Excellent pastoral care lies at the heart of our school community and we believe that pastoral well-being goes hand in glove with achieving the highest possible academic standards. Form teachers play a central role in guiding their classes and helping with any difficulties and worries that sometimes face young people.
Our staff, supported by efficient pastoral procedures, provide extremely effective support and guidance for pupils. Our form teachers are supported by an experienced pastoral team who lead each year group. They are, in turn, supported by a dedicated Deputy Head (Pastoral) from the Senior Management Team.
Relationships of mutual respect are actively promoted within the school and each pupil’s views are listened to with care, promoting both. collective responsibility and the needs of each individual.
Our pastoral programme encompasses our PSHCE programme as well as a programme of compulsory bonding trips for Years 7 to 9, promoting the benefits of taking controlled risks, the importance of teamwork and encouraging resilience in all our students. Our local, regional and international experiences include a Year 9 residential where students learn that to succeed you have to take care of each other. We find that peer support works much better than peer pressure.
Seniors are also encouraged to participate in the Duke of Edinburgh scheme to develop leadership skills and promote the value of teamwork.
Student Council
Each form group elects a representative and one representative from each year group attends the student council meetings which are chaired and run by members of the Sixth Form Head Students. The aim of the Student Council is to ensure that every student in the school has a ‘voice’ and it provides a forum in which all students can discuss issues which affect them on a day-to-day basis and potentially bring about change for the better.
