Having trouble viewing this content? View in browser

Cambridgeshire council and Learn Together logos

Cambridgeshire Schools Newsletter

School Term and Holiday Dates 2026-2027

Thank you very much to all those who responded to the consultation on this issue. The summary results of the consultation, together with the confirmed dates, are now on the council website as follows:

Cambridgeshire

The confirmed Cambridgeshire school holiday and term time dates for 2026 – 2027 are therefore agreed as shown below, or in the link here: CCC Agreed term dates 2026-2027

These dates total 195 days, from which schools should choose 5 days to set aside as professional training days.

Autumn Term Dates 2026

· Tuesday 1 September to Friday 23 October (39 days)

· Half Term: Monday 26 October to Friday 30 October

· Monday 2 November to Friday 18 December (35 days)

· Christmas Holidays: Monday 21 December to Friday 1 January

Spring Term Dates 2027

· Monday 4 January to Friday 12 February (30 days)

· Half Term: Monday 15 February to Friday 19 February

· Monday 22 February to Thursday 25 March (24 days)

· Easter Holidays: Friday 26 March to Friday 9 April

Summer Term Dates 2027

· Monday 12 April to Friday 28 May (34 days)

· Half Term: Monday 31 May to Friday 4 June

· Monday 7 June to Wednesday 21 July (33 days)

· Summer Holiday: Thursday 22 July onwards

Phil Nash - Senior Adviser for Leadership

Easter Holiday Activities and Food (HAF) Programme

The DfE has extended funding for the HAF Programme during 2025. This news is welcomed due to the positive impact this programme has had on families in Cambridgeshire. Holiday scheme providers will be funded to offer free places to eligible families during the Easter, Summer, and Christmas school holidays.

The Easter HAF Programme is operating between 7 – 17 April. Eligible pupils can attend a participating holiday scheme for up to 16 hours, fully funded. A daily meal and participation in enriching experiences is offered. Eligibility vouchers are issued to parents/carers on 3.3.25 by email and/or text.

Further details: HAF@cambridgeshire.gov.uk

Update: Implementation of Liquidlogic's Early Years and Education (EYES) System

Cambs CC is aiming to go-live with the implementation of a new Education Case Management IT System called EYES in August 2025. This system will replace the Council's internal IT systems provided by Capita ONE and CACI's Impulse Nexus. The objective of making this change is to provide a single record of a child or young person across our children's services network including early help, children's social care and education and support our vision of Inclusion for All.

As part of this implementation, the data exchange provider will change from Wonde to Group Call. This change will require new data sharing agreements to be signed by all schools, the details of which were included in an email to Heads sent on Friday 7 February.

If you have any queries regarding the data sharing agreement, please contact ccceducationandtargetedsystems@cambridgeshire.gov.uk

If you would like to know more about the system implementation in general, please contact the project team via cds.pmo@cambridgeshire.gov.uk .

The project team will continue to keep all schools and settings updated as we progress through the project including any key dates/changes etc. We are looking for a number of early adopters who would work with us to test the application, portals and data exchange. If this is something your school might be interested in, please let us know along with your data sharing agreement.

Talking Together in Cambridgeshire

Talking Together in Cambridgeshire (TTiC) will host its fourth Festival of Stories, which aims to shine a light on how stories can be used in fun and interactive ways to boost young children’s communication, language and literacy skills. Have a look at Talking Together’s 2025 Events Programme.

The festival will also highlight how 50 Things to Do Before You’re Five can be used by parents and carers across Cambridgeshire, to create new stories based on everyday activities, to help build memories and bring families together.

Festival of Stories - Online Events will include the Stories from Objects workshop which will be held on Teams on Tuesday 11 February. This will be led by Nicola Wallis of The Fitzwilliam Museum, and the `Take a Little Walk, Little Bear sensory, storytelling session’ will take place on Wednesday, 26 February. This will be performed by international storyteller Cassandra Wye, and will be held online via Teams.

Funded places are available on the Introduction to Making It REAL training – a new one-day course where participants will learn how to support parents to boost their children’s literacy development in the home environment.

TTiC is also working closely with Cambridgeshire Skills who are offering funding to cover course costs for those who meet the eligibility criteria. More details about the course including the dates and how to book a place can be found on the Introduction to Making it REAL webpages.

For more information please contact Helen Wootton

PSHE Service KS5 Launch Event

The PSHE Service are pleased to invite colleagues from KS5 settings to the launch of the Cambridgeshire KS5 Personal Development Framework and Audit Tool.

Currently, there is no statutory requirement to provide PSHE/Personal Development for KS5 pupils, but the pressure is building on the DfE to address this essential element of the broader education for students.

Most KS5 settings in Cambs are offering some PSHE for students. This resource and audit tool provides support for colleges to develop their offer.

The resources were developed with students at four Cambridgeshire KS5 settings and local agencies who suport this age group.

Date: Thursday 13th March 4.15- 4.45pm.

KS5 Personal Development Framework Launch Event booking

Primary Physical Education resources for teachers

The PE advisory Service has created some innovative e-resources to support PE teachers.

The Practical Guide to making children safe near water - a fantastic toolkit bringing key messages to life through 20 innovative lessons and activities which can be done on dry land or at the pool.

Making Cross Country Running Fun - a superb resource containing top tips, and 24 running games, relays and a range of sustained activities which will make running fun, and improve children's fitness levels.

These resources are available to purchase here: PE Market Place

For further information please contact Ian Roberts

Elastik - new Cambridgeshire education data project

Following on from a successful project in Bedford, Elastik are keen to work with Cambridgeshire schools in using digitalisation and AI to support teachers and improve performance with both assessment and in improving writing:

Elastik: using school data effectively

Elastik will offer a discount to schools who sign up at the same time as part of a Cambridgeshire project. For further information or to see some case studies please contact Becca White.

Cambridgeshire County Council Preparing for Adulthood SEND Festival returns by popular demand!

My Life, My Future is a full-day event at Burgess Hall, St Ives on Friday 11 July 2025 for young people with Special Educational Needs aged 14-25, parent carers and professionals.

As well as our specialist education provision, we are very keen for our mainstream school and college students with special educational needs and their parent carers to attend too and please ask for your support with attendance and communication to parent carers to support further information on preparing for adulthood (PFA)

This event will be held at Burgess Hall, St Ives and is for young people and their families and professionals who are beginning to think about their future and next steps. The event will offer advice, support, key stallholders within the four PFA areas of: employment, friendship, health, and wellbeing and building independence as well as fun activities, such as: bowling, ping-pong, food, and refreshments. More information can be found here: Preparing for Adulthood SEND Festival.

I would be very grateful if you could you let me know if your school or college would like to attend, through the quick booking survey found here: PfA SEND Festival School and College register

A Caring Cambridgeshire

Headteachers and senior leaders - on Friday 21 March 2025 we are hosting a convention aimed at bringing together multi-agency partners to support Cambridgeshire’s progress towards being a more ‘Caring Cambridgeshire’ through a relational and trauma informed approach. Sarah Callaghan welcomes your attendance. Please book your place here: A Caring Cambridgeshire Convention booking form

SORTS - Recognising and Responding to Self-harm in Schools

Researchers at the Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge have produced a set of FREE resources to help school and college staff provide a supportive response to students who self-harm.

The resources have been co-developed with mental health professionals, school staff and young people as part of a research project funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR). The NIHR recently published a press release about the launch of the SORTS resources, which can be read here:

NIHR - New resources launched to enhance support and prevent self-harm among young people in schools

The SORTS website is designed to support a whole-school approach to self-harm prevention and intervention, and as such, includes an entry-level, 30-minute e-learning module targeted towards all school staff as well as information, videos and downloadable resources.

Take a look here: Sorts - Recognising and responding to self-harm in schools

Ramadan 2025 guidance

This year Ramadan will begin on or around the Friday 28 February 2025 and ends on or around Sunday 30 March 2025, with the celebration of Eid-al-Fitr. These are tentative dates as the actual date of commencement of Ramadan 2025 is subject to the sighting of the new moon. Eid-al-Fitr is the festival at the end of Ramadan and celebrates the ending of the month of fasting. The festival in 2025 will take place either on or around the evening of Sunday 30 March and Monday 31 March 2025. This is a significant religious festival for Muslims across the world. Parents may request a day of authorised absence for Religious Observance and this should be authorised.

More detailed guidance can be found here: Advice for Ramadan 2025

Further information and guidance can be found on the SACRE website. Cambridgeshire Standing Advisory Council on Religious Education | Cambridgeshire County Council

Pension Auto Enrolment

In line with the pension legislation, Cambridgeshire County Council is required to re-assess and enrol employees into a qualifying pension scheme this year as it has been three years since the last automatic pension enrolment took place for all Cambridgeshire County Council employees. The Council has selected a re-enrolment date of Saturday 1 March 2025 which means all maintained schools now need to work with their payroll provider to undertake the process as outlined in the following briefing, to ensure anyone that meets the qualifying criteria is auto enrolled into the relevant pension scheme (TPS or LGPS). :

Pension Auto Enrolment Briefing paper 2025 for all Maintained Schools in Cambridgeshire

Once this process has been completed schools (or their payroll provider) must complete and return the following spreadsheet to HR.Advisory@Cambridgeshire.gov.uk by 31 May 2025.

Blank declaration Pension Auto-Enrolment 2025

We have liaised with the payroll provider which supports the majority of LA maintained schools to ensure they are aware of this requirement and will be ready to do this on instruction from each school but if you can also ensure that the relevant officer within your school /payroll provider is aware to enable this deadline to be met.

Bookings open for PECT's FREE Schools Sustainability Showcase event

This event is open to all schools and is completely FREE to attend. PECT’s annual schools event is an opportunity for primary and secondary schools to come together and take part in practical hands-on activities to inspire new ideas and projects to take back to school. Accompanying staff will get to meet other providers and schools to further extend partnership working.

This year’s event will be taking place at ARU Peterborough on Thursday 22 May 2025 from 9am – 3pm offering brand new and exciting activities.

For more information or to make a booking, please see Schools Sustainability Showcase - PECT.

SENDIASS Forum for SENCOs

We would like to invite you to an informal online session which highlights who we are as a service and how we can work collaboratively with you as a school whilst advising parents.

We are offering this session primarily to SENDCO’s, however please do send someone in your absence if you cannot attend.

There are two online sessions available to book either on Tuesday 11th March at 10am or Thursday 20th March at 10am.

Please book via the following link: Customer booking, SENDIASS Cambridgeshire Event

We will send out the TEAMS link nearer the time. We look forward to seeing there!

PE and School Sport Conference - Monday 19 May 2025

Date for Diaries

We are excited to confirm that the Cambridgeshire PE conference will be in St Ives on Monday 19 May 2025. The Event Title is `When everyone is included, everyone wins!’ and the focus is about the power of PE and sport in overcoming disadvantage.

Schools will be encouraged to develop understanding of the enablers, barriers and opportunities for increasing physical activity across inequality groups, and will be challenged to create an environment where all young people are valued and can participate confidently with their peers.

More extensive details will follow soon. To book a place go to: PE course bookings

Cambridge Science Centre - FREE Teacher Preview Evening

Cambridge Science Centre is inviting primary teachers to a Teacher Preview Evening at the Centre on 27 February (5pm to 7pm). There will be an opportunity to:

Explore hands-on exhibits

Take part in an engaging STEM workshop

Discover how the Centre supports the science curriculum.

Booking is required.

Reserve your place here: Cambridge Science Centre Teacher Preview Evening

Training and Events

Making Sense of Assessment in PE

6th March 2025, 1.30pm-3.30pm, Online. £49 for Cambs maintained schools, £54 for Cambs Academies and all non-Cambs schools

Audience: Primary, Special and Secondary school teachers who teach physical education

Primary PE Subject Leader Network meeting

18th March 2025, 3.45pm-5pm. Online. Free for Cambridgeshire maintained Schools and Academies with a membership SLA. £25 for Cambridgeshire Academies

and all Non-Cambs Schools

Audience: Primary phase PE Coordinators.

Small Pool Operators Courses

Two day course (£302) and One day update courses (£171) available in March and April.

Venues: The Grove Primary, Cambridge, and/or Bassingbourn Primary, Bassingbourn

Audience: All staff who monitor small pools in school.

Exploring Gender

25th February 2025, 3.30pm-5pm or 4th June 2025, 2pm-3.30pm. Online. £40 subscribing schools, £50 for non-subscribing schools.

Audience: All staff in primary, special and secondary schools

Teaching RSE in Primary & Special Schools

30th April 2025, 3.30pm-5.30pm. Online. £40 subscribing schools, £50 for non-subscribing schools.

Audience: PSHE Leads and teachers in primary and special schools.

Digital Lifestyles for Primary Schools

6th May 2025, 9.30am-11.30am. Online. £40 subscribing schools, £50 for non-subscribing schools.

Audience: Primary Schools

Making Sense of Assessment in PE

6th March 2025, 1.30pm-3.30pm, Online. £49 for Cambs maintained schools, £54 for Cambs Academies and all non-Cambs schools

Audience: Primary, Special & Secondary school teachers who teach physical education

Primary PE Subject Leader Network meeting

18th March 2025, 3.45pm-5pm. Online. Free for Cambridgeshire maintained Schools & Academies with a membership SLA. £25 for Cambridgeshire Academies

and all Non-Cambs Schools

Audience: Primary phase pe coordinators.

Small Pool Operators Courses

Two day course (£302) and One day update courses (£171) available in March and April.

Venues: The Grove Primary, Cambridge, and/or Bassingbourn Primary, Bassingbourn

Audience: All staff who monitor small pools in school.

Developing an Enabling Environment in the Classroom

For Teachers and Teaching Assistants working the in Reception and PVI staff. Wednesday, 5 March 2025, 13:15 – 16:15. Over Community Centre. Early Years Members £27, Non Members £45.

A Package for Practitioners in EYFS Aiming for Excellence - The power of play and the importance of interactions in the EYFS.

For Teachers and Teaching Assistants working the in Reception. Tuesday, 18 March 2025, 13:30 – 15:30. Thorndown Primary School. Early Years Members £18, Non Members £30.

Every Child is an Artist

For teachers, Art subject leaders, PVI practitioners, and teaching assistants. Wednesday, 2 April 2025, 13:30 – 15:30. St Ives Library. Early Years Members £18, Non Members £30.

Schools and settings option 2: A 90-minute whole-staff CPD session.

For any school setting needing music support various courses available. Location: At your school. £95 per session.

Primary Music Network Meeting
For any music leader. Monday 3rd March 16:00-17:00 Location: Online. Cost: £75 for yearly access (Free for schools that have completed our ‘Schools Assessment Survey’)

Britten Sinfonia – Key Stage 2 Schools’ Concert – Surround Sound Playlist

For Key Stage 2 pupils and their teachers. Friday 21 March 2025, 13:00 – 14:00. Ely Cathedral. £4 per pupil/teacher with 2 free tickets for groups over 20+

Moderating Year 2 Teacher Assessment

For Year 2 Teachers, 3rd April 2025, 13:30 – 16:00

Face to Face Winhills Primary, St Neots - £60

Moderating Year 6 Writing

For Year 6 Teachers, 24th April 2025, 13:30 – 16:00

Face to Face Winhills Primary, St Neots - £60

English Subject Lead Day

Primary English Subject Leads, 28th April 2025, 08:45 – 14:30

Face to Face Winhills Primary, St Neots - £95

Primary science subject leader network

For Primary Teachers. Tuesday 25th February, 15.30 – 17.00. Online webinar. Contact training@sciencelearningeast.org for pricing info.

Engaging science in year 3