STANDARDS of reading, writing and mathematics among Oxfordshire’s seven-year-olds are on the rise according to official government figures. Key Stage One results released today show 81 per cent of children in the county achieved Level 2b in reading, three percentage points up on last year, whilst 89 per cent achieved the Level 2 benchmark, up from 88 per cent last year. In last month’s Key Stage Two results, in Maths 93 per cent of Oxfordshire’s 11 year-olds achieved Level 2 (up from 91 per cent last year) and in Writing assessments further progress was made with 86 per cent achieving Level 2 – up three percentage points on 2012.
On all measures Oxfordshire was in line with, or above, the National average figures for 2013.
ENCOURAGING SIGNS The council’s Cabinet Member for Children, Education and Families Melinda Tilley said: “Following the impressive Key Stage two results released last month, I am delighted to see further encouraging signs that children at the earliest stages of their schooling are starting to make the strides we all want to see. We are starting to witness sustained progress in attainment levels throughout the primary school years, which will be hugely welcomed by Oxfordshire schools and the communities they serve.
“This progress is testament to the hard work of teaching staff and the efforts of children and their families. I would like to congratulate everyone associated with these improving results and would urge them to keep going to help our children truly fulfil their potential.”
Image courtesy of webarchive.netionalarchives.gov.uk
FURTHER ROOM FOR IMPROVEMENT Cllr Tilley added: “It must be stated that we are still at the beginning of a long road. It’s no secret that recent standards in core subjects among primary school-age children in Oxfordshire have been a long way below where they need to be, and there is still room for significant further progress.
“There is certainly no room for complacency and everyone involved in raising the attainment of Oxfordshire children should continue striving for our county’s results to be the absolute best they can be.”
THAME firefighters will be in the car park near Thame Town Hall on Saturday (05/10), offering car washes to raise funds for the Fight Fighters’ charity.
They will be there with their buckets, hoses and ‘shammies’ between 10 am and 3 pm.
ANYONE doubting six years ago that Thame Food Festival would grow to become one of the best on the national food festival circuit, has surely now been made to eat their words. An estimated 25,000 people flocked to Thame on Saturday (28/09) for the town’s sixth annual food festival to sample great local and artisan food and drink, to watch the celebrity and local chef demonstrations, and havr a fantastic, free foodie day out.
Food festival crowds in Upper High Street, Thame
Over 150 stall holders lined the streets and market squares of Thame, with displays stretching from the High Street right through Cornmarket to the Upper High Street, with more spilling into North Street. On offer were mouth-watering selections of hand-raised pies, craft baked breads, exquisitely decorated cakes and rustic flapjacks as well as fruit vinegars, locally pressed oils and seasonal vegetables, still in muddy coats, fresh from the fields.
Street food was hot, spicy and plentiful, with delicious curries and slow-cooked Cotswold lamb, crèpes and local ice creams, hot roasts and hand-made burgers, all washed down with a glass or two of cider or the special festival ale, Thame’In of the Brew, created by The Vale Brewery in Brill.
Demonstrations were courtesy of Raymond Blanc OBE, Tom Kerridge, Adam Simmonds and Shaun Dickens as well as local chefs including Chris Godfrey (The Charles Napier in Chinnor), Mike North (The Nut Tree Inn at Murcott), Nigel Rumsey (Rumsey’s Chocolaterie) and Beverley Glock. BBC Radio 2’s Ken Bruce and stand-up comic, food writer and beer expert Jim ‘Jams’ Davies compèred the day.
“Saturday was the most amazing day, a fabulous opportunity to enjoy real food and drink in the setting of a beautiful market town,” said TV chef and Thame Food Festival Patron Lotte Duncan. “People came in their thousands to buy from the huge variety of different producers who’d lined up to get a stall at the event, watch the cookery demonstrations from the wonderfully talented chefs and afterwards take home all sorts of delicious goodies to eat and drink – if indeed they made it that far and were n’t gobbled up on the day!
“I had the most fantastic feeling, standing there at the top of the High Street where all I could see were people milling about laden down with bags of food they’d bought, talking excitedly about what they were going to do with it,” she said. “They’d come to have a really happy day out, sampling all the different artisan produce made with so much love and care, and enjoy the company of others who love the same thing.”
Visitors also dug deeply, giving donations for the goody bags provided by festival headline sponsors, McCormick and for parking and using the double decker, red bus park and ride. More than £4000 was raised in total by the event, which will be given to local charities by the Lions and the Rotary Club, to support the Thame Food Bank and to plough back into the community fund to put on next year’s food festival.
Other local charities including SeeSaw which helps Oxfordshire children who need extra support before or after a close family bereavement, also benefited from having free stalls on the day, collecting more than £560, as did Thame’s Helen & Douglas House hospice care for children and young adults.
The Mayor of Thame, Councillor Peter Lambert, commented, “The Thame Food Festival is brilliant. This year’s festival was very well organised by all involved. It’s a really good event and really good for Thame.”
Luise Pattinson, who runs The Book House in Thame, which this year celebrates 40 years trading independently in Thame, said, “The food festival is an absolutely amazing event, which brings people to Thame and showcases the sort of town independent retailers here know it to be. Thame’s a vibrant place that’s totally individual, and now the whole town is buzzing. Events like this really help Thame make its mark – people will soon be back now they know what it’s like.”
That a sentiment echoed by Lotte Duncan, who concluded: “I think the event has really put Thame on the map, not only as one of the best market towns in Britain, but also as the first stop for local food and drink. Saturday showed us that the food festival is something people from far and wide are happy to travel to, and the whole town benefited from the crowds. Many of them will come back, to do their Christmas shopping or at any time of year, having seen what a wonderful place it is. As well as all the visitors, we also have our generous sponsors to thank for that, and the tireless work of our festival administrator, Alison Isherwood, and I’d like to express our huge gratitude to them all.”
A garden of reflection, dedicated to the young people of Thame who have tragically lost their lives, has been officially revealed by the Mayor of Thame, and recognised by launching hundreds of balloons into the sky.
Hundreds of relatives, friends and acquaintances, as well as town council representatives, gathered to celebrate the lives of those young people gone too soon, in an event that mixed entertainment, pathos and emotion, bringing the town together to see the fruition of a joint project between local business, volunteers and supporters of the Thame Youth Memorial.
In his dedication speech to the triangular garden in a corner of the Memorial garden in the Upper High Street, the Mayor of Thame, Peter Lambert, told the crowd: “Within weeks of moving to Thame I couldn’t help but notice what a wonderful sense of community spirit this town has, and if anything, this Youth Memorial epitomises that spirit.”
After praising the hard work and dedication of those who ‘faced and overcame many obstacles’ to produce what he called, ‘a stunning design’, the Mayor concluded: “We are now the guardians of this special place and I ask that all of you, whatever your age, please come together as a community and take ownership of this Memorial and help keep it as a place of pride and memory of those we have lost and will lose in the years to come.”
The programme included a song called ‘Bring Him Home’ sung by Ric Ashley Smith, and a speech of appreciation by Michael Oatway, a local Member of the Youth Parliament.
A further £6000 is still needed to cover a loan for final construction costs of the memorial. If you would like to make a donation you can do so via the Thame Youth Memorial Trust’s website at www.thameyouthmemorial.org.
Image courtesy of sustainablebuildingsolutions.co.uk – Testing for draughts which means heat escape & wasted energy
A group concerned about future energy security, based in Haddenham, is celebrating after it was awarded a grant of £3000 to buy equipment to do ‘air tightness’ testing to improve insulation in local homes.
Essentially this is a high tech way of identifying areas in rooms where improved draught proofing would reduce energy bills.
Haddenham Transition spokesperson, Robin Aitcheson, explained: “We are proposing to offer this as a service to local householders with a particular emphasis on households on low incomes and the elderly. We need volunteers to help with this project. Any help would be gratefully received – even just a few hours at some time in the next few months.”
Contact: Robin via editor@thame.net if you can help with this very worthwhile cause.
THE death has been announced today of the former town councillor and former Thame Mayor, Delia Smith. In a tribute, Thame Town Council said: “It is with deep sadness that we received the news that Delia Smith passed away on Saturday, September 28, after a long illness. The Council expresses its sincere condolences to her family at this very difficult time.
” Delia served the town as a town, district and county councillor and was elected Mayor of Thame Council in 1979 and 1980. Delia cared passionately about her community and the people in it and devoted her time and energy to local politics making an outstanding contribution to the Civic Life of the town.
Ann Midwinter, South Oxfordshire District Councillor and former Mayor of Thame Town Council whilst Delia served as a town councillor, said: ‘Delia was a dedicated councillor and always had the town’s best interests at heart working tirelessly for the people of Thame.”
Delia Smith’s most significant achievement for Thame was probably her enthusiastic campaigning and support for a by-pass around the Thame.
Peter Lambert, the Mayor of Thame, shares a ‘cheesey’ jokes with stall holders, What’s cooking, Thame
What a wonderful day Thame had last Saturday at the Food Festival where thousands from all parts of the country came to enjoy a veritable feast of tasty delights. Over 150 stall-holders presented Thame and its visitors with a celebration of exciting, delicious, and mouth-watering real food and drink. The Town was bracketed by two demonstration kitchens where TV chefs jostled with other skilled chefs to cook good, honest, real food recipes throughout the day. The celebrities signed their books and chatted to the customers. Champagne Masterclasses and wine tasting was provided free at the Thame Players Theatre.
Visitors waited patiently for variously prepared delicious meals of meats, pizzas, wraps, breads, and confectioneries enjoying their food and drink while listening to music and chatting to friends. A vast array of fresh foods, preserves, pickles, jams, fish, meats, cheeses etc could be purchased.
What a wonderful advert this was for visitors to Thame showcasing its own shops, cafes, pubs, architecture, history and above all its hospitality. Our visitors went away able to return to Thame to shop, to site see and to relax in a venue that they experienced as friendly and welcoming.
Congratulations to those who organised and provided Thame with one of its most memorable and enjoyable days in many a long time.
At about 5.05pm on Tuesday (24/9) a black Toyota RAV4 was in collision with a black Peugeot 307 at the crossroads of Standbridge Road junction with Woodways causing extensive damage to both cars.
Police Tape
Three occupants of the Toyota were extracted from their vehicle by the fire brigade and taken to Stoke Mandeville Hospital with chest and leg pains.
The three occupants of the Peugeot were also taken to Stoke Mandeville for their injuries which were not life threatening.
Air Ambulance attended together with two Bucks fire engines, four ambulances and two roads policing units to assist the injured persons and conduct a full investigation.
PC Liz Johnson, of Roads Policing, Milton Keynes said: “We urge frequent road users through Haddenham to take extra care when travelling through the village and to note that we will be conducting road safety checks in the near future.”
If you have any information, particularly if you saw the collision or the events leading up to it, please call PC Johnson via the Thames Valley Police Enquiry Centre on 101.
If you don’t want to speak directly to the police you can contact the independent charity Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111 or online at www.crimestoppers-uk.org. (opens new window)
No personal details are taken, information is not traced or recorded and you will not go to court.
IF you’re planning a visit to The Thame Food Festival this year, why not let someone else take the strain? The organisers of the event have arranged a special free park and ride service from just outside town, so that visitors can leave the car behind while they enjoy all the tasty treats on offer.
A fleet of traditional red London Routemaster double-decker buses has been laid on to ferry festival-goers to and from the Thame Showground, allowing them to make the most of their day out without having to worry about where to park.
Buses leave every few minutes from the showground. If driving from out of town, just look out for the Thame Showground which will be signposted from all approaches to Thame, or pop the address (The Thame Showground, Kingsey Road, Thame, Oxfordshire OX9 3JL) into your sat-nav and let TomTom do the rest.
Park the car for free all day and then hop on board. Visitors can enjoy a bird’s eye view over the countryside from the top deck whilst travelling the short distance into town and back again, and find plenty of room for all those foodie purchases too!
A road closure will be in place on Saturday, September 28, in the centre of town to make way for the annual Food Festival. This year sees even more stalls plus celebrity appearances from Tom Kerridge, Giancarlo and Katie Caldesi and Festival Ambassador, Raymond Blanc OBE. The first cooking demonstration kicks off at 10am with a full line-up of talks and demonstrations running until 6pm. Festival programmes are available from the Information Centre.
DESPITE the occasional gremlin in the PA system, a quiz in aid of the Thame Youth Memorial, proved to be a very entertaining night, raising over £400 towards the final stages of raising the funds to build the memorial.
Peter Butt, Chair of the Thame Youth Memorial Trust, was obviously delighted with the result of the quiz which was held at Barley Hill School, in Thame. He said: “Thanks to everyone who joined us for the quiz night last Friday. We raised just over £400, thanks to the generous bunch that turned out and all the raffle prizes donated by attendees and local businesses.
“A special ‘thanks’ to Sue Boyle and her quiz adjudicating team who run these quizzes for groups such as ours to help raise funds, volunteering their time. I can’t thank them enough, on behalf of all the groups they have helped over the years and continue to do so.”
The Thame Youth Memorial will be officially opened by the Mayor of Thame, Peter Lambert, on Sunday morning, September 29, starting at 11.30am with street entertainment, and the opening ceremony itself from 12 noon.
PHOTO: To winning team, Brains of Britain 67: (L to R) Simon Fiddler, Mike Dyer, Quiz Mistress – Sue Boyle, Nicola Dixon, Alison Champken Woods and Nigel Champken Woods
ame Showground, allowing them to make the most of their day out without having to worry about where to park. .jpg)