Medina Matters 4th October 2019

Update from the HeadKaren Begley, Head of School

The end of another busy week! It does not seem possible that we only have two weeks left of this half term.

I am impressed with the majority of our students who are looking very smart. I feel it is important to remind you how important attendance is. There is a direct correlation between attendance and GCSE results. We need to be aiming for 100% attendance!

It was great to see so many Year 7 parents and carers at our informal drop-in tutor evening yesterday. Anyone unable to attend can contact the tutors for a catch up – contact details are on the website. Information about the planned UKSA trip, the extracurricular program and the CATs results were shared with parents.

On Tuesday, the Federated Year 11 careers and GCSE information evening was very well attended and the message from all the providers was very clear in terms of Year 11 doing the best they can in all their subjects; and that maths and English were subjects that they would be required to re-sit whatever route they chose to follow. I would like to thank Naomi Smy who arranged the evening. There were a large number of exhibitors in the sports hall for students to speak to after the talks in the theatre.

Don’t forget it is our first parent voice meeting of the year next Wednesday, 9th October. The meeting will be held in the Library starting at 6.10pm. Everyone is welcome.

Well done to the top house point achievers: Year 7 Luca Burton, Year 9 Kane Everson, Year 10 Lucie Chambers and Year 11 Sam Stant. In Year 8 we had three top achievers: Jake Gough, Zak Holbrook and Alex Jones.

Have a great weekend and thank you for your continued support.

Diary Dates:

Wednesday 9th October 2019Year 11 Learn with Us Taster Day

Wednesday 9th October 2019 6.10pm in the LibraryMedina College Parent Voice Meeting

Tuesday 15th October 2019Year 8 HPV Vaccinations

Monday 21st October - Friday 1st November 2019Half Term Break (2 weeks)

Monday 4th November 2019First Day Back

Thursday 7th November 2019Shakespeare School Performance

Week Begining 11th November 2019Year 11 Mock Exams

Wednesday 13th November 2019Year 9 Sexual Health Awareness Workshops

Thursday 14th November 2019VI Form Open Evening

Tuesday 26th November 2019Year 9 Learn with Us taster session at Southampton University

Wednesday 27th November 2019Year 9 Sexual Health Awareness Worshops

Wednesday 4th December 20196.10pm in the LibraryMedina College Parent Voice Meeting

Safeguarding News

Safeguarding Alert: Porn Email Scam

Over three billion fake emails are sent out each day and many of them are phishing emails aiming to trick people into passing over their passwords and other data, especially for their bank accounts.

An insidious and alarming version of a phishing email is the 'porn email scam'. In this scam a victim is told that the attacker has video of the person watching illegal pornographic content, sometimes even titled 'I know your a pedo' (sic). The email includes the demand that unless an amount of money is paid by BitCoin, the attackers will release the images to everyone on the victim's contact list.

There are an estimated 8m different sextortion emails and over 200m compromised accounts that could be targeted. Could yours be one of them?

If you are sent one of these 'porn scams':• Don't panic, take a step back - Stop, Pause and Think.• Do your research - Copy and paste the text into Google.• Take action to protect yourself - Think about contacting the police.• Improve your digital security - Change passwords and check your email security.• Don't stay silent - Talk to someone or call The Samaritans..

There are many ways that passwords may be collected, but a data breach is the most common way that millions of email addresses and password pairs get out into the 'wild'.

One way to find out whether your email address has ever been comprised is to go to the website 'Have I Been Pwnd' https://haveibeenpwned.com/ and enter your email address. More information, including examples of these scam emails can be found here: https://shop.ineqe.com/blogs/news/safeguarding-alert-porn-email-scam

Download a Sextortion Infographic: https://cofense.com/sextortion-infographic/

Test Your Password

'How secure is my password' is website where you can check how quickly 'hackers' would take to guess your password. The top ten passwords people use are:

123456 password12345678912345678123451111111234567sunshineqwertyiloveyou(Source: Digital Trends https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/top-100-worst-passwords-2018/)

According to 'How secure is my password' all these passwords can be guessed 'instantly'. One easy way to strengthen a password is to make it longer, and add at least one special character like ! or ?. Simply adding an ! to sunshine in the above list would now take 2 hours to crack, two exclamation marks would take 4 days.

By adding the name of the site you're on, you could strengthen your password so it would need 143 trillion years to crack.

sunshine - instantlysunshine! - 2 hourssunshine!! - 4 dayssunshine!!sainsburys - 143 TRILLION YEARS!!

Have I Been Pwnd - https://haveibeenpwned.com/How secure is my password - https://howsecureismypassword.net/

If You Don't Know, Don't Go (West Yorkshire Police and Leeds Safeguarding Children Partnership )

West Yorkshire Police and Leeds Safeguarding Children Partnership have launched a campaign warning young people to be wary of invites to free parties from older people who they know little about.

A tactic used by perpetrators of child sexual exploitation is to lure children to parties through social media and word of mouth, where they then ply them with drinks and drugs before pressuring them into sex. They may also bribe them into doing things they aren’t comfortable with in return for a lift home, as the ‘party’ is often held in an area that the young person is unfamiliar with.

Advice to Young people

If you do accept an invitation to a party or gathering there are things that you need to do keep yourself safe:• Make sure you know the location of where you’re going and whose party it is.• Read the road signs if you accept a lift.• Tell a trusted adult where you are going and who you’re going with.• Tell someone what time you’re expected back.• Make sure you have credit on your phone.• Make sure your mobile battery is fully charged.• Take enough money with you to get you home

Read more: https://www.westyorkshire.police.uk/news-appeals/if-you-dont-know-dont-go-campaign-highlights-party-tactic-used-perpetrators-child

[Note that the link to more information on the Police webpage doesn't currently work]

Poster: https://www.westyorkshire.police.uk/sites/default/files/party_model_poster_jpeg_12.9.19.jpg

The West Yorkshire Police website has lots of links to valuable resources on a range of other safeguarding topics: https://www.westyorkshire.police.uk/advice

Netball News

Our amazing year 9 netballers played their socks off for a victory against Cowes. End to end action with team Medina winning 8-5.

Well done everyone!

Cashless payment for everything at Medina College

We are very excited to be introducing School Gateway to Medina College – a parent engagement app that will allow you to pay for school trips, communicate with the school and view your child’s achievements and reports at anytime from anywhere.

All school related payments will go through School Gateway from Monday 4th November. To stay up to date with what’s going on at school make sure you download the app for free. Just search School Gateway in your App store and download.

Your login details will be automatically generated using the contact information Medina College already has for you, so please make sure the details we hold for you are up to date. You can check and change these details by sending an email to the Head of Year/Assistant Head of Year for your child.

If you have any questions or would like some more information, please see the School Gateway site here: https://schoolgateway.co.uk/

You can also login to the online version of School Gateway via this site if you do not have a smart phone, although we do recommend using the app if possible as it makes it far easier to get hold of parents when we need to.

AMBITIONSUCCESS

PROGRESSINNOVATION

RESPECTENGAGEMENT

We will insist that all of our staff demand the best of all of our students all of the time. Each and every student will be ambitious for themselves and their

future. Our families will always support our efforts to secure appropriate and worthwhile employment and training for their children.

We will provide a curriculum and continuous professional development framework through which all of our students and staff can achieve excellence. Celebration of academic and other achievements will be regular, systematic and genuine. We expect our parents to join in with and support our culture of high expectation and reward.

We will demand that all of our students, regardless of age, ability, gender or background make good and outstanding progress in all of their subjects. We

expect that all of our students will demand this of themselves and that our families will show a genuine interest in their child’s learning journey.

We will let creativity flourish so that independent thinking becomes the norm for all within our learning community. We will seek new ways to do things, embracing developments in technology and learning so that our young people are ready to take their place in the rapidly evolving world of work.

We will insist that all those within our learning community engage fully with all of the policies and procedures within the organisation. We expect our teachers to deliver well-planned and interesting lessons so that our students and their families commit to the experiences on offer. We expect excellent attendance from all stakeholders and we look forward to engaging in frequent dialogue with our families at numerous school events and meetings.

We will insist, at all times, upon good manners, politeness, appropriate language and behaviour from all within our learning community. We will

be tolerant of the views of others and we will consistently challenge all forms of prejudice, discrimination and harassment.

At the Isle of Wight Education Federation, our ethos is underpinned by these core values. We are a learning community which embraces opportunities for all our learners by securing high quality learning and teaching. We aim for all our students to achieve their full potential both as students at Isle of Wight Education Federation schools and as considerate global citizens of the future. We always aim to be the best we can be, nothing less will do.

'Let's Talk About SEND' Week!

Are you a Parent Carer of a child with Special Educational Needs and / or Disabilities on the IW?

Parents Voice IW is your local Parent Carer Forum, and we need to hear your views.

Please come and tell us about your experiences of SEND provision here on the island.

Mon 7th October - Sat 12th October

(for parents of children at this school only)

(for parents of children at this school only)

(for parents of children at this school only)