Breaking news

At 4am tomorrow morning, 8 S6 students and 3 members of staff from Drummond Community High School will be on their way to Kenya.

Since February 2008 (Issue 155) Spurtle has been covering Drummond's partnership with the Muthambi Boys and Girls High Schools at the foot of Mount Kenya. Now they've raised enough money to open this latest chapter, had the jabs, worked out what they want to achieve and are ready to go.

Planned activities include:

Spurtle launched this website in October 2009, and after 9 months staff will meet soon to review it in detail.

We're not uncritical of ourselves, but would certainly welcome objective criticism from readers. Tell us what you like and what you don't like, which bits of the site you find useful and which are just plain irritating.

Above all, please tell us where you have spotted any failed links or other glitches we've overlooked.

If you have ideas for additional information or features, we'll gladly consider all suggestions.

Thanks for your help!

Berlitz Language Centre in Frederick Street requires accommodation for its international students.

Director Stephen Penman contacted Spurtle to tell us these students are usually professionals aged between 25 and 55 who have been sent by their companies to study English in Edinburgh.

They are, apparently, 'polite, mature and interesting people who would like to get a taste of British life in a welcoming household with good standards'.

Leith Central Community Council meets on Monday evening at 7.30pm in the Nelson Hall at McDonald Road Library.

The draft agenda is available in Extras, as are the minutes of last month's AGM and ordinary business meeting.

Planners at City of Edinburgh Council are circulating a draft of revised planning guidelines on Building Heights and Roofscapes.

You can download a pdf of this draft by clicking on the link at the bottom of this page. The revised passages are highlighted. For purposes of comparison, the current Guidelines (adopted in 1999) are also available below.

Here at the Spurtle we are pro-bicycles, but the behaviour of those cyclists who insist on using the pavement is becoming a pain.

Not only are they a hazard, but they give the rest of the bicycling community a bad name.

Spurtle is monitoring the problem for future coverage, but we can't be everywhere all the time – we need readers to tell us where the problems are and when.

Please send your reports to: spurtle@hotmail.co.uk.

Broughton History Society (BHS) now has an online presence.

A link to their new page in the Spurtle website can be found at the foot of the menu on the left-hand side of the screen.

The page is administered by Spurtle, but content is entirely decided upon by BHS. At present it includes details of committee members, aims, subscription fees and a complete programme of events for the 2010–11 curriculum. 

Also available are recent back issues of the BHS Newsletter, a mine of well-researched and anecdotal information on the neighbourhood's past.

Drummond Community High School's 'new' Head Teacher Norma Prentice outlined a year of challenges and successes at Tuesday's Celebration of Achievement and Prize Giving Ceremony.

A firm believer in the effectiveness of partnership-working between home and school, she thanked staff, students, parents, carers and friends in the community, and spoke of her excitement at joining a school which is already doing well but where the best is yet to come.

'Often, we feel: Why bother? Why go through all this study? Who cares?

A Spurtle stringer tonight contacted Mission Control with exciting news of major local interest.

The opening film at this year's Edinburgh International Film Festival, The Illusionist – already tipped as a modern animation classic – sets several scenes on the streets of Broughton, and they are clearly identifiable.

Our source, an industry insider who attended the gala and phoned Spurtle from the party afterwards, spotted 1950s versions of: the Barony Bar (Broughton Street), the Playhouse (Greenside Place), and the Broughton Hotel (Broughton Place).

Local athlete Kimberley Reed is progressing almost faster than we can report it.

Since featuring in Issue 183, she has won gold in the Girls B Hammer at the Scottish Schools Championships in Grangemouth on 11 June, not only winning her age group, but beating all other female competitors with a personal best of 46.98 metres.

This makes her 4th in the UK at under-17 level and 10th in the UK at under-20 level. She's also first in Scotland for her age group, and second at under-20.