Work Experience week

S4 pupils had an excellent week on work experience placement with the school receiving very favourable reports about the pupils from local businesses. Staff and pupils would like to thank Suzanne Murdoch at the Ayrshire Chamber of Commerce and all the companies who provided placements ensuring that our pupils had a successful and productive work experience. Thank you to Mr. Kelly, Mrs. McLay and Tammy Borthwick for organising the event.

Army work experience

Doon Academy has successfully secured 8 places on the Army work experience week in February 2011.

Barnado's Drop In Club

Barnado’s Drop In club will resume on the 5th November and will be available for pupils every 2 weeks. Everyone is welcome to attend.

Seasons for Growth

Kate MacLeod from Seasons for Growth will be visiting the school in November to provide in-service training on bereavement counselling to the core support team.

Construction course

Ayr College staff will be delivering a 12 week construction course, in school, to 8 S5 pupils. The old SFL base will be transformed into a construction site for the course beginning in February 2011.

Health4Life Comenius project meeting

As part of Doon Academy’s Comenius ‘Health4Life’ project Mrs Dorans and Mrs Ferrie attended a project meeting at the IES Alcarrras High School in Spain. Together with teachers from our partnership schools in Belgium, Poland, Greece, Portugal and Spain they finalised the arrangements for the project programme. Amongst the many activities at the meeting was a ‘Health4Life’ logo competition where the logo designed by our S3 pupils Cameron Smith and Varri Murdoch gained 2nd place. The next project meeting will be in Belgium in March attended by pupils and staff with the main focus being a health debate.

Student teachers

Staff and pupils bid a warm welcome to our returning student teachers, Suzanne Fraser in the English department and Ruth MacCallum in Biology, who will be in school for a 5 week placement until the 3rd December. We wish them every success.

Romania visit

During the October holiday week a team of twelve Doon Academy students, part of the Lazer Group from Bellsbank Church, visited Romania on a mission trip.
The team worked on projects with the Romanian based charity ‘The Smiles Foundation’. The group were involved in working on eleven of the nineteen projects that Smiles is currently developing in Romania. These activities included: working on a farm by cutting back hedges and painting pens; delivering aid to poor, deprived families: taking aid in the form of food, soap and sleeping bags to the homeless; visiting Tileagd school and village; delivering a container into Salard; visiting the emergency housing unit and helping at the crèche with children who need love and attention. Throughout the week the students were able to see ‘how the other half live’ and this proved to be an emotional journey for them. On return, the group hope to spread awareness about the Smiles Foundation and continue fund-raising in the school and the community to help to make a difference to the Romanian people.

Supported Study

Supported Study sessions after school on Wednesdays and Thursdays are now underway. All pupils in S4 to S6 are welcome to attend to gain extra help and support from their teachers.

"Wear it Pink"

The S4 Care Group organised a fundraising event for ‘Wear it Pink’ to raised money for Breast Cancer Research. They held a non-uniform pink day, cake sale and raffle which raised over £190. A special mention to Mr. Paton who deservedly won Best ‘Pink’ Dressed Male with his pink shirt, pink belt and pink furry boots!

Poppy Scotland Project

S1 and S2 Support for Learning pupils visited the War Memorials in Ayr as part of the Poppy Scotland project. The visit helped the pupils to understand how much the community contributed to the defence of the country during the two World Wars and how much it is still supporting the service personnel today with projects such as Combat Stress in Hollybush.

Doon on BBC

The BBC came into school and filmed some S1 pupils with Mr Gilmore and Ms Joss talking about their lives and researching on the Internet.
Here is the link to BBC School News Report website where you can see the finished report and film.

BBC First Click Campaign

Here is a link to a report on the First Click Campaign. Doon is mentioned at the bottom of the page.

Y dance display at SLF

On Thursday 23rd September, 13 S3 pupils travelled to the SECC in Glasgow to take part in the Learning Festival. All the pupils had been involved with East Ayrshire’s pilot scheme which highlighted the dangers of smoking, drinking and taking drugs alongside encouraging the pupils to take part in exercise, in particular dance. The pupils had learned a dance routine which they performed in front of an audience at the SECC and some spoke about their experiences. Well done to the following pupils who had a great day out and represented their school and district in a very positive manner: Hope Stark, Zoe Gibson, Demi McCreadie, Varri Murdoch, Tammy Reid, Tami McLelland, Hazel Murdoch, Raegan Heggie, Blair McCrone, Carly Hay, Fiona Kennedy, Rachel Maxey, Kody Nutt and Alex Dearie.

Maths Challenge 2010

Well done to S3 pupils Connor Strang and Hayley Mitchell and S4 pupils Heather Dunn and Rosie Coles who represented Doon Academy at the Maths Challenge 2010. The team performed well in a closely contested competition which was narrowly won by Loudoun Academy. Thank you to Mr. Dunlop from the Maths department who accompanied the pupils to the event.

Under 15s netball success

The following pupils have been picked to represent Ayrshire in the Under 15s netball league: Lauren Shaw; Claire Boyd; and Jade Scott. The girls had to endure 2 gruelling trials at Queen Margaret Academy and beat off competition from another 55 girls who came from all over Ayrshire. Well done girls Doon Academy’s staff and pupils are very proud of you!

European Day of Languages

Doon Academy celebrated the European Day of Languages by learning new words in as many different languages as possible ranging from Arabic to Swahili. Pupils made puppets and filmed sketches in French, as well as singing songs and playing games. A great day was had by all!

Scottish Chamber Orchestra

Musicians from the Scottish Chamber Orchestra (SCO) visited the school and conducted workshops with pupils to help them extend their musical talent. The pupils then attended a performance by the SCO which was described by pupils as magical.

Wear it Pink

The S4 Care Group working with Tammy Borthwick had a visit from Wendy the community midwife. Wendy spoke about her work and the group asked many questions. They have also been busy organising fund raising activities for this year’s ‘Wear it Pink’ Day on Friday 22nd October in aid of breast cancer research. The group have arranged for face painting, a pink wearing non-uniform day and two raffles. All donations are welcome for this worthy cause and well done to the care group for your excellent enterprising attitude.

Board Games for Alzheimer's Scotland

In the Art department a group of S3 pupils are working with Enterprise Officer Linda Paterson and Jennifer McKeand from Alzheimer’s Scotland to produce board games for people with dementia. The group already have some good ideas and they could make history as nothing like this has been made before. We wish them every success.