Robert Thirsk High School

The Robert Thirsk High School is named after the famous Canadian Astronaut. It is Calgary's newest school, having been recently opened in September 2013. The school started with 850 Yr 10 & 11 students, 850 in total but with a capacity of 1500. Their logo is 'The Comets'.

INTRODUCTION
- The school has been established to run a piloted flexibility program and look at high school re-design.
- The schools three focus areas are 'Personalising, Connecting and Thriving'.
- Selection processes - staff had to present what they could bring to the school, which was unique and how they would connect student learning to 'personalising, connecting and thriving.'
- Staff have a combination of skill sets.
- The school doesn't feel like they are doing anything radical, rather they are just able to pull ideas from a range of schooling environments and trial them in this new setting.
- They've had lots of successes, but their biggest challenge is to communication with the public - students 'get it' but parents are harder to convince!

      The Living Wall - this school also has a passion for plants / worm farms and other Ag Science.

SETTING OBSERVATIONS
- Community Learning Leaders - multi disciplinary. Work together in these groups on different ideas/ projects. This happens in Year 10. They meet with their learning faculties one a month, but in Community groups they meet once a week, focussing on student intervention or cross-curricular planning.
- Students are structured into community groups. They are named by colours. This is different from other schools.
- They only have 2 APs due to the size of the school and budget.
- Teachers are assigned a community and follow that community through until the end of Year 12. 
Once the kids go, they start back at the year level they started with.
- The teachers in a community come from all different subject areas. There are around 4-6 teachers in each community. These teachers are then divided into Connect Groups (Home Group), which meet on a Friday. This block rotates through e.g Friday lesson 1, then Friday lesson 2 etc.
- Students are of mixed ability in each class- no 10-1, 10- 2etc
- 2 programs for students with cognitive delay. Sometimes these students are incorporated into life style courses. at the community level staff are encouraged to modify etc. credit rescue approach - students work is accommodated or modified so they get a basic understanding of the course so they can get the credits.
- Learning Commons (Library) - physical and digital/ virtual hub. 8 entrances. Have a tech area where students can do activities such as tech conferencing.
- No streaming In English and Social Studies in Year 11 & 12. This does occur in Maths and Science from Year 11.
- Focus groups occur for an hour before lunch on Monday to Thursdays.  Students are able to access any teacher during Focus Group time. All students must be in a class with a teacher (in theory?!)
- Lessons are 70 minutes a day, except for Friday when lessons are 60 minutes.

ASSESSMENT
- Assessment in each subject is competencies based.
- Teachers write reports 4 times a year. They use common descriptors based on the competencies across the subjects rather than grades. They also have 2 parent/ teacher nights, mid semester after the reports have gone out. Parents go to the Connect teacher for the interview. Teachers provided the connect teacher with enough information from their subject to speak on their behalf.
- In a Maths test they promote the importance of self-reflection. Will indicate that there is an error in a certain area on the test, rather than point out the error. The process is then about error analysis.