Friday 5th November 2021
I hope you all had a wonderful half term break and managed to get some time together with your families.
The return to College started on Monday with a Trust Wide virtual INSET day for all staff within the Magna Learning Partnership; the highlight being a Keynote Speech from Tom Sherrington, a renown teaching consultant who aims to work with teachers and school and college leaders to explore and implement contemporary educational ideas that help deliver excellent all-round education for all young people. The day was very successful and well received by our staff. Teachers focused on expert practice in the classroom and how we can support and maximise our interactions with all our young people to ensure that any gaps in learning are closed.
We hope that students that have had a disrupted week for travel due to the rail line closure to Salisbury have been able to continue their learning effectively by joining lessons online. We will be actively encouraging staff to check the learning with students next week and support any issues that may have arisen.
Our Student Union met again this week to discuss a range of events and also teaching and learning in the college. They have been presented with materials that will support all our students to develop effective testing routines of knowledge in their Independent Study time. In the coming weeks we will explore how these materials will be used and shared with students, and will send these to parents as a reference to support strong study habits at home.
The college community currently has a very small number of reported positive Covid cases from tests taken during the half term break. We are not at or approaching the threshold to have to consider bringing in stricter regulations, but continue to monitor closely in the event that we will have to revert back to mask wearing in communal areas. All deep cleaning of the building and sanitation has continued and the students are behaving very maturely in their interactions with each other. Testing kits continue to be available for students to collect from reception, and we strongly encourage students to report their results on the NHS app to allow accurate data to be collected from the college.
This half term, like many others, is a busy one, and includes our second Open Evening on Tuesday 23rd November. If you know of friends and family who are exploring the opportunities for their young person’s next stage in education, please book to attend the evening and see what wonderful facilities and teaching staff have to offer here at the 6th Form College. Bookings can be made via our website at; https://www.salisbury6c.ac.uk/study-with-us/open-evenings/
I hope you have a wonderful Bonfire Night this evening and have an enjoyable weekend.
Louise
Head of College
Exams Officer – Lisa Lucas
The resits for GCSE Maths and English and the Cambridge Assessment entry examination have run smoothly this week. There were obviously some nerves and for the majority of students; particularly as due to the pandemic, this was their first experience of sitting an External Exam.
Well done to all students who had exams this week, most of whom were well prepared, adhered to exam regulations and were polite and receptive to instructions. There is one paper left for Maths GCSE on Monday. So good luck to those students sitting this paper.
InvestIN – Rosie Roberts, Career Lead and School Liaison
InvestIN runs immersive career experience programmes for students aged 12-18 in over 28 industries and this year they are bringing their most popular programmes to more UK cities. If your young person is interested in Medicine, Law, Investment Banking, Psychology or Engineering, then these regional weekend programmes could be perfect.
In addition, parents in the College community can attend their free-of-charge event for teachers and parents at the University of Bristol at 6pm on 23rd November to launch these events.
The evening will aim to not only provide information about these opportunities, but also offer tailored careers advice and complementary resources to students.
Parents and teachers can sign up for the event here.
Volunteering at S6C – Steve Price, Teacher of Business
As we reported in our previous Weekly Updates, we have Volunteering Club as part of our Clubs and Societies on a Wednesday afternoon. The group is working on assisting students at WyvernStEds. But we were keen to know, are we seeing an impact of the work we are doing, not only on the organisations we support, but the students themselves who are volunteering?
It is very early days in the project and we shall do a formal review at the end of Autumn Term 2. Anecdotal feedback from WSE is that the S6C students bring energy and drive to the sessions they support, that they are outstanding role models for their students and that the link we are trying to establish is starting to embed.
The impact of volunteering on the students themselves has been significantly positive, attendance each week is at 95% plus, students on discussion enjoy their experience and WSE value their support and hard work(Two students now run an additional homework support group on a Wednesday) The key highlight though has been the growing sense of ‘belonging’ in the group and the development of relationships amongst themselves and the staff involved. Great work Volunteering Members!
Baking Club – Dr Sally Tye, Faculty Lead for Humanities (and baking extraordinaire)
This week at the Baking Club students learned how to make a white chocolate malteser cheesecake.
Over the next few weeks we will be looking at some Christmas recipes, including a delicious mince meat recipe with my secret ingredient! Great to enjoy yourself, or make in a decorative jar and give as a Christmas present. Remember it is time to get your Christmas Puddings prepped too!
Here are students Erin Penn and Madeline Woods’ wonderful and scrummy looking efforts at the malteser cheesecake.
