Parent Council

Next Parent Council meeting on 4 June 2025

21 May 2025: The next meeting of the James Gillespie’s High School Parent Council will be held on Wednesday 4 June at 7 pm in the school library.

All parents and carers are most warmly welcome to join this last meeting for the current academic year.

If you have any questions or issues that you would like to raise ahead of the meeting, please get in touch with the PC by email:

Email the Parent Council

Agenda

  • Focus on Maths teaching at JGHS – Miss Dolan, CL Maths
  • Report and updates from the Parent Council, including:
    • capacity and rising rolls
    • finance and fundraising
  • Discussion of issues with particular relevance to S1-S3
  • Headteachers update, including reports on Short Life Working Groups on mobile phones, communications and homework – Neil McCallum
  • Q&A

Reports from meeting on 25 March 2025

Information from the last meeting held online on 25 March

Reports from PC meeting on 25 March 2025

25 March 2025: Many thanks to those who joined the Parent Council meeting this Tuesday.

Agenda

  • Health and Wellbeing – Inclusion X – Ian Porter and Anna Kirkwood
  • Comment from Tracy Urquhart, Senior Manager Quality Improvement Officer, CEC
  • Update from the JGHS Parent Council
  • Headteacher’s report
  • Q&A

Meeting recording

Watch the meeting recording (opens on YouTube)

Summary of meeting discussion (from transcipt, opens as pdf)

Presentations

Inclusion X suport at JGHS (Anna Kirkwood and Ian Porter, opens as pdf)

PC report 25 March 2025 (Hilary Snaith, co-chair; opens as pdf)

Finance update 25 March 2025 (Kirstin Leighton, treasurer; opens as pdf)

Headteacher’s report 25 March 2025 (opens as pdf)

Policy documents

The headteacher mentioned a number of school policy documents in his comments. You can access a range of these policies on the JGHS website:

JGHS policy documents

Next meeting

The next meeting of the Parent Council will be on Wednesday 4 June in the school library at 7 pm – all parents and carers are very welcome to join us.

Parent Council meeting 25 March 2025

The next meeting of the JGHS Parent Council will be on Tuesday 25 March at 7 pm. The meeting will be held online via MS Teams – the link will be shared via the school email.

All parents and carers are most warmly welcome to join us.

Agenda

  • Update from the Parent Council
  • Headteacher’s report, HT Mr McCallum
  • Health and Wellbeing / Inclusion X at JGHS, DHT Mr Porter
  • Q&A

If you have any questions that you would like to see addressed, please contact the PC by email. It will also be possible to ask questions via the Q&A during the meeting.

Email the Parent Council

Have your say – HMIE inspection

4 February 2025: As you will have seen already, JGHS will be visited by inspectors from Education Scotland in the week of Monday 24 February 2025.  

As part of the preparation for the inspection, all parents and carers have been sent the link to a survey about their experiences with the school.

Parent and carer survey

This is an important opportunity to have your voice heard about the issues that matter most to you, so please do take the time to complete the survey and leave your comments.

Please note that all responses must be submitted by Friday 7 February.

The inspectors will also be meeting with the parent council during their visit, and will be particularly interested to discuss:

  • how well the school works in partnership with parents and carers;
  • how well the school keeps parents and carers informed of progress of their children’s learning;
  • examples of how parents and carers work with the school to support children’s/young people’s learning

If you have any comments about these matters that you would like to share with the PC, please do contact us by email.

Please send us any feedback by Monday 17 February so that we can collate the responses.

Many thanks!

Email the Parent Council

Update to SQA exam timetable for 2025

3 February 2025: The SQA issued a revision to the exam timetable for this year on Monday 3 February.

The revision includes a number of alterations to the dates of presentations, including a new date for Higher Psychology, which will now take place on Friday 25 April, rather than Wednesday 7 May, as previously. Higher English remains on Wednesday 7 May.

Full details of the new schedule are now available.

SQA Timetable 2025 (opens as a pf)

Information provided to Daniel Johnson MSP, and forwarded to the Parent Council shows that in the new timetable:

  • the number of coincident exams has decreased by 47%
  • the number of occasions where learners sit two exams in one day has decreased by
    38%
  • there are now nine days where 100% of learners have one exam a day (up from
    eight)

Related info

Letters sent by the PC to the SQA and others requesting timetable revision, and responses received, are available on the Deputations page

PC deputations and campaigns

Report from Parent Council meeting 29 January 2025

30 January 2025: Many thanks to those who were able to join the meeting of the Parent Council on Wednesday 29 January.

We were joined by Headteacher Mr Neil McCallum, Science Curriculum Lead Mr Iain Coltart, and CEC Councillors Steve Burgess and Pauline Flannery.

The meeting discussed a number of issues including:

  • concerns about rising rolls and school capacity, and recent engagement with the City of Edinburgh Council
  • co-scheduling of SQA Higher exams in English and Psychology
  • presentation by Iain Coltart about the delivery of science teaching and S1-S6 pupil pathways

Added 5 February 2025: The minutes of the meeting are now available:

Minutes from JGHS parent council meeting 29 January 2025 (opens as a pdf)

Presentations available

The presentations by Mr Coltart and the PC Co-chair, the finance update from the Parent Council, and the Headteacher’s report are available now:

Parent Council report and comments, 29 January 2025

Science teaching at JGHS, January 2025

Parent Council finance update, January 2025

Headteachers report

Due to lack of time during the meeting, Mr Mr Callum shared a written report with responses to a number of issues raised by the PC, including:

  • SQA exam diet – Higher English and Psychology
  • Capacity engagement
  • English texts
  • S1 residential
  • Pupil bulletin
  • Double periods
  • Streaming
  • Reporting
  • SLWG on phones, homework and communications
  • School news

Headteacher’s report 29 January 2025

Links to recent deputations to the City of Edinburgh Council about school capacity, and the letter to Daniel Johnson MSP and others about the SQA timetable are also available:

Parent Council deputations

Update 3 February: the Parent Council is pleased to note the revision to the SQA timetable published today, which has addresed the issue of co-scheduling of Higher English and Psychology.

Update to SQA timetable for 2025

Next meeting

The next meeting of the Parent Council will be on Tuesday 25 March at 7 pm, and will be held online.

We will hear from DHT Mr Ian Porter about the health and well-being support provided for pupils and JGHS.

Parent Council meeting on 29 January 2025

24 January 2025: The Parent Council meeting will be held this week on Wednesday 29 January at 7 pm in the school library – all parents and carers are most warmly invited to join with us.

Agenda

  • Update on Parent Council activities, including:
    • Capacity and rising rolls at JGHS
    • SQA scheduling of Higher English and Psychology
    • CEC Inclusion review
  • Finance report – PC Treasurer
  • Delivery of the science curriculum at JGHS – Science Curriculum leads 
  • School updates – Neil McCallum (HT)
  • Q&A

Due to availability of school staff, the planned presentation about inclusion, health and well-being support at the school has been moved to the meeting in March. 

As always, if you have any points/questions/concerns that you would like to raise with the Parent Council, please contact us by email:

Email the Parent Council

Parent Council Finance Report

Summary of PC budget 29 January 2025

Letters and deputations

Recent communications sent by the PC to Council officers about rising rolls, SQA timetabling and other issues can be accessed below:

Parent Council documents and papers

Previous Parent Council meetings in AY2024/25

Parent Council meeting 26 November 2024

Parent Council AGM 9 October 2024

Parent Council meeting 10 September 2024

Happy New Year 2025!

9 January 2025: Happy New Year, and welcome to 2025!

The first Parent Council meeting of 2025 wil be held on Wednesday 29 January at 7 pm in the JGHS library.

in addition to the usual updates from the Parent Council, and the Headteacher’s report, the main item on the agenda will be a presentation and discussion with Mrs Nikki Graham about the support for pupil health and well-being in the school. This will also touch on the new Inclusion policies from the City of Edinburgh Council.

All parents and carers are most warmly invited to join us.

If you have any questions that you would like to raise in advnace of the meeting, please do get in touch:

Email the Parent Council

Presentations from November meeting of Parent Council

26 November 2024: Many thanks to those who joined the online meeting of the Parent Council.

The meeting heard an update on recent activities by the Parent Council, a presentation by DHT Nigel Cotter on the SQA exam results at JGHS in 2024, and a report from HT Neil McCallum.

The presentations from the meeting, and the link to the meeting recording on YouTube are now available.

James Gillespie’s High School Parent Council meeting, 26 November 2024 (opens on YouTube)

Parent Council November 2024 update (opens as pdf)

SQA results at JGHS (opens as pdf)

Headteacher update November 2024 (opens as pdf)

If you have outstanding questions that were not addressed by the meeting, please let us know.

Email the Parent Council