St Illtyd’s students continue to expand their minds

Students at St Illtyd’s Catholic High School continue to open themselves to a wide range of experiences as they expand their minds. In recent times they have undertaken a waste management project, celebrated exam results, explored cybersecurity, STEM projects and the power of writing.

Eco Club Update - Waste Management

On April 6th 2024, it became law for all schools in Wales to recycle. St Illtyd’s will have recycling bins in all classrooms and in the canteen. With this in mind, this term our Eco Club members have put all their efforts into the Eco Schools topic of “Waste Management.”

Members decided that they would create a video to be shown to all pupils in St Illtyd’s that would introduce and raise awareness of recycling. They started the spring term researching everything to do with recycling. From this work, the older members of Eco Club - Year 10 members - created a story board for the video. From this story board, Mrs May wrote a script for the video. The younger members of Eco Club- those in Years 7 and 8 were responsible for filming the different scenes for the video. Finally, our Year 10 members edited the video.

This video will be shown to all pupils in St Illtyd’s. By all recycling together, we can improve not only the St Illtyd’s environment, but we will also be playing our part in helping the wider environment.

Luisa May, Community Focused Schools Co-ordinator and Eco Club Lead

CyberFirst Girls Competition

In November, eight Year 8 girls participated in the CyberFirst Girls Competition, an annual cybersecurity contest for schools organised by the NCSC in the UK. This competition is designed to introduce 12/13-year-old girls to the field of cybersecurity, encouraging them to explore potential careers in the industry. The girls tackled a variety of challenging tasks, including password analysis, logic gates, binary analysis, and cyber awareness.

Throughout the competition, the participants showcased exceptional problem-solving and critical thinking skills. Their dedication to the team was evident as they sacrificed ten days of breaks and lunches to work on the competition tasks, demonstrating a united front. A heartfelt congratulations to Team 1 for achieving an impressive 1085 points.

Team 2, who also embraced the challenge and, in the process, increased their cyber awareness. Overall, the girls' commitment and achievements in the competition are truly commendable.

Melanie Hopkin, Subject Leader of ICT & Business

Cyber Security STEAM Club

Year 7 students are actively contributing to creating a more secure world. Thanks to Matt Tomlinson from Cardiff Metropolitan University, these pupils engaged in a Cyber Security STEAM afterschool club, spanning five weeks of enriching activities.

The club covered a diverse range of topics, including cryptography, encoding and decoding ciphers, interactive security systems, and more. This unique opportunity facilitated the growth of critical thinking and problem-solving skills among the students.

Working collaboratively, the pupils operated a robot through a track and honed their programming skills using Tinkercad, creating 3D digital designs with online CAD using Arduino. The students actively participated by interacting with the tutor, posing insightful questions to deepen their understanding of the complex topics they encountered. This experience has been instrumental in fostering a culture of curiosity and continuous learning.

Anticipating many more opportunities to nurture and expand their young minds, we celebrate the students' engagement in this educational journey towards a more secure future. We would like to thank Matt Tomlinson from Cardiff Metropolitan University for giving his time to run this club.

Melanie Hopkin, Subject Leader of ICT & Business

Hay Festival Scribblers Tour 2024

Two groups of aspiring authors and poets from KS3 attended Cardiff Metropolitan University, Cyncoed campus, along with Mrs Davies and Miss Preece, for the Hay Festival Scribblers Tour 2024. The pupils (and staff) were treated to a day of interactive workshops led by several authors, to encourage pupils to build stories and express themselves through the power of writing.

The children (and staff) were delighted to meet people such as Jenny Valentine, Emma Carroll, Laura Bates, Benjamin Dean and Karl Nova. The authors and compere (Jenny Valentine) were enthusiastic about spending time with the pupils, on and off stage, which resulted in many creative conversations, and we learnt a great deal about celebrity culture from a former journalist.

All the pupils were extremely lucky and grateful to receive a free book. This book was the author’s latest offering, and they had the chance to get it signed too.

All pupils reported that the day was a success, and they are looking forward to attending the Hay Festival itself in May.

Mrs Davies and Miss Preece would like to thank all the pupils for their excellent behaviour and exemplary representation of St Illtyd’s. Another ‘thank you’ to Mrs May for organising the day and driving us to the venue in the school minibus.

Tracey Davies, Specialist Teacher of Literacy and Rachel Preece, Teacher of English

Year 11 Numeracy Results Day

Thursday 11th January was a big day for our Year 11 pupils as it was the day they received the results from their first GCSE sat back in November 2023 - Maths Numeracy. Mrs Jordan made it an occasion to remember by inviting all Year 11 pupils into the canteen during registration to receive their results and to celebrate together. The photos here capture the mood of the day perfectly. A huge well done to all our Year 11 pupils and we wish you all the very best of luck for the upcoming exam season.

STEM Roadshow

At the end of February, we were delighted to welcome the STEM Roadshow back to our school. The STEM Roadshow is an engaging theatre roadshow celebrating STEM (Science, Engineering, Technology and Maths). The theme of this year’s show was “Electricity”. The highly interactive show explored what electricity is and how we generate it.

All of Years 7 and 8 watched the performance. There were many opportunities to get involved and we had no shortage of volunteers at each performance. We even managed to get Mr Richards and Mrs Kaczmarska involved!

We would like to thank the roadshow team for an enthusiastic and engaging performance. We would also like to thank BAE Systems, the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy for financing this initiative.