20 July 2010 Work Experience

It was great to receive a letter of thanks form Ho Cheng Sit who completed a couple of weeks work experience at SCOLA - she had this to say :

"I enjoyed working for SCOLA because the environment is very friendly and all colleagues were very kind to me. In addition, all colleagues in SCOLA cooperate and work as a team".

Thank you for those kind words - it was a pleasure having you at SCOLA. Best of luck for the future!

Saboohi Famili - Principal

15 July 2010- Staff Conference 2010: Your Views, Your Scola , Our Future Day 2

The Staff Conference held on the 15th July was particularly for part time staff. I had four sessions to deliver as part of the staff development activities. It was great to have the highest number of colleagues at the A-Z of Social Networking session where I showcased examples of real life impact of social media in business. My thanks goes to Jo Barnett - Snr Lecturer, ICT Digi Media - from SCOLA and Brenda Knight from Best of Sutton who helped bring the session to life.

The other workshops included the 'Signs of a Miserable Job' which was aimed at Curriculum and Support Management, 'Qwizdom' for teaching staff and 'Evaluating Multimedia Learning Resources' which was aimed at teaching staff. Hopefully these sessions added value to the day and inspired colleagues to use some of the techniques and resources provided in their planning and work. This was yet another great day of activities which was well received and well attended.

Saboohi Famili - Principal

13 July 2010- Staff Conference 2010: Your Views, Your Scola , Our Future Day 1

Today was an exciting day for me. I was facilitating the 2010 Staff Conference, a full day of fun- packed activities that hopefully will lead to the changes we want to make at SCOLA. Anxious throughout the planning stages due to the fact that the activities were so different to what the staff are used to, I started very early to ensure that all was in working order and to my standards. It was reassuring to be greeted by our hardworking caretakers George Skillen, Tony Kelly and Bob Richards, who had transformed the arena into a nice cabaret style conference set up.

The day progressed very well and staff participated in activities with enthusiasm and energy. Excellent feedback was provided that was an encouragement to me that I had pitched the session right and that the hard work had paid off.

The first activity of the day of the day started at 9am entitled "Who am I" and was a good ice-breaker which got staff moving about and talking to one another. This activity was followed by finding solutions to problems and then an adventure in Sherwood Forest! At 12.30 a fantastic buffet lunch was served and staff had the opportunity of networking. After lunch feedback was given on the activities that had taken place in the morning. The fourth and last activity to take place was one involving lego called Monumental Direction and staff had the opportunity to work together in teams. It was great to see how staff interacted with one another!

The success of the conference was due to the hard work of those who participated. My special thanks go to Arnie Skelton, www.etduk.co.uk, Howard Shepherdson from TVU and Jan Keone who helped me with suggesting various activities for the conference.

Saboohi Famili - Principal

09 July 2010- SWLSEP Conference

Yet another abbreviation to be added to the jargon buster pages on our website. SWLSEP or The Southwest London School Effectiveness Partnership is a co-operative and collaborative arrangement among the London boroughs of Kingston, Merton, Richmond, Sutton, Wandsworth and Croydon. This partnership allows individual southwest London local authorities to build their capacity for school improvement, through co-operation and joint project work.The 2nd annual conference held at Sandown Park with beautiful grounds and inspiring surroundings was well attended and promised a day of information giving and knowledge transfer. The following people addressed the conference throughout the day - Trevor Sandford: DCSF 14-19 Regional Adviser; Mary Vine Morris: Director, London 14-19 Regional Planning Group; David Andrews: Senior Fellow of the National Institute for Careers Education; and Patrick Leeson: Director, Education & Care, Ofsted.

I thoroughly enjoyed the event and made good contacts with colleagues from different neighbouring boroughs.
It was great to feel part of a bigger team that can potentially achieve effectiveness on a larger scale and give educational partners a louder voice.
Further information can be found on http://www.lsep.org.uk/swlsep/

Saboohi Famili - Principal

8 July 2010 - Get That Job Seminar

A well attended and very successful seminar delivered by Arnie Skelton from Effective Training & Development generated a raft of very positive comments and brought in people who have never been to SCOLA before. Those who attended were impressed with what they saw and very complimentary about the seminar itself.

A Job Coach who attended commented as follows: "I found the afternoon extremely beneficial! What an amazing person Arnie is - the content of the session was appropriate for our clients too!"

Those who attended also had the opportunity of speaking to SCOLA's Information & Guidance team.

Judging by the excellent comments we received I am sure that this was the first of many more great seminars to come!

Saboohi Famili - Principal