Corporate Session | Competency Reference

 

On Monday 27^th April 2015, a number of our year 12 students, who participate in the ENVISION programme, attended a Competency Reference session lead by Tim Knappett and Charles Lea from ENVISION. The session was centred round the efforts of the volunteering staff from Interserve, who continue to work with the school to help develop our students’ personal skills.

Interserve is one of the world’s foremost support services and construction companies. They are listed in the FTSE 250 index and have gross revenues of £3.3 billion and a workforce of circa 80,000 people worldwide

As part of the corporate session, which took place in our new £1.6 million Sixth Form Centre, the coaches from Interserve circulated round the teams and took turns sharing their personal success stories; as well as the best advice they were given to help overcome their challenges. The next phase of the session involved the Interserve coaches acting as Personal Skills Advisors, during which they engaged the students in a conversation about the work they did in order to deliver their projects.

The information gathered from each student will then be used to write a Personal Competency Reference that will serve to showcase the skills developed whilst carrying out their projects. This will then be presented to the students in the form of a Competency Reference Certificate, which they can use when applying for jobs and University places in the future.

 

 

On Saturday 25 April 2015 a group of Year 7 students headed to the National Space Centre in Leicester. This was a visit organised for the people that had attended the extra-curricular Science Club. We left school at about 10am on Saturday and we had arrived by 11am. We checked in and received our tickets. Mr Jones then announced that we had free time, which meant that we could explore for ourselves in groups. We had about an hour to look around the exhibits before meeting again near the globe (a very big model of the planet Earth) so that we could all go into the Sir Patrick Moore Planetarium to see a film called ‘We are aliens’.  After lunch we made our way to the 3d Simulator where, after having a ‘mission briefing’, enjoyed a ride during which we saw and felt all the crashes and the movements that happen in space travel. When the ride was over Mr Mohsin told us it was time to go, after a great day out.

Yashryan Singh Mahi 7W

Four of our highest achieving Year 13 A Level Chemists were recent participators in the Royal Society of Chemistry’s Chemistry Olympiad.

The Chemistry Olympiad is a nationwide competition, testing the best and brightest young Chemists. The competition is based on real world Chemistry problems and can often stimulate much debate, raising awareness of what Chemistry is all about. It provides a good opportunity to develop some of the skills required for study at University and beyond. Our four budding Chemical Engineers came out with their heads held high; (from left to right) Mohammed Atteq Ullah and Donte Nembhard both achieved a Silver Award. Dhanish Amin and Manish Bains both achieved a Bronze award.

Congratulations to all four boys.

Mr M Mohsin

On Monday March 16^th we left school early to beat the traffic on our way down to Devon for our AS and A2 Geographical Skills & Fieldwork Investigation which accounts for 15% and 30% of the A Level qualification respectively.

Students were quick to take advantage of the views on our way down which included spotting the numerous solar farms alongside the M5 and the beautiful south Devon towns such as Totnes, which is a Transition Town; one which is working toward zero use of oil and in general trying to find ways of living that are in line with our earth’s natural systems.  Our Year 12s kept the drivers entertained by the discussions which ensued!

Our long journey was rewarded with a walk along Start Bay.  We learnt about the history, geology and ecology of the area.  Did you know that Operation Tiger was a pre-D-Day training exercise which took place here?  The day ended nicely with a three course dinner and free-time to play table tennis, investigate the local area and generally chilling-out in the common room.

On Tuesday the Year 12s visited the River Harborne – a tributary of the River Dart – to collect data on wetted perimeter, hydraulic radius and the gradient of the valley. They also had chance to use geographical information systems to evaluate flood defences at Harbertonford.

The Year 13s went back to the coast to study the change in vegetative communities as a result of succession on exposed coastal sand.  They had the best of the weather, but we had more fun as we witnessed Narvair’s histrionics due to a hole in his wellington!

On Wednesday we headed to Plymouth to assess the differences in the characteristics of urban areas and the implication this has for the access different people have to education, employment opportunities, freedom from crime and so on.  As part of this we studied the recently gentrified Royal William Yard, the former Royal Navy depot with grade 1 listed naval buildings and stunning views over the waterfront.  Discussions followed as to who would or could live in such an up-market area and whether the Urban Splash development would stand the test of time.

We had an early start on Thursday so that we could get packed up and ready for the off before squeezing in our last bit of Geography.   The A2 students headed out to nearby woodland which served as useful revision for their Ecosystems unit of work while AS students took a tour round the centre and learnt about the various renewable forms of energy, including a geothermal borehole and biomass boiler. Did you know that the ground below 6 meters maintains a nearly constant temperature between 10 and 16⁰C?

Ms Wharton and I would like to say a big thank you to all 27 of our 6^th Form Geographers.  We had early starts and were still in classrooms at 830 pm, yet there was no moaning, they were punctual and impressed the Field Studies Staff with their inquisitive minds and good sense of humour.  Well done!  We hope your hard work pays off in your exams.

Mr Bird & Ms Wharton.