Kinross High School

The Kinross High School badge.

Kinross High School is a state school in Kinross, Scotland. It is located adjacent to the leisure centre, and is part of Loch Leven Community Campus, named after the nearby Loch Leven. In 2010, the school moved from the old building located on the high street to the new campus about half a mile down the road. The school has about 930 pupils enrolled and about 100 members of staff. It is now a Community Campus with public facilities including a climbing wall, a gym, a library and several meeting rooms. The main corridor is called the street which is where the majority of pupils meet during break and lunchtime. There are 4 eating places in all - Food To Go, fast food lane, baguette bar and the hot food bar.

There are three houses - Lomond, Benarty and Ochil. The house the pupil is in depends on the floor that they get registered in - the bottom being Ochil, the middle being Benarty and the top being Lomond. Every day, the pupils have a "tutor support period" in which they meet in their tutor support group which gives the younger pupils a chance to talk to the older pupils about matters such as exam revision tips, bullying or help with homework. The group lasts 10 minutes on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday,but on Wednesday, it is a 30 minute period after the second period.

Uniform

Junior pupils (1st to 4th year) are expected to wear a shirt with a green, purple, red and yellow tie with black trousers/skirt and dark shoes. Senior pupils are expected to wear a purple blazer and a purple tie - both of which display the school logo and the motto - "Learning the key."

Roll

2010/2011 - 915 pupils 2011/2012 - 895 pupils 2012/2013 - 906 pupils

The School Day

The school day starts at 8:50 where the pupils meet in their "Tutor support groups" to get registered. Each period apart from 1 and 2 last 55 minutes with period 1 and 2 lasting 50.

There are two bells at lunch, one at 13:45 to signify the end of lunch and one at 13:50 to signify the start of period 5. Similarly with registration, there is a bell at 08:50 to tell pupils to head to registration, then there is a second bell at 08:55 to signify that registration has started. On days of assembly, the doors to the assembly hall are closed after the 08:55 bell.

Senior Management

Catchment area

The school serves most of the local communities around Kinross shire. Schools that are in the catchment area are:

• Kinross Primary School
• Milnathort Primary School
• Portmoak Primary School
• Fossoway Primary School
• Cleish Primary School
• Blairingone Primary School
• Arngask Primary School (as of 2013)

Lunch

There are many options for lunch in the campus. Many pupils choose to head down the street into Kinross and buy lunch at Sainsburys or Baynes. Most however stay in and have five different options for lunch.

• Food to Go
• Pre order
• Baguette Bar
• Fast Food
• Hot meals

The hot meal section is where the pupils can buy hot food things like curry, fish and chips or baked potatoes. The pre order facility is when the pupils choose what they want at break and then they pick up their lunch in a bag when lunch comes. They have a variety of sandwiches, baguettes and wraps to choose from with various different fillings. The fast food sells things like burgers, pizza or paninis. The baguette bar sells various baguettes in different sizes with the option of different fillings. It also sells wraps and rolls. Finally, the food to go sells items similar to the fast food option, although they sell pre made wraps. The Food to Go is the only facility that you can buy food from out of school hours in which you can buy various chocolate bars or energy drinks. The pupils can also buy items of food out the vending machine.

There has been a push to use a cashless system in which the pupils can top up their lunch card whenever they want and add money again when it's all been spent. This is favoured by the school as it's much quicker to pay and there is much less change needed in the tills. There is still the option to pay by cash, but the staff are often reluctant to take notes over £5.

Facilities

The High School is located in Loch Leven Community Campus which helps try to bring the community together. As a result, many of the services that used to be offered in Kinross have now been moved into the campus. The library is now located near the main entrance. This allows the public to borrow books but also allows pupils to borrow books for their classes. It also provides an areas for the pupils to study on their free periods and other classes to use the IT facilities. There are also various meeting rooms throughout the campus which are available to hire. There is also a new climbing wall used for extra curricular clubs after school. There are now three main PE halls and a gym. The three halls include a large games hall, a smaller games hall and a dance studio. Each hall has the facility to play music through the speakers and the games hall has a large scoreboard if rival teams are playing against each other.

There are also new outdoor pitches. The MUGA (Multi Use Games Area) is used to play sports like basketball, tennis and hockey. There is also a football pitch and a larger pitch used for games, running and rugby.

Exam Arrangements

Fourth year pupils who are sitting their standard grades sit their preliminary examinations after the November in-service days which are usually half way through. Pupils doing Intermediate 1, 2, Higher or Advanced Higher sit their prelims after the February half term. All years have two weeks of study leave in which they're expected to make use of their time by studying or catching up on coursework either in school or at home. Pupils aren't allowed to use the facilities like the gym or library while they are on exam leave.

At the beginning of May, pupils sit their final examinations which are assessed by the Scottish Qualifications Authority These usually start at the end of April and usually run into a few days of June. Fourth years generally get their study leave earlier than the seniors since their exams usually start earlier as they have eight subjects as opposed to five or four.

The exams are usually done in rooms around the school, however the main exam hall is the assembly hall which has the capacity for about 150 pupils to sit an exam at the same time. In the case of the class being too large or having two exams running simultaneously, some pupils sit their exams in classrooms or in the activity meeting space. For those with extra time, they sit their exams in the support area so they are not disturbed by pupils finishing their exams earlier.

Security Issues

Since the school is now located in a campus, it means that members of the public are allowed to enter the building at the same time as the pupils. Before the move into the new school, many questions were raised about the pupils' security. As a result, there has been a large push to make sure that pupils wear official school uniform rather than jackets or hoodies. Most of the pupils are instantly recognized by the purple blazer. Every pupil is also given a Young Scot Card which allows them to pay for their lunch and access most parts of the building without getting a member of staff to let them in. This means that there are areas in which only the pupils are allowed in and members of the public are not - the teaching block for example where the majority of classes are held.

External links

• Kinross High School's page on Scottish Schools Online
• Kinross High School website

Notes