Gender assembly

Mrs Cox led a very powerful assembly this week on the theme of sexism and appropriate language. In part, the assembly was arranged because we have had a number of reports of inappropriate language being used around school, particularly from students in the older year groups. I am aware that students often use slang and they are increasingly unable to distinguish when it’s appropriate to use it. In addition they can use professionally and socially unacceptable words without considering venue and occasion! Specifically, the assembly focused on gender related vocabulary and some students seemed surprised that we have warned them that these words, descriptions or phrases are not acceptable in school. The student equalites group have been raising the profile of this and other themes of the last few months and they have already taken a whole school assembly, appointing ambassadors and speaking to the governing body. I will ask Mrs Cox to circulate the pp slides Please do take the time to discuss this with your children at home.

CPS

This week is an important one for Cathedral Primary School. The planning committee meets on Wednesday 18th at 6pm at the Colston Hall to make as decision about the permanent site within the basement of the library. The arguments have been in the public domain for some time now and I will not repeat them here. However, there is no doubt that the development of the campus, the sharing of staff, resources and knowledge will benefit both BCCS and CPS. Please do feel free to attend and show your support, the meeting is open to the public.

Sixth Form and school day

Please be reminded that there will be another opportunity to discuss the sixth from project on Monday 9th March. 7pm in the Cresswell Centre. We will also organise an open event to discuss the proposed changes to the timing of the school day before the holidays. I have begun discussing both subjects with students and have really enjoyed listening to their questions and comments.

More politics. A broad and balanced curriculum.

Thank you to all those parents who came along to the consultation 6th form evening last Wednesday. I understand that the debate has continued this week and I have spoken to a number of parents since the evening. I will take the time to discuss the issue with students over the coming days and will let you know about further planned events. Thursday was eventful. As well as the astonishing concert in the Cathedral (congratulations again to all involved) we welcomed Tristram Hunt, Shadow Education Minister to the Cresswell centre. It was interesting to hear about a possible direction for education after the election in May. It is the first time that I have hear a figure quoted in relation to budgets, a 7% cut over the span of the next parliament was suggested as realistic. That will be a challenge for all schools! He was also asked about the findings of the Warwick Commission report, the future of cultural values. Over the last decade there has been a 50% drop in GCSE entries for DT and 23% for Drama. The other arts are equally in decline. This may be to do, in part with the English Baccalaureate and the introduction of progress 8. Schools are being encouraged to ensure that all students take History, Geography and a Language. Mr Hunt mentioned History as being an important subject, I agree but no more so than RE or Music (not on the list!) “There are major concerns that the educational system is not focusing on the future needs of the cultural and creative industries and the broader needs for inn ovation and growth,” the commission said. For me a broad and balanced curriculum must include the subjects that help us to understand the world and its people. We should also be providing a curriculum relevant to the needs of the students we teach. No two schools are the same.

Bullying!

I hope everybody has had a good half term. The next term is always a challenge particularly with an early Easter as we only have five weeks until the holidays begin again! I wonder if anyone managed to catch the BBC programme ‘The Gift’ earlier this week, if not I recommend it to all students and parents. It focused on the impact of bullying for victim and perpetrator. I am sure that it will be used in PSHE lessons in the near future. All schools have bullying and BCCS is no different, we must be constantly vigilant raising awareness at every possible moment. There is no legal definition of bullying but we have our own definition at BCCS: http://www.bccs.bristol.sch.uk/Home/BCCSOnline/Community/Policies/Anti-Bullying-Policy I hope that as many parents as possible can join us for the joint concert with Churchill Academy this Thursday at 7:30 in the Cathedral. It promises to be a wonderful evening. In addition I hope that you will be able to join us in the Cresswell Centre on Wednesday when we begin our consultation process for the joint sixth form application with CGS. The presentation begins at 7pm and there will be time for questions. All parents and students are welcome.

Changing Bristol

Thanks to Mr Moreton for organising the conference last week focusing on extremism and radicalisation. I attended most of the day and we all learned a great deal. We had presentations from some excellent key-note speakers and I was also pleased that so many of our sixth form students were able to attend. We were joined by representatives from most Bristol schools and a number of others from other local areas. There are a number of high profile cases in Bristol including that of a student at City Academy who disappeared without warning for Syria before Christmas. The school governors met on Thursday for an away day. This is an annual event that in previous years has been held in different schools around Bristol. Over recent years we have visited: City Academy Bridge Learning Campus Oasis Brightstowe Merchants Academy Gordano School This year our governor Edward Benzecry kindly hosted us in his offices across the road from the school .The office is on the top floor of 2 College Square and affords a wonderful view of the school. On the agenda, the proposed sixth form development bid and the timing of the school day. I am anxious to discuss both of these issues with parents and students over the coming weeks and months and hope to see as many as possible in our first discussion on 25th Feb at 7pm in the Cresswell Centre. Education in changing rapidly and Bristol is not immune.

Training Day, Politics and Extremism.

The staff training day on Friday focused on data and extremism! Quite a contrast! The data aspect is really about student performance, knowing your school, class and individual children. Teachers are now able to complete electronic seating plans for their classes complete with data about progress, SEN etc. Staff spent a good deal of time in departments discussing class profiles ensuring that we have the answer to the following questions. Who are underperforming? Which students need to be stretched and challenged more often? What are we doing about it? How are we communication these actions? We also considered how we might encourage reading more particularly among boys. For one of the initiatives staff have been asked to recommend a book for display on classroom doors. There are a number of other recommendations and I will complete a separate post on this issue. A number of students in year 11 also joined staff on Friday re-drafting English coursework. In the afternoon session we were joined by a representative from Special Branch, who asked us to consider how schools can be encouraged to spot the signs of extremism, in all its forms. Essentially this is a child safeguarding issue and prompted a useful debate. On Tuesday BCCS host a radicalisation and extremism conference aimed at raising awareness for all schools in Bristol. We had a wonderful sixth form event last week in the Cresswell Centre. Representatives from all the main political parties were invited for a Question Time event with all members of the sixth form, We were also joined by some students from CGS. The students asked questions to the panel who were predictably divided in their opinions. Students voted at the end. A clear winner was the representative from the Green Party, Darren Hall with the Lib Dems in second place.