School

JGHS bookdrive fundraiser

7 December 2025: The Parent Council’s Small Sums Fund distributes funds raised by the school back to the School Community. 

Small Sums Fund

English reading circles for S1 and S2

This year we have been raising funds to buy books that will support pupils in S1 and S2 to (re)discover a love for reading and literature, in reading circles in English classes.

The English curriculum team have develped a fantastic list of books across all genres that small groups of pupils can get together to read and discuss. Titles include books from mystery and detective fiction, contemporary fiction, adventure, comedy, graphic novels, thrillers, and science and historical fiction – truly something for everyone.

The funds raised will buy packs of 5 copies of the same book, so that all pupils in a reading circle will have a copy to take home and read.

To make the funds go as far as possible, we are buying pre-owned, as well as new books. We have already bought sets of Nancy Springer’s “Enola Holmes – the Missing Marquess”, Katherine Rundell’s “The Explorer”, and Malorie Blackman’s “Robot Girl”.

Please support if you can

We are working with the James Gillespie’s Trust, a registered charity, so that we can claim gift-aid on any donations made, and make the funds go even further.

JGHS bookdrive fundraiser – Justgiving

If you are able to donate, please visit the Trust’s justgiving page – all the funds that come through this appeal will go directly to buying books that will go into school.

Many thanks!!

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

Welcome to the new S1 students

17 June 2024. It was great to see so many of the parents of the incoming S1 students at the P7/S1 transition event at JGHS today.

A copy of the slides presented by our co-chair Hilary Snaith are available below. They give information about the role of the Parent Council at JGHS, some details about the activities we have been engaged with over the past year, and information about how you can get invovled.

Welcome to the JGHS Parent Council (opens as pdf)

Our first meeting of the new session will be Tuesday 3 September – we hope to see you there!

If you have any questions at all, or if you have feedback you would like to share, please get in touch by email:

Email the Parent Council

The Chat: parental engagement about relationships, sexual health and parenthood

27 October 2023: Healthy Respect – NHS partners who provide training on relationships, sexual health and parenthood (RSHP) – are setting up a new parental engagement project looking to find out what parents and carers want and need to support their child’s learning around RSHP.

A coalition of NHS Boards commissioned independent research to explore with parents and carers a number of themes, including:

  • How they support their child’s learning at home in terms of RSHP topics
  • What they know and think about the RSHP learning going on at school
  • How they want home and school to work together (so that children and young people get the best learning experiences)
  • What would help parents and carers at home in their role as their child’s teacher on all these matters.

The new project that has been developed from this is called The Chat:

Visit The Chat website

There are a number of ways that parents/carers can get involved. The first opportunity is to be part of a group conversation about this area of learning. Please see the Chat website for more information.

JGHS School Improvement Plan 2023/24

26 September 2023: Following on from the last meeting of the Parent Council on 5 September, the School Improvement Plan for 2023/24 is now available. The plan covers five key priorities:

  • Leadership of Change
  • Curriculum
  • Learning, Teaching and Assessment
  • Ensuring Wellbeing, Equality and Inclusion
  • Raising Attainment and Achievement

You can download the full plan, and the summary of priorities at the links below:

JGHS School Improvement Plan 2023/24 (opens as pdf)

JGHS School Improvement Plan 2023/24 Priorities (opens as pdf)

Inaugural Donald J Macdonald Kindness Awards presented

18 September 2023: Sixteen pupils nominated for the inagural Donald J Macdonald Kindness Awards. All were outstanding nominations and were richly deserving of winning the award. However, the pupils detailed below had mutiple nominations from staff across the school and were awarded the prizes this year. 

The prize was set up by the JGHS Parent Council through the many donations made to celebrate the retirement of the former headteacher Donald J Macdonald in June 2022.

Goodbye to Mr Macdonald

The pupils receiving the awards were given a glass pendant and certificate the to mark the occasion.

Rosa Connolly – S3 

A foreign student spoke with a member of staff because they felt that they had no friends. They mentioned this to the student named above and they befriended the student and arranged a weekly lunch date together. They would have organised more lunches, but the students were at Darroch on other days.

The foreign student left JGHS this summer, to return home. However, they have swapped numbers and will keep in touch and a friendship has been established for life. Rosa has shown this level of kindness to a number of pupils and sought to make sure that they feel valued and included. 

Kyle Balfour – S3

Kyle has been receiving treatment for cancer for several years. He had been granted a wish from ‘Make a wish’ foundation. When he found out that a mum didn’t get granted a wish due to being an adult. Kyle wanted to let her make a wish instead of him to make her feel better. This was granted and the lady got the experience of a lifetime. 

When Kyle was in SFL another pupil was very upset and visibly distressed. Staff were working with the pupil to try and calm them down. Without any prompting, Kyle went to the cupboard, got a game, went over to the pupil and said, “do you want a game”. Within minutes the pupil was calm, then Kyle had them interacting and laughing and playing the game with him. This is how he approaches all young people and looks to support them. 

Lennox Walker – S5

He is one of the kindest pupils I have ever met. He is always willing to help those around him and is nice to everyone he meets. Although I have only ever taught him when covering a class, he always comes out of his way to ask how myself and the others in the department are. Despite what he has been through he is so positive and kind. He comes in with Adam, Oscar and Dharun to work on his basketball and he always is so grateful for allowing him to do this and he has improved so much. He is so polite and just genuinely lovely and a really deserving person to win the award. He also helps with junior basketball on Mondays which the S1s love and he is an excellent role model for them and all that he is involved with in the school community. 

Farra Dunn – S6

Farra has overcome many challenges over the past few years and yet has consistently shown kindness to others less fortunate than herself.

Farra currently works weekly in a voluntary capacity with children with a range of complex social, emotional, and behavioural needs despite facing challenges and adversity in her own daily life. Farra is an outstanding young person and is richly deserving of this award for the kindness she shows daily towards others. She is an excellent role model and works to look after others in our school community and beyond.