Blog week ending 1st April

This week we celebrated our cultural heritage, traditions and diversity with Cultural Own Clothes Day – and it was such a joyous day of self-expression, identity and ultimately, a display of our happy and multi-faceted community of which we are extremely proud.  Students and staff members chose clothes that they felt represented them whether by cultural heritage, an organisation or group to which they belong or something that they identify strongly with; each donating a £1 to charity (each House will decide its nominated charity next term).  As you can see from the below images we have an extremely culturally rich community!

WG6 Cultural Day report by Year 12 student Meenatchi T

On Wednesday, we had the opportunity to celebrate the range of different cultures that we have in our school community. Our year group, Year 12, decided to take part in the WGSG celebrations and we all went for the most exquisite representation of our cultures that we could. We have a range of cultural backgrounds in our year group, spreading from Europe to Asia to Africa.  It was a showcase of colours, a place for unity and a time for us all to establish and strengthen our bonds with our peers in our year group.  The event was a key day in our WG6 experience and we all really enjoyed it! 

We took some pictures together (featured above) which meant a lot to us as we all could see the physical unity of our cultures and the diversity that we have at our school as a whole. This day reminded me and the rest of the peers of our year group of the inclusivity we have at our school and how broad and accepting the school environment is. It was a great opportunity to connect with teachers and those in your year group that have similar cultures while also having a fun day at school. I hope the school continues to celebrate these cultures because it is what shapes us as the young adults that we are today and it makes the day and our time at school definitely more enjoyable.

As Year 12, we all definitely had loads of fun during our time in cultural day. It was a day to express and embrace the colours of the world while also appreciating your own roots and your culture. It was a blast!

We were privileged to receive a very special guest last week, Rory Steyn, who was Nelson Mandela’s personal bodyguard and head of security.  Rory quickly to grew to respect and admire Mandela and considers him the most important figure in South Africa’s history.  Rory shared his personal experience of living and working with Mandela and really captured, for us, the essence of the great man and exemplary politician and leader he was.  Nelson embodied a clear vision for a united nation with equal opportunities for all of its citizens – regardless of race, religion or gender.  Rory witnessed Mandela working tirelessly, leading by example; championing the rights of children, appointing female politicians, expanding and developing scientific education and research and fighting for peace and justice around the world.  Rory’s insight and continued loyalty to the memory of Nelson Mandela are an inspiration to us all.

Mrs Price our Endeavour MAT Director of Data and Information, attended the event and commented “The clear message for me was that the man we all saw on our TV screens whether shaking hands with presidents, celebrating with the National rugby team or spending time with his family was as exactly as portrayed.  Mandela was the advocate for reconciliation not only for his work to bring about an end to apartheid in South Africa but as a much loved and respected global leader who treated every person he came into contact with kindness and dignity and as an absolute equal”

"Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world."  Nelson Mandela

Below, our Equality & Diversity student leaders and prefects from both WGSG and WGSB met with Mr Steyn ahead of his talk.

Year 11 GCSE Art student, Nina P has produced this stunning cultural identity portrait piece.  The oil painting forms part of Nina’s portfolio of work which has been submitted to the examining board.

“My final piece represents my identity and that I am proud of this. As a Polish and English citizen, I am proud of my culture and proud of both my English and Polish Nationality. I elucidated my nationality by adding ribbons of red (signifying the white and red Polish flag) but also blue which is added to make it seems like the United Kingdom flag. These ribbons are entangled through my hair highlighting that my culture is a part of me. I think that everyone should be proud of their cultural identity as I am proud of mine”

By Nina P WGSG Year 11 ART Student

Mrs Cai, Teacher of Mandarin, leads a WG6 Elective Group where staff and students share recipes and make dishes from around the world.  In this session Mrs Cai and the students made Chinese ‘potsticker’ dumplings.  And I can personally vouch for how delicious they were!

Mrs Triboix-Kamga is a MFL teacher of both French and Spanish.  Her Year 7 students are currently working on their vocabuloury skills.  We are all so excited to be able to begin to plan new school trips to enable our MFL students to practice their language skills and experience different cultures in ‘learning beyond the classroom’ overseas trips.

Mrs Cai’s Y8 MEP students shared with the class details of their culture in terms of their clothes, traditional food and drink and the weather of that country – all in Mandarin! 

Student Leader announcement.  Our Student Leader campaign and election process has been completed .. and the votes have been counted!  I would like to congratulate all of our new Student Leaders who will take responsibility for their new roles from next term.  The campaign process included them all delivering a whole school introduction to state their plans and vision for the role in a bid for student and staff support and votes!  I would also like to sincerely thank all of our current School Leaders for their hard work and for the valuable contributions they have made to school life via the extra-curriculum clubs they have run and for the support they have provided to our students.

Our new student leaders and their areas of responsibility have been confirmed as;

Head Girl - Sydney S

Head Boy – Jordan G

Deputy Head Girl – Lily M

Deputy Head Boy – Will T

Student roles/areas of responsibility;

Careers - Rukayat A & Sydney S

Events - 12A Sharon E, 12B- Mary B, 12C – Amelia E, 12D – Khadeejah N, 12E – Caitlin N

Wellbeing - Temi A & Millie B

Equality & Diversity - Grace P & Abdulrasheed T

Environment - Jordan G & Lily M

Teaching & Learning - Amy O’S & Freya C                                                                                                     

Scholars - Christopher H & Jess N

House Leads

Bader                    Jason M & Deborah A

Franklin               Etti T-M & Daveen B

Hepworth           Moyosola O & Will T                    

Singh                    Ciara G & Shannon B

Pictured below, our new Student Leaders. We will feature introductions from each of our Head Students in the blog after the Easter break.

Our Year 9 Musicians have been working on their composition and performance skills using the software app BandLab which enables them to create and produce their musical ideas and tracks.  Students have been exploring a range of musical styles, different instruments and singing styles as they ‘find their musical sound’ and create their finished piece of music.  Pictured below, students practising and recording pieces, together and individually.

Mrs Dent, our Head of Music, is looking to offer a range of lunchtime and potentially afterschool opportunities for students to enjoy and develop their musical range. She is currently hoping to appoint some “Music Perfects” to assist in the Guitar, Ukulele, Singing and Keyboard Clubs.  If you’re interested in finding out more, please speak to/email Mrs Dent.

Easter Egg Maths!  Across our Year 7 classes this week students (really!) enjoyed an egg-cellent Mathematical challenge involving Cadbury Crème Eggs!  In groups, students calculated their and their teacher’s height in crème eggs as well as working out how many crème eggs would fit under their desk and what percentage of the egg is the crème goo.  Below, students measuring Mrs Atkins Crème Egg height as well as other calculations and a little ‘quality control’!

We would like to wish all of our families a wonderful and enjoyable time with friends and family, and to those of faith, who will be marking Easter Holy week, Ramadan and Passover we wish you a blessed and joyous time.

We will welcome all students back to school after the Bank Holiday Monday on Tuesday the 19^th April.

Best wishes,

Michelle Lawson

Head Teacher