Message Spring Term 2025 Edion Thereld News Excellence, Leadership, Opportunity ‘Best for All’
Headteacher Update Welcome to the inaugural edion of Thereld News! We are thrilled to bring you the rst-ever newsleer, packed with excing updates and stories from our school community. This edion covers a wide range of topics, including our recent trip to Silicon Valley, where students explored the heart of the tech industry in the USA. We also highlight the Year 8 Enterprise Day with Hyundai, which was a fantasc opportunity for our students to develop their entrepreneurial skills. Addionally, we were delighted to welcome back Elaine Smithers, a former teacher from the late 1960s and early 1970s, who shared her wonderful memories of Thereld. Our school musical, "Malda," was a resounding success, showcasing the incredible talent of our students. We also hosted a Careers Fair, providing valuable insights and opportunies for our students' future paths. During RaG Week, our Sixth Form students demonstrated their generosity by raising over £1,000 for James’ Jar of Gis, a fantasc cause which means a lot to our school community. The front cover of this newsleer features the rst-ever lesson in our new Science facility, and we look forward to sharing photos of the ocial opening in our next edion. As this is our rst newsleer, we welcome your feedback and suggesons on what you would like to see in future edions. Thereld News aims to keep you informed and engaged with all the wonderful acvies and achievements within our school. Thank you for being a part of our community, and we hope you enjoy reading this edion. James Malley Headteacher
USA Silicon Valley / San Fransico Student diary wrien by Vihaan, Year 9 Day 1 Dear Diary, I am currently on a plane to San Francisco, from London. The plane ride is thirteen hours long, I have read so much throughout this ight and solved my rubix cube! Day 2 Now, on the rst day aer the plane ight, we went to the Golden Gate Bridge, which was stunning and beauful. It wasn’t just the bridge, the urbanizaon in the background was also very cool. We then went to the gi shop, which was incredibly overpriced – but that was to be expected. Aer that, we went to the café. Later, we went to Alcatraz – which was very interesng. Alcatraz was a prison on an island that was famous for being so dicult to break out of. One quote I read about it, went like this: ‘If you break the law, you go to prison. If you break the prison laws, you go to Alcatraz.’ We went to the entrance and picked up radios containing headphones – we were told to follow the instrucons of the radios with our headphones and go to where they took us. They could – for example – show us specic cells and tell us details about the prisoners who lived there. While being renowned for their lack of jailbreaks, nothing is impossible and, seldom, people did break out of their cells and managed to hurl themselves over about a kilometer of sea. One successful aempt happened when (I think), an ocer gave the prisoners an ample supply of spoons, as a sort of toxic way of saying, ‘ha, you can’t get out.’ However, they did get out by painstakingly cung through the steel to escape. It was said to have taken six months of plan-ning, which makes sense. Anway, I will write about what happened today, tomorrow – hopefully. Or else I will connue to be a day behind which isn’t so bad, I guess . Day 3 So, on the third day, we went to Stanford University – a university in Stanford (believe it or not). It was enormous, and there were literal roads
separang the dierent blocks – these wide roads were only built for bikes as people were beer o cycling to dierent places; like its own mini city. Personally, I really admired the atmosphere: everybody was cycling, people were chang, contently, and the weather was a nice cherry on top to set the mood. Certainly, a great contender when I pick my university. As I menoned before, the place was like a mini city. To expand on that: there were plenty of restaurants and shops such as Subway, which is where we ate. Aer that, there was another part that was like an all-in-one shop. Vast, there was a secon for books, food, clothes and even a mini-Apple store! It matched up as many people there have a MacBook. Then, we went to the Tech Interacve. Personally, I had my fun and enjoyed it, – The me we spent there wasn’t enough for me as there were so many dierent things to explore. Finally, we went to the Computer History Museum, which I enjoyed too. Day 4 Today was quite a good day. We rst went to do the Silicon Valley Tour, which was very excing. Just going in the coach, I saw so many cool tech companies like Nvidia. In the actual tour, we went to a massive apple store, which I have been to many a me; yet I never get bored, and I love their unique, clean aesthec. We also went to the Google store. Finally, we went to the Intel Museum which I really enjoyed. We had a proper tour guide who actually explained what we were looking at; for example, seeing the transistor’s amount exponenally increasing over me was fascinang. Someone called, ‘Ben’ in our group wore a ‘bunny suit’ which people wore when making computer chips and I was shocked that it actually worked and that none or very few germs were transmied. There were two secons of the tour for the intel museum. The second secon was more of a physical lab. We were put into pairs and had to make simple and clear designs to assemble a toy; we obviously had to gure it out ourselves before, however. We then got other groups’ instrucons and aempted to solve the toy with their method (there were mulple ways to solve it). Though many groups said otherwise, ours was denitely the best. Also, I bought a really nice Intel bole for $12, then later I had to bin it as I forgot to empty it! Overall, I loved the trip and would love to go next me!
Year 8 Enterprise Day with Hyundai Hyundai Day is a great event for our Year 8 students and really helps them link the theory we teach around Eskills and transferable work skills to the world beyond school. We are very lucky to have Hyundai as one of our local partners in building communicaon skills in school. As part of the school career programme, all of Year 8 are invited to take part and create TV adverts to promote sustainable cars in the future. They are joined by Hyundai who delivered to school brand new vehicles for the students to take inspiraon from. The three best teams were then invited to showcase their talents at Hyundai HQ in Leatherhead and all nalists received amazing prizes. This iniave has many objecves, the most important ones being communicaon and teamwork, all designed to help improve employability skills.
“ I enjoyed vising the car, geng in and seeing what it was like on the inside. I enjoyed planning our car advert and then presenng our ideas to the class.” Zac L “Learning about the cars was very interesng as was designing the advert in our teams.” Joel P “ Excing! I was in the nal and presented our team’s ideas to the Execs at Hyundai UK Head Oce. That was enjoyable, especially playing on the PacMan arcade game they had in their lobby!” Edward H
Elaine Smithers - Thereld Alumni On 3rd March we welcomed back a very special guest to Thereld. Elaine Smithers was Head of Needlework at Thereld School in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Currently in a care home at 89, Elaine had expressed her wish to come back to Thereld for a visit via their ‘Wishing Tree’ iniave and so they got in contact with us and we were delighted to welcome Elaine back. She has many fond memories of the school and said that it was, by far, her favourite school to work at. Mr Claytor was Headmaster and Miss Bowhill was the Deputy Head at the me. On arrival Elaine met with Mr Malley, Headteacher and took a tour of the school. Things had denitely changed since her day and she shared many memories of her me here. Her next stop was a texle lesson where she had a
chance to see our Year 7s create felt characters and speak with them about school. It was then lunch me and Elaine enjoyed lunch with a number of students and sta including Mr Malley who presented her with a cercate for service to the school and the Headteacher’s Award for Excellence badge.
If you would like to support Sam in his fundraising eorts please follow the link: https://www.justgiving.com/page/sam-imrie-1730388097466?utm_medium=FR&utm_source=CL More informaon about MRF can be found here: https://www.meningitis.org/ My name is Sam Imrie and aer spending 7 great years at Thereld, I am currently in my rst year studying civil engineering at the University of Bath. So far my rst year at university has been a mix of growth, adapng to a new environment and learning to be independent. These have all been valuable experiences while using key skills such as the importance of me management, crical thinking and eecve communicaon, all things that I learnt from my me at Thereld. From learning how to design small-scale bridges to compleng group projects; designing a seang stand for Bath City FC, Uni so far has been just as fullling as I hoped it would be. The hard work I had to put in during both GCSEs and A-levels have absolutely paid o! However, the biggest highlight of my rst year is absolutely having the privilege of being able to fundraise for the Meningis Research Foundaon (MRF) in order to be part of the university team to climb Mt Kilimanjaro this August! Kilimanjaro Fundraiser - Sam Imrie, Thereld Alumni
Eco Team combined forces with the STEM Society Our Eco team combined forces with our STEM society this term and had a really interesng talk from our visitor Julia Gaudelli who is a rered soware engineer who has worked with the Mullard Space Agency in collaboraon with UCL for many years. She came and spoke to the students about her work involving the use of satellite almetry for research into climate change in the Earth's polar regions. The informaon is sent to sciensts and researchers all over the world who use it to monitor changes in the world’s cryosphere. It was a fascinang talk and our students were really engaged.
Malda Jr! This year’s musical has been excing, inspiring and challenging (at mes!) for everyone involved, from acng, singing and dancing to stage design. All the students who have been involved with Malda Jr! have shown nothing but dedicaon, passion and enthusiasm for the producon. It was a pleasure to see students from all year groups working together and creang a real family feel throughout the whole process. I am sure that if you came and saw the performances you can agree that the posivity and enjoyment was palpable! I personally want to thank all the students and sta involved in creang a truly superb show! On to next year….! Miss Christopher
Careers Fair As part of Naonal Careers Week 2025, we once again held our annual Careers Fair with over 40 exhibitors from a really wide range of professions, ranging from future technologies to accountancy and hospitality! All the students in the school visited the fair as part of the C@T (Careers at Thereld Programme) which focusses on our students learning specic employability skills in each year group. There were also a number of Further Educaon and Higher Educaon instuons present who were able to talk to the students about the courses they oer and the entry requirements. Students had the opportunity to interview employers about their pathways to their jobs and consider which skills are the most important for each profession. We hold this event every year so any parents wishing to take part as exhibitors are always welcome - please contact enquiries@thereld.surrey.sch.uk if you are keen to get involved.
RaG Week—17th March As part of the annual RaG week (Raise and Give week), this year our Sixth Form Commiee raised money for James’ Jar of Gis (hps://jamesjarofgis.co.uk/ ). All prots made in school will go to this charity . The Sixth Form had organised fundraising events throughout the week for students to parcipate in. The events organised included: • Monday - Bake Sale • Tuesday - Sponge the Teacher • Wednesday - Thereld's Got Talent—We were lucky enough to have singers through to stand-up comedy, • Thursday - Five-A-Side Penalty Shoot-outs • Friday - Teacher Lip-Sync Bale. The week ended with a bang were students watched their favourite teachers lip-sync to their chosen tracks in a hilarious showdown. It is a great community event in school and congratulaons to all the Sixth Formers involved!
Year 9 McLaren Stem Day 60 students across Year 9 spent a construcve day working alongside the Smallpeice Trust on a McLaren funded STEM day. Students spent me designing, building, tesng and producing a sales pitch for an electric vehicle. All students engaged really well with the acvity producing a range of innovave designs and incorporang ideas around aerodynamics, cost eecve use of resources and budgeng skills. As well as delivering excellent presentaons to the rest of the group, students showed a high level of eecve teamwork, communicaon and creave skills as they develop through both the Science and Careers curriculum at Thereld. They were a credit to the school and should be proud of the work they produced on the day.
Nine of our Year 12 students headed to the Peak District this weekend to complete their Gold Duke of Edinburgh Award training and pracce expedion. They spent the Friday compleng the Gold DofE training syllabus and route planning before two days exploring the Peak District. The weather was mostly kind but with some chilly nights and strong winds to contend with!
A Great Aernoon of Dodgeball In partnership with LEO Academy we hosted over 50 Year 4 students for a Dodgeball tournament on Monday 24th February. We welcomed students from West Ashtead Primary Academy, Great Bookham School, The Greville Primary School, Walton on the Hill Primary School and St Peter’s Catholic School, Leatherhead. Thank you to our wonderful student helpers for making the event such a success!
Headteacher Hot Chocolates Congratulaons to the students awarded Headteacher hot chocolates this term. Mr Malley has been delighted to welcome these students to his hot chocolate reward for winning Interhouse compeons, taking part in Duke of Edinburgh expedions, Extended Project Qualicaon, Eskills winners, Hyundai Enterprise Day winning team, excellent eort, excellent progress, being a Holocaust Ambassador, involvement in Malda Jr school producon, mentoring and Parents Evening helpers.
Headteacher Hot Chocolates cont.
Headteacher Hot Chocolates cont.
4th April End of term Ski Italy trip departs 22nd April Start of term – 9.30am start for students New Science Build Opening Ceremony 23rd April CGI Day for Year 9 24th April Year 9 Opons Deadline KS4/5 Presentaon Evening 25th April Years 7, 8 and 9 Inspire Awards Assemblies 5th May May Bank Holiday 6th May Year 13 Leavers Assembly GCSE Exams begin 7th May Year 8 HPV Vaccinaons 8th May Year 6 Parents Meet and Greet Trust Quiz Night 12th May Silver Duke of Edinburgh Pracce A Level Exams start 14th May Year 8 HPV Vaccinaons 23rd May Culture Fesval for Years 7-10 & 12 End of half term – 2.30pm nish 26th May to 30th May Half term 2nd June 9.30am Start for students 3rd June to 6th June Year 5 Taster Days 6th June Year 12 Geography Field trip 10th June Year 10 Geography Field trip Year 5 Taster Day 13th June to 15th June Silver Duke of Edinburgh Qualifying 19th June Year 10 Geography Field trip to Worthing 20th June Year 13 Prom 23rd June Alumni Day 24th June Higher Educaon Day Year 9 vaccinaons and Year 8 catch up vaccinaons A Level Exams end 25th June GCSE Exams end 26th June Year 11 Prom Year 12 Kingston University Social Science Trip 27th June INSET Day 30th June to 4th July Gold Duke of Edinburgh Qualifying 1st July Year 6 Inducon Day & Year 6 Inducon Evening for Parents 2nd July Year 6 Inducon Day 3rd July Summer Showcase Year 5 Taster Day 4th July Year 5 Taster Day 8th July Year 5 Taster Day 10th July Headteacher Reward Trip KS3 Prizegiving Evening 11th July Sports Day 12th and 13th July Bronze Duke of Edinburgh Training 14th to 18th July European Experience Trip – Year 8 Upcoming Dates
*Curriculum Enrichment Days day trips and in school events Year 7 - London Zoo & in school acvity Year 8 - Strawberry Hill & in school acvity Year 9 - Bletchley Park & in school acvity Year 10 - College and Universies visit & Thorpe Park Year 12 - Geography eld trip to London & Epsom 15th July Higher Educaon Day for Year 12 16th July to 18th July Year 7 PGL Trip 17th and 18th July Curriculum Enrichment Days * Belgium Baleelds Trip End of Summer term End of Summer term – 3.15pm nish for students in school