Welcome to Portobello High School’s website. We are pleased to provide those visiting our site with information about the school and aspects of our work. Good communication is important to us as a school and we regard our relationship with parents/carers and the wider community as crucial to the success of the school.
Here at Portobello High School we are committed to providing a challenging and rewarding educational experience. We are a non-denominational, six year comprehensive based in the East of Edinburgh. Our school roll is 1305 pupils and despite being the largest school in Edinburgh, the House System we operate and our policies and procedures ensure that every pupil is welcome, known and supported.
We pride ourselves in being an inclusive school which offers many and varied opportunities, both within and outwith the classroom, for the growth and development of pupils in our care.
Please contact the school if you require more information.
Peigi Macarthur
Head Teacher
The International Links working group would like to share a message received from the head teacher of our link school in Chogoria, Kenya. This message follows the adoption of some trees in the grounds of Kiurani Secondary School Help raise funds to give Kiurani pupils and staff the opportunity to visit Edinburgh.
I wish to register my warm appreciation on behalf of our school and myself for your kind participation in adopting our trees we were planting in December.
We would like to thank everyone who helped with the blood donor session that took place at the school on Thursday 2nd May 2013.
A total of 71 volunteers offered to give blood and 56 donations were given. There were 41 new donors in this session.
The Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service are very grateful for all your help.
We are delighted to report that Youth Worker Rachel Barr was runner-up in the national part-time Youth Worker of the Year category at the Youth Work awards. Rachel Barr is an absolute professional who clearly demonstrates her skill, knowledge and experience of Youth and Community Learning Work in Portobello High School. She has a high profile among staff and pupils and has worked hard to introduce, initiate and develop innovative projects in school. Her commitment to Youth Work is unquestionable and she actively engages with partner agencies to investigate new Youth Work opportunities for the pupils of Portobello High. Most recently, her work with the Mentors in Violence Prevention Programme has involved her in recruiting and training a large group of S4 – S6 pupil Mentors who work with current S1 pupils to deliver this important gender based violence awareness and prevention programme. read more
In April the Science Club ran a two week project to hatch and raise baby chicks from eggs. The eggs arrived on Tuesday 16th of April and spent the first two days in an incubator to keep them at the required 37.7 degrees Celsius needed for chicken egg incubation.
On Wednesday 17th pupils arrived to find that two eggs had cracked as the chicks started ‘pipping’ their way out and ‘cheeping’ was heard from the eggs throughout the day. At 5.30pm on Wednesday the first chick hatched, followed within 20 minutes by the second. All of this was recorded on the webcam set up to monitor the eggs overnight.
Neil Rowan was awarded the Basketballscotland School Age Volunteer of the Year. Neil has been a pupil at Portobello High School for 6 years and since the day he started he has always shown a real interest, ambition and desire to play and coach basketball at its highest level. Despite training and playing demands with the Open Boys school team, The City of Edinburgh Junior and Senior Men’s teams and the U/18 Men’s National team, Neil has always been determined to give something back to the sport that has given him so many opportunities. He has coached very successful school teams at all levels and offers so much to the club game too. Congratulations to Matthew Wingate who was one of three others in competition for this national award.
