In light of the weather warnings and the advice from Scottish Government of major disruption to travel arrangements a decision has been taken to close all South Ayrshire schools tomorrow, Thursday 1st March.  
 
We anticipate that schools will re-open as normal on Friday,  please check the school website and Twitter account @Marrcolofficial for updates.

We like to celebrate student success in every part of their lives here at Marr.  We were recently notified by a parent of success our pupils had outside of school.  Jenna and Eve Beswick both competed today at the Scottish Indoor Athletics Championships and represented Ayr Seaforth U13 Girls at the 4x 200 m relay. They won the Gold Medal and also achieved a Club Record. (K Beswick, 25th February)

We are delighted that the girls achieved such fabulous results at a national championship and are happy to celebrate this success with them. Here they are pictured with their teammates.

We would also like to remind parents and pupils to keep us informed of all success our pupils have, whether in school or with local clubs. 

Style and File Marr Nail Bar has been going for three short weeks . The Nail Bar consists of twelve pupils in third year of school, and they attend the Nail Bar for two periods a week on a Wednesday afternoon. The afternoon flies in, and the pupils are engaged the whole time.
We are focusing on customer care and have a strong and positive work ethic promoting a positive attitude in the work place for our young people. Already in this short period of time the pupils are enjoying themselves, and are beginning to show a positive attitude towards each other and the Nail Bar. They are planning out the look of the Nail Bar and working hard on budgeting and getting value for money. The have picked their own name and have been positive in promoting a praise culture in Style and File. Pupils who previously did not like each other are now working together and are building positive relationships with each other as well as with member of staff who drop in to get their nails done.
They had their picture taken for the local paper today as they were being presented with a cheque for the Nail Bar from DYW Ayrshire. The pupils had made big effort to dress smart ,wear their uniform and were very proud of their involvement in Style and File.

ICAEW BASE CHALLENGE – ROUND 2!
 
Well done to all the students who successfully completed round 1 of the Institute of Accounting for England and Wales (ICAEW) BASE Challenge! The following students have been successful in progressing to round 2. The first name in each team has been nominated as the captain and will be responsible for registering the team. Students can complete the game any time before 8 March 2018, and do not need to complete the task in one sitting. The top 48 teams from across the UK will win the chance to compete in the National Final in Birmingham to win prizes, such as, individual laptops.
 
There is also the chance to win additional prizes throughout the Challenge. Students can take a group photo depicting what they think chartered accountants may look like and share it on social media with the hashtag #BASE2018. ICAEW will be awarding the team with the most likes and shares on Facebook and Twitter a team experience day of their choice! So if you see any on Twitter it would be a great help if you could like and share. Good to luck to all the teams – for more information please see Miss Wyllie in Business Education.

You may remember our previous post about the community competition to design a logo for Dementia Friendly Troon and Surrounding Villages.  We are very happy to make the following announcement:

Over the past few months, various individuals and organisations have been working on developing Troon, Loans and Dundonald as one Dementia friendly community.  The aim was to raise awareness in our towns and villages, providing training to staff within our shops and businesses, in schools, organising regular events and leisure opportunities for people with dementia and their carers.  Central to this was engaging the whole community and particularly to involve our young people in supporting our older citizens.
 
The Group required a logo to be displayed in shops and business which have undergone training, welcoming people with Dementia into their premises.  The logo will be used on leaflets, letterheads, the website, it will be on show in shop fronts and business premises. 
 
The judges chose a winner from all of the Logo Competition entries and we are delighted to say that the winning entry was designed by Marr pupil Jodi Hainey!
 
Her wonderful dandelion image was chosen to be used around Troon and surrounding villages in supporting and welcoming people with Dementia into their premises. Jodi along with Emily McCalmont who was presented with second place, received prizes, certificates and thank you letters for their hard work on the project. 

What a fantastic achievement for Jodi.  We do hope that you enjoy seeing this logo start to be displayed locally. 

We have a new project here at Marr College that was officially opened recently
The new enterprise, ‘Creation Station’ allows students to invent and then produce all manner of hot drinks and smoothies, the baristas then serve the drinks to customers.  South Ayrshire Council has been working with the Prince's Trust and Developing Young Workforce Ayrshire (DYW) to get the business up and running.
£7,130 has been invested in the scheme by the Prince's Trust Development Awards (through the Cash Back for Communities programme) and DYW Ayrshire with the funds used to buy equipment vital to make this new enterprise a success.  A further £5,640 of funding has been provided to set up a nail bar appropriately named “Style and File” which will be launched in May.
 
Ayrshire College is also helping by training the young people so they’re ready when the customers start rolling in.

Councillor William Grant, Lifelong Learning Portfolio Holder for South Ayrshire Council said: "These projects are ideal, not only do they provide practical experience which the young people can use when they leave school, they also build confidence and transferrable skills.  There is a lot of emphasis on academic achievement in schools but practical experience can be important too. There is a thriving hospitality sector in and around Troon so this training could be vital as a gateway to employment.”

The young people at Marr College will hopefully take part in more of these initiatives going forward.
Jamie Kerr (14) S3 said:” I want to be a mechanic but I will be dealing with customers so this experience will help me. We have already served Troon Rotary Club who came to the school and we are getting really good.”
Emily McCalmont (14) S3 said: “This will give me more confidence to deal with people. My maths will also get better as we need to set prices and cost supplies”

Claire Baird, DYW Ayrshire Project Executive said “We are absolutely delighted to support such an innovative project and are very impressed by the way the project has been implemented with the full involvement of the young people.”
 
Walter Smith, Prince’s Trust Ayrshire Chair said: “The “Creation Station” project will develop the core skills that potential employers are looking for in young people including confidence, communication, commitment, customer services and courtesy.”

Graeme Hobson, Acting Head Teacher at Marr College said: "Improving customer care skills could make a big difference to those taking part. They are also learning how to set up and run a business which is inspirational.  I’m looking forward to the nail bar launching in May as we give even more of our young people the chance to succeed beyond the classroom."

As part of the support for our cluster primaries, we will be having a fundraising day this Friday.  One of our cluster chaplains, Richard Woods, is currently over in Haiti working to build a school. As part of our commitment to RRSA and Unicef, each school in the Marr cluster has been asked to raise a minimum of £150 to support the “Classroom in a Box” initiative which will see 8 classrooms in the new school being given basic supplies to allow education to start in the new building.
 
Please bring home baking, money to buy home baking and wear something blue with their uniform to support this initiative. Home baking will be sold by senior pupils at the Barista area, to promote the launch.

Following the Careers and Options evening tonight pupils can access all curriculum booklets on our dedicated curriculum options page if they have lost the copy they were issued with.

Following the invitation letter which parents received last week, we can now confirm the programme for this evenings careers and options night. It is open to all our student in S2-S5. 

Below you  will find the list of over thirty businesses/organisations who will be in attendance, and all are eager to meet our young people and discuss their options for future careers. We hope to see as many of our  students and parents as possible this evening.  Please do not hesitate to contact the school if you have any queries.

Special Delivery!
 
Our S3 Administration class worked on a festive project in conjunction with Troon Primary and Santa in December 2017. The class produced personalised letters from Santa to Primary 3 students, as we all know how busy Santa is during December.
 
The P3 classes worked hard on writing their letters to Santa - telling him a bit about their siblings, pets, what they want for Christmas etc. They made a lovely job of decorating their envelopes! In return our S3 Administration students used their Word Processing and Access database skills to complete a mail merge -  producing a personalised letter for each Troon Primary student. These were delivered in festive envelopes with a Santa sticker enclosed for each child. The class were even trying to convince Miss Wyllie to let them hand deliver the letters dressed as elves! A big thank you to Mrs Roan from Troon Primary for her help coordinating the project.

(Apologies from the newsdesk - this feature should have been reported in December.)