Dundee City Council Education Department has established a pupil mentoring programme in Menzieshill High School. Mentors from the business community will provide support to help pupils gain a better understanding of the world of work and the skills necessary to progress into positive, sustained destinations.

Further information can be found here

Ross Starke and Christopher Vannart of Menzieshill High School’s Debate Club were worthy winners in the second round heat of the Donald Dewar Memorial Trophy Debate held at Webster’s High School on Tuesday 5^th February. Proposing the motion “This house would ban companies from lending at exorbitant rates of interest”,  they saw off stiff competition from the High School of Dundee, Webster’s High School and Montrose Academy to win a place in the semi-final of the competition. Both Chris and Ross were very highly commended as speakers by the judges.

Third Year Course choices

This is now the time of year when Third Year pupils make their choices for Fourth Year. The process began in December 2012 when we asked Third Year pupils to give us an indication of the Choices they were likely to make. This enabled us to look at class demand and the staff we have available to teach Fourth Year courses. From that time we have been working with your son / daughter to help them to make informed choices for their Fourth Year.

To assist them they have had input from their class teachers on the courses on offer next year. House Heads are supporting your son / daughter in the decision making process.

The following timeline completes the picture of the process and deadlines for completion of Choices:

11 Dec 2012 S3 Trial Choices

14 Jan 2013 S3 Parent information evening

28 Jan 2013 Guidance lessons on choice and career paths

31 Jan 2013 S3 Reports to parents with Course recommendations

5 – 14 February S3 Course Choice interviews

18 Feb 2013 S3 Parent consultation

19 Feb 2013 Deadline for return of Choice of Course forms

March 2013 Confirmation of course letters to parents

11 June 2013 New timetable begins

Further information:

• The Choice of Course form
• Course information can be found in the ‘Department’ section of the website.
• Information about S3 College options. Dundee College has a ‘Parent Zone’ explaining college courses for Fourth Year.

If you should require any further information, do not hesitate to contact the school.

You can read our Christmas 2012 newsletter here.

For pictures from the debate, click here

A capacity crowd inside the LRC witnessed an exciting Christmas Debate intensely fought out by teachers and pupils. An 90 ticket sell out watched as Art teacher Mr Meijka and S4 prodigy Andrew Fry argued for the motion “This house would abolish Christmas” while History supremo Mr Macdonald and S1 Kianne Newton argued against.

The drama started early as Mr Meijka, after 8 minutes of speaking, finally succumbed to pressure from the audience and departed the stage. It took pressure from Chairman Chris Vannart and continuous ringing of the bell from timekeeper Abby Lang before he finally realised he was costing his side dearly. Mr Macdonald then stepped up and sprinkled Christmas cheer through the audience with a well-structured speech which included some Christmas rhymes. His speech rightly earned a rousing applause from the audience and he had appeared to have already won the audience over with just half the debate gone.

Then, the magic happened. Andrew Fry delivered a rather magical performance and remained strong even when put under pressure from a Point of Information. His efforts surprised all and had the audience talking about him after the debate. It was then left to Kianne Newton to round off the debate and she made a very good account of herself especially when performing in front of around 100 people.

After a quick discussion between judges Mrs Squair, Mrs McGeechan and Ross Starke, the win was unanimously given to the Opposition, and Christmas remained. The judges felt that although the quality of argument was in favour of team proposition, it was right to award the win to the opposition after the severe penalty given to Mr Meijka for running on too long.

The occasion was a good one enjoyed by all and the debate can be regarded as a success.

Mrs Squair later thanked all the pupils and staff for coming along, as well as Graeme McKenzie and Chelsea Cameron for catering, Matthew Turnbull for baking some shortbread, and most of all to our debaters for putting on a show. Money raised from tickets and refreshments has gone to the Go Africa group for their planned trip to Kenya in July 2013. 

Ross Starke

The school’s Christmas Concert on Tuesday 11th December was a great success.  Pupils from all year groups showed off their musical skills with a range of groups performing.  These included the string group, a brass band, a woodwind group and even a ceilidh band as well as the S1-S3 and S4 – S6 ensembles and the choir who, as well as singing themselves, insisted on audience participation.  Hearty thanks must go to Miss O’Neill and Mrs Coull and all the music instructors who made sure our pupils performed so well.

The concert was preceded by a Christmas Market with a range of stalls selling Christmas goods, crafts and cake and candy.

You can see photographs here.

Emma Young from Menzieshill High School in Dundee was one of five national winners in this year's S1/2 Human Rights Newspaper Front Page competition. In her submission, Emma chose the issue of religious intolerance and violence in India. The judges described her winning
entry as "informative, well researched and well presented". Emma is pictured receiving her award from Menzieshill HS HT Ms Helen Gray. Emma also collected a cheque for £20 from sponsors Hodder Education.

The annual Modern Studies trip to the Houses of Parliament went ahead on 17 and 18 September. Following a similar structure to previous years, 21 senior pupils took the chance on the Monday evening to shop on Oxford Street before visiting the theatre (Billy Elliot). Up bright an early on the Tuesday, it was straight to the Parliament for the tour, before meeting and speaking with local MP Jim McGovern. After Parliament, the group took a 'flight' on the London Eye before heading to Downing Street and Trafalgar Square. All too quickly, it was back to the train station and

the return journey home - an intense two days.

The Modern Studies Department would again like to thank Jim McGovern for sponsoring our visit to the Parliament and for meeting and talking with the pupils. I would also like to compliment the pupils on their good behaviour - they were a credit to the school. Well done.

Congratulations to Molly Fowlie winner of the 2012 Harry McLevy Memorial Award. The S3 Modern Studies investigation competition, which is open to pupils from across the nine city schools, involves pupils researching, analysing and writing up an investigation on an issue related to their Standard Grade studies. The highly topical theme of Molly's investigation was whether or not Child Benefit should continue to be paid to higher rate taxpayers. In selecting Molly's entry as the citywide winner, the judges commented on Molly's range of research, insightful analysis and excellent presentation. As well as a certificate and a prize of £20 as the school winner, Molly also collected a second certificate and a further £50 as the citywide winner. The Harry McLevy Memorial Award is jointly organised by the Claverhouse Training Group and Dundee Modern Studies

Association and has the support of Dundee City Council.

Picture shows Molly with the HarryMcLevy Memorial Award and several of the other school-based winners.

On Wednesday 20^th June S1 pupils from Menzieshill High School hosted an evening of celebration: families, friends and special guests were welcomed to the library and guided through a year of Literacy Across Learning.  They watched a funky film and enjoyed a presentation by class reps.  The Olympic project for term 4 culminated with an inspirational talk by Olympic torchbearer Ronald McIntosh who told his inspiring life story and then became part of the judging panel for an S1 debate.  The motion was “This house believes that the 2012 London Olympics will be the best ever.”  On this occasion the opposition won and both teams were praised for the high standard of lively debate.  Literacy Across Learning is a new S1 course at Menzieshill High School which has been praised by Education Scotland and featured in a 4 page spread in the Times Educational Supplement.

Find out more about Literacy Across Learning and see our film on our blog

Second year pupils at Menzieshill High School had a treat on Thursday 26th January when the award-winning author of the Timeriders series, Alex Scarrow, visited the school to talk to them. Alex, who had careers as a rock guitarist, graphic artist and computer games designer before as he says “growing up and becoming an author” gave a lively and varied talk including video trailers and audience participation, discussing how our world would be different if, for example, Hitler had won the Second World War or the Roman Empire had not fallen. He finished with a gripping reading of the first two chapters of his first Timeriders novel leaving everyone on a cliff edge of anticipation to find out how the story continues.

On Friday 24 February Menzieshill High School held their annual Languages in Work event, where S4 pupils have the chance to experience first hand what it’s like to use another language in a work environment. This year the business language was German, and the pupils joined companies such as Spar, Volkswagen and Siemens.  After the initial nerves, they confidently carried out all the tasks required by their companies - booking hotel accommodation for a visiting businessman, arranging transport from Germany to Dundee, making a phone call to arrange to meet a visitor (and later meeting them at the right time and place!).  Pupils could also choose to attend an interview for a summer job in Germany.  The pupils found it challenging but good fun.   

Each year local businesses generously allow the school to benefit from their German and French employees, who take on the role of tourist officer, interviewer, or visitor  for the afternoon.  This year we had three guests: Ingo Hein from the Scottish Crop Research Institute, Clémence Tardy from Dundee College, and Marlies Cowan from Tullis-Russell.  We are very grateful to them all for giving up their time, for being so encouraging and understanding, and for providing such a positive experience for our pupils.

Job interview with Ingo Hein ( from left Callum Barr, Jamie Bell, )

Making a business call (Ross Starke)

Pupils with Ingo Hein and Clemence Tardy