G15 is a partnership of all 12 secondary schools in Gloucester City linking with The Milestone Special School, Gloucestershire College and the Pupil Referral Service. Driven by a clear set of beliefs and united by a desire to see standards of achievement rise still higher across all our schools, ours is a partnership that will directly impact on standards, through partnership working and the pooling of our collective expertise. read more>
The G15 partnership is working with the Editor of The Citizen to put together an edition of the newspaper which will be on the streets of Gloucestershire on Friday June 22nd 2012.
G15 students want to include an article about what concerns young people as they grow up in the 21st century in Gloucestershire. Can you help us please?
Please click on the hyperlink below which will take you to the survey. Completing the Survey will take only a few minutes of your time but will provide us with loads of information about how it feels to be a young person in Gloucestershire today.
Please don’t forget to buy a copy of The Citizen on Friday 22nd June 2012 to find out the results of our survey!
Thanks very much!
Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA) is an inherited neuromuscular condition that affects nerve cells in the spinal cord called anterior horn cells. Messages from the brain travel down the spinal cord, through the anterior horn cells, then along motor neurons to the muscles telling them to move. In SMA, the anterior horn cells fail to provide an effective link between the brain and the muscles. Messages are blocked or distorted. This causes the muscles to waste away (atrophy). The motor neurons affected in SMA are those which enable walking, crawling, arm and hand movement, head and neck movement and swallowing. The muscles used in breathing can also be affected. The brain and sensory nerves, which allow us to feel sensation such as temperature and touch, are not affected in SMA.
SMA is a relatively rare disease that affects approximately 1 in 6500 babies born. That means about 100 new cases are diagnosed each year. Approximately 1 in 40 of us carry the genetic mutation that causes the condition. There are 4 main types of SMA. Types 1, 2 and 3 appear in childhood. The fourth type affects adults, and is known as Adult Onset SMA. Other rarer forms of SMA include SMA with Respiratory Distress (SMARD), Spinal Bulbar Muscular Atrophy and Distal SMA. SMA types 1, 2 and 3 are termed autosomal recessive. This means that for a baby to be affected, both parents must be carriers of the faulty gene. In these circumstances, there is a 1 in 4 chance in each pregnancy of the baby being affected by SMA. The inheritance pattern of the adult and rarer forms of SMA can be different from the childhood forms.
All types of SMA produce muscle weakness but in varying degrees of severity. Type 1 SMA is the most severe and is usually fatal within two years of birth.
My cousin who is just 11 months old was diagnose with Spinal Muscular Atrophy in April 2011. She was diagnosed with type 1 which is the most severe of the 3 types. She may not live till the age of 2, and cannot move her legs, arms or neck. She has to have fluid removed from her lungs on a regular basis by her mother, and can still noit hold her own neck up.
Thank you very much for reading.
Sophia Jones, Beaufort Community School
Click the links below to view and download the documents:
- Online Sponsorship guidelines (.pdf)
- Presentation 2012 (.pdf) - Presentation 2012 (Microsoft Powerpoint)
1. May 2012
2. June 2012 - Celebration of Success Evening
3. July 2012
4. August 2012
5. September 2012
