All the pupils were excited to create their own individual masterpieces for the Stepgates school art exhibition entitled 'Sunset silhouettes'.

Using a range of art skills, each class followed a theme of their choice to create their art works. The exhibition coincided with our Platinum Jubilee family picnic, and pupils were enthusiastic to show their families around the exhibition.  Mrs. White, who organised the exhibition, was thrilled to see the pupils and families reactions when seeing their art on display. Families were able to purchase individual art, raising funds for art resources. The exhibition was a great success.

Thank you to all those who supported the event.

What an exciting time the children at Stepgates have had this week - they have enjoyed a Themed Week celebrating the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee! 

Each day, the children have taken part in many different activities, including: Drama workshops, tile painting, portrait painting, themed computing, Music and various arts and crafts to commemorate this event. On Monday, the whole school entered via the playground to the sound of the National Anthem, and walked the red carpet into assembly where the Queen was waiting for them! We all watched the Queen’s Coronation and talked about how significant being the longest reigning Monarch was; this was followed by an introduction to the week of celebrations.

The week finished with a community picnic, symbolic of the coming together of our school and families once again after a turbulent two years. The children all looked wonderful in their red, white and blue outfits and have all had a fantastic afternoon. Thank you to all our families who came along! It was wonderful to be back together again and to welcome you all to Stepgates Community School to commemorate this poignant time for our country. We have had a fantastic week, the school has looked wonderful, decorated with bunting, flags and portraits of the Queen. 

Finally, we would like to extend our thanks to FOSS, who bought every child a special bookmark to remember this event – thank you!

After many months waiting for COVID-19 to release its grip on our ability to mix with people, we were delighted to finally organise an official ceremony to celebrate the opening of our school swimming pool and changing rooms.

The Mayoress, Cllr Gill and her Deputy, Cllr Harnden (who will become the new Mayoress in the next few weeks) joined us, along with many of the wonderful people, past and present, who have helped us to achieve our goal after many, many years of fundraising.

With the pool looking sparkling in the sunshine and a welcome tea on offer courtesy of ‘Megan’s Cakes’ and the local Southern Co-op, along with the beautiful vintage crockery very kindly loaned to us free of charge from ‘All About The Taste’ in Chertsey, a lovely time was had by all.

It was particularly pleasing to welcome back staff, governors and FOSS members who have been instrumental in keeping this project alive over the past 10 years since our old pool was condemned and demolished.

The children at Stepgates are swimming once again as part of their curriculum, and we are gradually opening our doors to others in the local community.

THANK YOU to everyone who has supported us, every donation and every minute you have given up to help, is very gratefully received by us all.

The final step in this journey is to build an enclosure around the existing pool to create an all year round facility for the children of Stepgates and the local community to enjoy for generations to come.

If you would like to help us in any way, no matter how small, we would be delighted to hear from you. 

During the week of 3^rd – 7^th July 2023, Stepgates School celebrated Big Splash Week. During this, we not only raised money for our swimming pool roof, but were also able to join together across the school through water-themed activities. Each lunchtime, the Year 6 children set up games, races or just fun activities for the younger children. For example: hook a duck, bubble machines and bubble wands, water sprinkler limbo, water sprinkler operation, relay races with sponges and buckets of water and water trails using pipes. 

The big challenge of the week was our coin trail. We were delighted that Kites Class came first, creating a river of coins that measured 58 metres! That is all the way from the swimming pool and into the MUGA!

All Year groups from Years 1 – 6 took part in a sponsored swim where we had some amazing results of over 30 lengths for some children! Classes also carried out their own water-based learning in class, whether this was through activities in the PE lessons or writing about rivers and water related learning.

Thank you so much to parents/carers and our whole school community for supporting this event, including your kind donations of coins for the coin trail and for sponsoring children in their sponsored swim.

We have raised £1,486.34 for our swimming pool roof.  This is a fantastic achievement!