12th September 2025 Dear Parent Carers, Weekly Update: 12/09/25 I am delighted to welcome all students and staff back to St Martins School for the new academic year. I hope that you have all had a good summer and feel refreshed and ready for the year ahead. I am really excited to start my journey as Headteacher at St Martins. For those of you who are new to St Martins, we compile a ‘weekly update’ to share news, information and updates from across the school, Post-16 and Project SEARCH. We hope that you find them useful. Term dates for the year are included with every update to support with planning, and key dates are shared every half term too. Staffing Updates In addition to my new role as Headteacher at St Martins, there have been some other staffing and leadership changes to support our ever growing and developing school. Rachel Cooper is remaining as Assistant Headteacher, but will also deputise as Headteacher in my absence. Leigh Bradder, our Design Technology teacher has taken on the role of Assistant Headteacher for Teaching and Learning, and his teaching role is being covered by supply teacher, Jo Woodhall. Our Post-16 team is now being led by new Assistant Headteacher, Liz Sanger. Liz previously worked for the Respect Schools as a Headteacher for their Kingsmead site. We are excited for Liz to join us and establish our new Post-16 site, Friar Gate Studios. We are joined by two new teachers – Sarah Cavell and Hannah Parkes. Sarah is also our new Cultural Capital Faculty Lead. Our Learning Mentor team has been strengthened by two new Learning Mentors, William Fell and Morgan Stanley. The Classroom support team has one new Teaching Assistant – Sarah Beatty, and two new Classroom Assistants – Paul Nelson and Virginia Wong. Last but not least, our Admin Team has been joined by Joanna Whittle who works closely alongside Heather, our SENCO, to help administrate the Annual Review process. I hope that you will join me in extending a warm welcome to all of our new team members!
Toni Beardmore Headteacher St Martins School, The Derwent Campus, Bracknell Drive, Alvaston, Derby, DE24 0BT Tel: 01332 571151 Email: admin@stmartins.set.org Online: www.stmartinsschoolderby.co.uk The Shaw Education Trust Limited is a company limited by guarantee, registered in England (no 09067175) Registered address: Shaw Education Trust, Kidsgrove Secondary School, Gloucester Road, Kidsgrove, ST7 4DL. The details of our academies registered as business names can be found at www.shaweducation.org.uk.