Ysgol Eirias

Eirias High School

Motto	Inspiring Learning
Prifathro	Phil McTague
Chair of Governors	Kerry Jones
Founder	Mr P Dodd
Location	Ffordd Eirias Colwyn Bay Conwy LL29 7SP Wales
Local authority	Conwy
DfE URN	401689 Tables
Staff	115
Students	1535 [2].
Ages	11–18
Houses	Llywelyn Hawks, Gwynedd Falcons, Glyndwr Eagles & Madog Kites
Colours	Maroon
Website	Ysgol Eirias

Eirias High School is a secondary school situated in Colwyn Bay, in Conwy county borough, North Wales. The school has approx 1600 pupils and over 120 teachers and staff. The school’s name is derived from its location, the grounds of Eirias Park. Its modern facilities include up-to-date science laboratories, modern computing facilities, and a high-speed school internet network. The current headteacher is Phil McTague, who took over from Clive Hampton in 2006. A new building was opened in October 2009.

About Eirias High School

The school operates in a climate of rigorous self-evaluation and constantly measures itself against the most demanding benchmarks. The school is extremely well resourced and situated on the headland overlooking the beautiful North Wales coast surrounded by the impressive 130 acre Eirias Park.

Estyn states 'the school provides pupils with care, support and guidance of exceptional quality.’

Eirias High School is at the forefront of new technologies in the curriculum and has recently introduced many new initiatives to support the teachers in their delivery of the curriculum and students in their learning.

A vast amount of care and attention is directed at the transition phase into Year 7 to help the new children settle into school life at Eirias.

Eirias High School is one of the top performing schools in Wales, as assessed by the Welsh Government, taking into account the academic performance of the school, the attendance of its students and the relative improvement over recent years in comparison to similar schools in Wales.

In their last inspection in 2009, ESTYN said that ‘standards in the Sixth Form are outstanding’ and ‘In addition to the exemplary leadership of the Headteacher, a major contributory factor to the school’s effectiveness is the exceptionally high standard of teaching which impacts positively on pupils’ and students’ learning.'

School Life

Houses

Eirias High School has four Houses. The houses are each named after a Prince of Wales adjoined to the name of a bird. Glyndwr Eagles, Llewelyn Hawks, Madog Kites and Gwynedd Falcons. Students are assigned to a House when joining the school based on their form group, and stay in that house throughout their school career. Each house is assigned colour, yellow, blue, red and green respectively for Eagles, Hawks, Kites and Falcons. There are many interhouse competitions for sports and art.

Uniform

At Eirias High School all students are required to wear full and correct uniform. There are two separate designated uniforms, one for Years 7-11 and one for the Sixth form, as well as regulations on PE kit.

In years 7-11 students must wear black trousers or a black skirt, a white shirt or blouse and a maroon jumper bearing the school crest, black school shoes, black or white socks. A wide variety of ties are worn by students.

• Most commonly, the standard year 7-11 tie, which is black with silver and maroon stripes, and a thinner stripe in the student's respective house colour.
• The Sports Colour, which is a black tie with a thick diagonal stripe in the students' house colour with a circular dragon and the initials EHS in black in the middle
• The Music Tie, which is awarded by the music department to students who have shown commitment to extra-curricular music in school and represented the County. The tie includes a large, diagonal stripe with the dragon and initials, as shown on the sports tie, and a staff pattern bearing a treble clef underneath.

One of the school rules that prohibits the wearing of outdoor clothes attracted press attention during the local cold spell in Dec 2010.

PE Kit bears the school crest, and must be purchased through the school, and consists of a while polo short bearing the crest and white shorts for indoor activities, a red/black rugby short, long black socks and black shorts for boys and black jogging bottoms or games skirt and a red sweatshirt for girls for outdoor activities.

Sixth form uniform is identical to the uniform worn by students in year 7-11, except with a black jumper and sixth form tie. The sixth form tie is similar to the sports tie, except the diagonal stripe bearing the dragon emblem is an outline and is not filled solidly.

Controversies

YouTube Data Protection Breach

In December 2010, a teacher at the school uploaded a video onto a school-owned account on the video-sharing website YouTube. The video was a screen recording of him demonstrating using the school's management system to record a behaviour incident, and included the name, home address, parents' contact details, photograph and confidential records of attendance and behaviour for a year 11 boy at the school.

The video went unnoticed until January 31, 2011, when complaints were submitted by an anonymous individual simultaneously to the school's governors, Conwy County Borough Council education authority, General Teaching Council for Wales, Department for Education and the Information Commissioner's Office; the video was removed. Local television covered the story heavily and the boy's family received an apology and the investigation by the ICO resulted in a formal warning on the condition the school improved its data security arrangements.

Mass exclusion of year 11 students

On 22 May 2014, the day before year 11 students were due to finish, all year 11 students were told they must not return to school for their final day. Local press described the incident as leaving school "finishing on a sour note".