What Our Parents Say

Our senior leadership team and governing board regularly survey parents to understand what we do well, and where we can improve, with results and action plans shared with the whole school community.

On the quality of remote learning provision and attitude to Lockdown 3.0 (January/February 2021)

First I would like to thank Ms. Kane for having taken on board parents request if online lessons would be possible. I appreciate you are always open to suggestions and always try your best. The online lessons are a life saver! it has many and varied benefits, some you may not be aware off: It helps with focusing immensely! it gives structure and motivation to. Also I had the chance to see how the lessons are given. What fantastic teaching!! Thank you so much for all the hard work to put this together! It is highly highly appreciated. 

I also find the new timetable you posted for today with exact timings. Fantastic! It is always a different weight if a teacher gives instructions/guidance than only from a parent! Of course we have bad days…. where work is not perfect or just the minimum, however it is a great support. 

Referring to Ms. Kane comments in a recent email that St. Catherine is going far and beyond compared to other schools. I really can appreciate this. I have talked to mothers from other schools who were in tears about the lack of support and non-approachability from their schools. Please know that what you do has a great impact. Thank you for going far and beyond. 

Thank you for the details you have sent through, I shall have a read through and I’m sure some of it will be very useful. Also I’d like to say Thank you to yourself and the other teachers for your continued support as it is very much appreciated.

I felt horrible pushing it all now we actually are calmer and atmosphere more blissful .

On the handling of the COVID-19 crisis (May 2020)

I think you have approached the situation correctly not putting pressure on an already stressful situation. You have allowed us to take whatever we feel we can achieve and I appreciate it.

Well done to all concerned. It’s nice to think the school community is there for support and guidance.

SLT team have led the school throughout this time amazingly. We as a family have felt supported and part of the community

Wonderful – children have felt like they are still at school & it’s great to see all the Twitter posts.

Very supportive, reassuring and caring regarding every aspect of the COVID-19 crisis.

Very informative and helpful – as both parents have continued to work we have found it difficult to home school but we have felt supported and not made to feel guilty about this.

On home learning provision (May 2020)

It is really helping with the learning and I am finding my child has been learning a variety of topics.

Helpful to have some guidance and ideas for the children. I also like the Twitter updates and options of learning that is posted.

We are coping well and my daughter is very happy 😊 We have focused more on completing all the IXL for Maths and English plus the websites recommended.

Governor Parent Survey

In December 2019 the governors asked all parents / careers to participate in our new annual parent survey.

The questionnaire covered the following topics:

• Teaching and Learning
• Communication
• Pupils and Pastoral Care
• Leadership and Management

A huge thank you to everyone who participated! We really appreciate the time that you took to answer the questions, share your comments and ideas. 

There were 109 complete responses and an addition 29 partial responses.  This covered over 60% of all the pupils in the school as detailed in the table below:

Year Group	Responses	# Pupils	Response in %
EYFS	16	30	53%
Year 1	17	30	57%
Year 2	20	30	67%
Year 3	29	34	85%
Year 4	23	34	68%
Year 5	41	68	60%
Year 6	39	68	57%
Total	185	294	63%

Over the past weeks we have been analysing the results and identifying what we can learn from them and how we can use them to further the development of the school. Any good school needs to be constantly looking at itself and reviewing its procedures and your opinions form a fundamental part of that process.

There are a huge number of positives to be taken from the report and this highlights a number of strengths that you feel the school has. The school must, however, listen to areas that you feel could be improved upon and this questionnaire has enabled us to get some insight and discuss them with the full governing body. 

The following pages show the results to all questions asked as well as the main areas of concern (i.e. the ten lowest scoring areas) and action that we will take as a result. We feel it’s important that we listen carefully and, when appropriate, take action.

Finally, we always welcome any feedback about any aspect of school life. Although the official questionnaires will be only once every year, we are always very keen to hear from parents / carers with suggestions for improvement in the way St Catherine’s is operating. 

Please feel free to email Ms Kane directly via head@st-catherine.herts.sch.uk  or arrange a meeting through the office – by popping in, calling or emailing admin@st-catherine.herts.sch.uk.