middle, ap-

peared on Sky Sports as they stepped on to the court with the Australian Netball Team—a great

honour.

Well done to the

Year 11 girls Eve Skitt, Molly McDer-

mott and Romia Manley, who took

part in the recent

Rotary Club Swima-thon. They were a

credit to the school.