The ‘Schools within Schools’ System
Our ‘Schools within Schools’ system is an innovative way of combining the pastoral and academic sides of academy life.
Students belong to a tutor group with peers of their own year group. Each tutor group is then assigned to one of our 4 schools: Attenborough, Hawking, Shelley and Turing. The school is led by a Head of School who, as Assistant Principal, is a member of the Senior Leadership Team. On this pastoral side of side of the system, the Head of School leads their team of Tutors to support students’ academic and social progress.
The Schools provide a platform for students to work with peers from different year groups. In this respect it is very much like a traditional ‘House System’. Students compete against each other in ‘inter-School’ competitions, raise money for their designated charity, operate a separate School Council and appoint Student Leadership Teams who help support the running of their School. The system offers more opportunities for students to become engaged and support the Aspirations Framework including the ‘3 Guiding Principles’ and the ‘8 Conditions That Make a Difference’.
In supporting the academic side of Academy life, the Head of School also acts as Line Manager to the Subject Co-ordinators that are within their School. The teachers from these subjects act as the Form Tutors within that School. This system makes communication easier in a large Academy. The names of the four Schools were chosen by students and named after an influential person, linked to one or more of the subjects associated with that School:
Attenborough: Humanities and Performing Arts.
Hawking: Science and Technology.
Shelley: English and Modern Foreign Languages.
Turing: Maths and Sport