Big Bosbury Hellos and Big Bosbury Goodbyes!

The Bosbury School staff list has changed quite a bit over the last few months, and so we felt it would be the ideal time to give a very warm welcome to several new faces, as well as wish some very big Bosbury goodbyes to members of staff who have left us for pastures new.

Firstly, we welcome our brand new Deputy Headteacher Mrs. Haylee Roberts, who joined the Bosbury family at the start of the 2023/24 academic year.

Mrs. Roberts made it through a gruelling interview process back in the summer with our Headteacher Mrs. McManus, having only being appointed Head herself in recent months, also being interviewed by the school governors and, perhaps the toughest test of all, answering a range of questions posed by our very professional team of young school councillors!

Our new Deputy Head joins us from Trinity Primary School in Hereford, a three-form entry school considerably bigger than our own where she taught for twelve years across several year groups in the primary range, leading in curriculum development and also taking up the post of Assistant Headteacher.

Mrs. Roberts has lived in Ledbury all her life, currently living with her husband and daughter. They enjoy spending time together as a family, heading out for family days and spending weekends at dance lessons, visiting friends and family, and going out on long walks with their dog!

Mrs. Roberts feels extremely privileged to have been appointed as Deputy Head of Bosbury, which she describes as: "A wonderful school with pupils who have made me feel extremely welcome." She is looking forward to learning more about the children and their families, and, in recognising the many amazing events already going on at Bosbury, she is very excited about supporting the continued development of our school.

Mrs. Roberts is passionate about equipping children with the necessary skills to allow them to be lifelong learners, and is looking forward to working with all stakeholders in order to embed the vision which the staff have for all of the pupils at Bosbury.

Mrs. Roberts visited us over the coming weeks before the summer holidays to familiarise herself with the daily runnings of Bosbury School and all of our wonderful children and families, and is already becoming extremely well-acquainted with the very lovely new Class 4!

We wish our new Deputy Head all possible success and happiness as she embraces her exciting new roles at Bosbury!

It was a bittersweet end however to the first half of the Summer Term last year, as we waved a very fond farewell to popular and long-serving member of staff Mr. Paul Smith.

Mr. Smith joined us way back in the year twenty thousand and thirteen, and since then he has been a familiar and friendly face in the morning to the hundreds of children who have passed through the Key Stage 2 gate, welcoming each and every pupil with their own personal greeting in order to start their day off with a smile!

Mr. Smith has also been known for his varied range of outfits on World Book Days, being on backing track duties with the trusty school speaker during many church services and Sports Days, and has raised the bar of quality staff break time cuisine to levels even outstripping those of Mr. Ponter with his familiar and extremely healthy (?) Ginsters Cornish Pasties and Rustlers Burgers!

Bosbury's resident fashion guru of the last ten years will also be remembered for his signature grey cardigan, which we dearly wanted to frame and proudly display in the school hall as part of Bosbury folklore, but in the end we had to respect his wish to dispose of this famous item of clothing to enable him to fully move on from Bosbury!

And we will indeed miss Mr. Smith hugely as he makes the move back to Manchester to spend more time with his parents. The many tears during his final assembly, which saw a slideshow of his time at Bosbury compiled by Mr. Ponter and a lovely poem written by Mrs. Dark being read out by the staff, are testament to how much he and his brilliant sense of humour was loved by pupils and staff alike; not to mention the affectionate (and very loud!) chants of "MIS-TER SMITH! MIS-TER SMITH!" which echoed around the hall during his last day at Bosbury!

As Mr. Smith poignantly stated during his final special assembly:

"You [the pupils] are the most important thing in school. Because without you, the school would be just an empty, lifeless husk."

We wish Mr. Smith all the very best for his new chapter, taking with him a wonderful hamper full of goodies and 'beverages', kindly put together by Mrs. Bolton from donations, and if he ever misses us while up north, we are sure the countless cards, messages of goodwill and further gifts from children and parents will give him great comfort.

Goodbye Mr. Smith - it has indeed been a 'pleash'!

The end of the last school year also saw us wave goodbye to two other very popular members of staff, Mrs. Lauren Baker and Mr. Owen Handy.

Mrs. Baker joined us just after Christmas and has been hugely-loved by Class 2, teaching them on Thursdays and Fridays over two terms and leading many exciting classroom projects with our older Key Stage 1 children. 

She leaves us to soon add a second child to her family, and we wish mum and baby all the best when it comes to the big day! Class 2 will be taught by the dream team of Mrs. Wilesmith and Mrs. Symonds from September.

Mr. Handy joined us around the time the Covid-19 pandemic was still affecting our lives at the start of 2021, with his enormous enthusiasm for sport and brilliant sense of humour quickly endearing him to our returning pupils.

Mr. Handy's lively and engaging PE lessons have been a huge inspiration to Bosbury School children, with his coaching and guidance also proving extremely valuable during many cluster school tournaments as he has also been instrumental in helping to develop the ever-popular Bosbury School Sports Day, including the inclusion of the brand new oval relay which we are sure will now a remain a permanent fixture at the climax of perhaps our school's most competitive annual event.

And as two doors close, two more open as we welcome both Miss Lucy Guest and Mr. Charlie Duffett to our school this year.

Miss Guest begins working in Class 4 as an SEN Teaching Assistant, and is already proving very popular with our Year 4 and 5 pupils with her very calm and friendly nature. Being extremely tech-savvy, Mrs. McManus was also very quick to ask her to set up Bosbury School's first ever Facebook and Instagram pages - be sure to check them out as they start to develop and gain followers!

Finally, Mr. Duffett, also from the Kidderminster Harriers Foundation follows in the footsteps of Mr. Handy in taking PE lessons at school. Pupils are already enjoying his competitive football and tag rugby games, as well as his brilliant new after school sports clubs and indoor activities for when the weather inevitably turns sour at times over the coming months!

We hope that Miss Guest and Mr. Duffett continue to enjoy working with the fantastic team and amazing pupils here at Bosbury. We are always here to help, so if something is confusing or bothering you, please don't hesitate to get in touch through our Headteacher Mrs. McManus at head@bosbury.hereford.sch.uk, or through either of our school administrators Mrs. Bentley or Mrs. Bolton at admin@bosbury.hereford.sch.uk, or by phone on (01531) 640276.