Message
Head
Impossible
Proudly
Bury
Anthony
Hilgay
Duchy
Oakington
Babraham -
Stanground
Tilney
Welcome from the CEO
Adrian Ball
Welcome to the Summer edition of We are DEMAT. This issue is a celebration of the successes we have experienced over the past 12 months across all our schools. As you will be aware, our DEMAT Together programme runs extra-curricular experiences at a Trust-wide level to give our children access to opportunities which may not be possible within a single school environment. This term has seen two projects within the programme reach conclusion and I was amazed at the results.
In early June at St Mary’s church in Ely, the DEMAT Together programme opened the first ever DEMAT Together Art exhibition featuring over 250 pieces of art created by pupils from every one of our schools. Over the course of a Friday evening and Saturday morning over 400 parents, grandparents, and casual passers-by popped into the church to view the wonderful displays. You can see images and read more about this on pages 7 and 8.
More recently the DEMAT Together Impossible Questions symposium took place at Cambridge University’s Department of Computer Science and Technology. This event saw the launch of the DEMAT Together Impossible Questions anthology, a collection of curious and unusual questions explored by the authors, who just happened to be pupils from across our schools. This was a fabulous day shared by pupils, parents, teachers, and trustees alike and a real demonstration of how working together can create these additional opportunities.
Over the course of this year 12 of our schools have experienced a visit from Ofsted and had their report published. I’m pleased to confirm that all of these have been graded as good bringing the percentage of schools rated as good or better to 93%, up from 48% five years ago. In addition, we have had three SIAMS inspections, all of which were judged to be meeting the expectations of a church school which we are pleased about. Huge thanks and congratulations for the staff members at each school who have been involved in these inspections.
I hope that you all enjoy the Summer break and I look forward to welcoming everyone back in September for another year of learning, knowing, and leading out.
Adrian Ball Chief Executive
Message from the Chair
Helen Jackson
It is a pleasure to be welcoming you to another edition of our We are DEMAT magazine.
Although being a Trustee can involve a lot of meetings, budgeting and paperwork, it has been a real joy this term to see some of our DEMAT Together initiatives come to fruition. The first was the art exhibition in Ely St Mary’s Church, showcasing work from pupils’ all over DEMAT –many of the exhibits were quite outstanding and it was wonderful to see pupils coming from all over the Diocese with parents and teachers to celebrate their work.
A couple of weeks later was the Symposium on Impossible Questions in which we were heard and read for ourselves some of the children’s own responses to their Impossible Questions, inspired by the talks given by Isabel Thomas. Again, the work was extraordinarily impressive, both for the originality of the questions, the depth of thought in the answers, and the humour and confidence with which the children engaged their readers. I really enjoyed being able to discuss the different contributions with children, their parents, and in particular the staff who had done so much to engage with the project and encourage their children.
We have just appointed two new Trustees with very strong backgrounds in the field of education, to support us in moving forward into the next season of the DEMAT journey. We will be thinking more about this, and what it means to be a Church Trust, at our Trustee Awayday in September. Meanwhile in our schools, you will see from the pages which follow that our staff, pupils and governors across the Trust have much to celebrate as we look back on a very full year.
I do wish you all a very happy, restful and well-deserved summer break.
Helen Jackson Chair of Board of Trustees
Trustees (l-r) John Bradshaw, Helen Jackson and ex Trustee Wendy Garrard at our Art Exhibition
Director of Education
Catherine Lock
As we come to the end of an academic year, it is a good moment to reflect on all we achieved for our children. As I write, we await news of our KS2 outcomes and, while not telling us everything about individual children, they are an important indicator of the hard work that has gone into making sure these children are ready and able to flourish as they move to the next stage of their education. As a trust, we have seen our phonics scores rise again – testament to the excellent work going on in schools to make sure our children have every chance to learn to love reading.
Many schools have worked hard on elements of the curriculum, adopting new approaches to music, DT and a trial of a new, carefully constructed RE curriculum which we’re really excited about. It was wonderful to see the truly accomplished artwork exhibited at St Mary’s church, Ely, and to hear the children speak with knowledge and pride about their work.
Due to the success of the talented and dedicated Phonics Associates, we are delighted to have recruited two new teams of excellent leaders from within our schools to work as English Associates and Maths Hub Leads. We will introduce them further in a future issue – watch this space!
While my team and I continue with training, support and (sometimes!) challenge, it is what happens as a result, in the classrooms with the children, every day that matters –this is where the magic happens! It isn’t just magic, though, and we know that deep thinking, careful planning and showing up every day with the attitude that “this matters” is really what drives our success. As always, I extend my heartfelt thanks to all who have a part in this and wish you all a wonderful summer holiday.
Hub Directors (l-r) Steve Davis and David Barrett in conversation with Catherine Lock
Head of HR
Helen Rothwell
Critical feedback to help shape our future.
Earlier this year, we were pleased to launch a trust-wide staff survey via TeacherTapp.
Keen that all our academies have an opportunity to share their views on several key areas, it was fantastic to see that all our academies took part.
Our response rates were much higher than average for a staff survey; we had 591 responses which is a 56% response rate. Thank you to everyone that took the time to feedback and contribute.
Our approach of working with TeacherTapp was purposeful, as it enabled a third party to capture responses anonymously and summarise findings back to academy leaders. This led to us being able to gain insight into how staff are feeling across the whole of the Trust.
It also provided the ability for us to analyse trends alongside areas we can focus on, noting benchmarks that TeacherTapp gain from surveying over ten thousand staff within education, with the ability for us to compare ourselves to responses within the primary sector.
When releasing the survey, we were wholly appreciative of the challenges our staff have faced in the past but hopeful that some of the significant steps forward taken at a school and trust level will be apparent in the answers. We were therefore encouraged to see that the majority of responses for teachers and support staff were all above the benchmarks.
Most notably, where staff were asked how content they are, our rates were 68% for teachers and 72% for support staff. This means that teachers are in line with the benchmark of 68% and our support staff are 16% higher than the benchmark of 56%.
Whilst these are positive rates, as we continue to implement core aspects within each of the 4 pillars of our people strategy, this question will be revisited with much determination to gain higher results in forthcoming surveys.
Rates are encouraging, but by no means as high, as we would like to see for all our staff.
Our leaders intend to address the lower responses for example, staff feeling they can participate in decision making which was 54% for teachers and 38% for support staff. Likewise, feeling part of a trust was 47% for teachers and 35% for support staff.
With increased communication regarding how Multi-Academy Trusts are seeing significant benefits of sharing of best practice, our trust will continue to support individual schools to be stronger together.
We plan to roll out a follow up survey before the end of term and thank in advance those who complete it. One of the critical components of our People Strategy has been to ‘create a feedback process to gather views from our stakeholders to support in decision making.’ TeacherTapp has helped to embed that trust-wide feedback from staff that builds on every-day feedback within your academy with a shared reason; to improve the lives of our current and future children.
Staff survey 2024
Here are our response rates compared to the National Benchmarks.
Children’s art exhibition
Celebrated in Ely
An Art Exhibition featuring children’s work from over 25 DEMAT primary schools was presented in St Mary’s Church, Ely on 7 and 8 June 2024.
The exhibition was a first for the DEMAT Together initiative and part of a programme of events designed to celebrate the diverse talents of their pupils.
Showing over 200 pieces of art, the successful artists, aged 5-11 years old, were invited for a Private Viewing with their parents on 7th June. The Art Exhibition was also open to the public the following day.
Sally Fisher, Event Coordinator for DEMAT says “We were really excited to present our first ever art exhibition. The standard of entries was extremely high and the enthusiasm of our schools, absolutely amazing. The exhibition created a real buzz with pupils and parents alike and we were delighted to welcome over 400 visitors to the exhibition over the 2 days!”
Visitors to the exhibition were invited to vote for their favourite art exhibit and the winning artists are to receive a special art set as a prize.
The winners are as follows:
Harrison Little Thetford Y4
Jake Ely St Marys Y6
Helena Pathfinder Y6
Alex M St Luke’s Y5
Kitty Ely St Marys Y6
Jacob Thriplow Y5
Jess Guilden Morden Y6
Alex St Luke’s Y5
Aleksandra Orchards Y6
Lorena Ely St Marys Y6
Praise Ermine Street Y5
Edie Ely St Marys Y6
Fariah Little Thetford Y4
Well done to all the schools who took part, we are extremely proud of all your artists for contributing towards such a truly fabulous event.
Impossible Questions
Celebrating our authors of the future
Children from across our schools worked with esteemed author Isabel Thomas to devise a series of impossible questions.
The series was met with great enthusiasm and inspired our young people to get thinking and create some wonderful pieces of work.
Schools collated all the submissions and chose their top three impossible questions. These were then sent to our hub directors for overall judging.
The judges chose 33 impossible questions from the submissions.
The successful children had their writing published in an anthology which they can keep as a special memory of their work.
The selected children, their parents and members of staff from their school, together with staff from our central team and trustees, were invited to a special symposium on Friday 21st June at Cambridge University Department for Computer Science and Technology
After an introduction from Adrian Ball our CEO, there was a keynote address from author Isabel Thomas, whose books and lectures inspired the children’s work. The children and parents alike particularly enjoyed her story of where “snot” comes from, and much hilarity was present when green balloons representing the “snot” were thrown all over the lecture theatre!
Some of our staff then read their favourite Impossible Questions to the delighted audience and then each of our budding authors were invited to the front of the auditorium to be presented with their anthologies to lots of applause.
After the presentations, the authors and their parents were invited to view their work which had been mounted and displayed in a special computer room. After all the excitement they were treated to a delicious lunch kindly laid on by the University. All in all, a fabulous day!
Thanks must go to David Barrett one of our Hub Directors for designing the anthology and to the University of Cambridge Department of Computer Science and Technology for hosting such a wonderful day for us all to enjoy.
Proudly leading out
Tricia Moss – Trust Curriculum Lead
There is so much good work happening in all our schools every single day and we are so proud of the way they welcome colleagues from across the Trust and beyond to share in professional development opportunities.
A huge shout out to all the schools that have welcomed colleagues for our regular professional development sessions. Since January alone, we have had forums, workshops, and open days at: Ermine Street Church Academy, St Luke’s, St Botolph’s, All Saints, William de Yaxley, Little Thetford, Stanground St John’s, Farcet, St John’s, Orchards, Elm and Guyhirn.
Staff feedback has been excellent.
‘I really enjoyed the session with John Walker. He was engaging and entertaining and explained reasons for the way we teach sounds really well. I have a new insight into Latin as well due to the conversation that we had. What I found particularly helpful was how to go about teaching the polysyllabic words in year 6.
This was a really beneficial session, thank you’ (Rebecca Hall, Year 6 teacher).
‘The opportunity to have John in my lesson was fantastic. It was so beneficial for my practice to see the expert example in practice which has given me the understanding of where we can aim to go as a school. The CPD session was really interesting as John was an encyclopaedia of knowledge on both Sounds Write and the development of the English language. All of our specific questions which would otherwise have been difficult to receive clarity on were answered with great detail. It was really engaging’ (Ryan Rouse, Year 5 teacher).
“The introduction of Sounds Write has enabled our youngest children to develop the fundamental skills of segmenting, blending and phoneme manipulation, which has positively impacted on their reading and therefore writing. Children are becoming confident and fluent readers, with a passion for reading.” (Head Teacher - Orchards)
‘It was an honour to welcome John and Tita to Orchards and to benefit from their expertise, which will help us to continue our journey at Orchards.” (Deputy Head – Orchards)
We are also extremely excited to be working with the Primary Knowledge Curriculum team to highlight this curriculum in our Trust. In July, St Botolph’s will welcome colleagues from across the country for our very first PKC open day.
Rachel Rayner, head at St Botolph’s sharing how the PKC curriculum has been implemented at our PKC Showcase for visitors beyond our Trust.
Bury wedding celebrations Reception wedding
Friday 7 June was a big day for the children in Reception at Bury C of E Primary school.
The class, staff, parents and carers walked to Bury Church for a very special ceremony where Reverend Garry Dawson Jones ‘married’ two of the children!
Everyone, including the staff, wore their best clothes and joined in the celebrations. It was a wonderful occasion for the children to learn about ceremonies and how they are conducted in a religious setting.
Our children were beautifully behaved for the entire time and were very respectful whilst in the church.
They enjoyed throwing confetti, to squeals of delight and then tucked in to a wedding breakfast with their family and friends. Finally, they joyously danced their hearts out to finish their exciting day
What beautiful photographs, well done to all involved.
Anthony Curton School dancing delights
Staff and children from Classes 3 and 4 at Anthony Curton School, Walpole St Peter, recently took part in traditional Lithuanian folk dancing.
The event was organised by Wish Dare Inspire, in conjunction with Norfolk County Council and West Norfolk Council, at St George’s Guildhall in King’s Lynn.
Over 570 children from various schools, including home-schooled children, took part in the week-long event.
Looks incredible, what fun! Well done all who took part.
Anthony Curton Gains regional PE award
More news from Anthony Curton School who are delighted to have been awarded an array of regional PE Awards.
• Norfolk PE KS1 Sporting Stars Gold Award 23/24
• Norfolk PE KS2 Sporting Stars Silver Award 23/24,
• School Games Bronze Sports Mark Award for 23/24
The School Games Sports Mark is a government-led award scheme launched in 2012, facilitated by the Youth Sport Trust to reward and recognise schools’ engagement (provision and uptake) in the School Games against a national benchmark and to celebrate keeping young people active.
Pictured, is Year 3 teacher, Lauren Wiles who worked so hard to make this happen.
Fabulous achievement from you all, brilliant news!
Hilgay and Ten Mile Bank Commemorating D-day
On Thursday 6 June, children from Ten Mile Bank and Hilgay Riverside Academies were invited to join the Parish Council, and community, in commemorating the 80th Anniversary of D-day.
The first part of the event took place at Baytree Nurseries in Hilgay, where the children enjoyed a bouncy castle, and delicious food while listening to Hilgay Silver Band. There were displays of rationed foods, and The Good Companions were knitting too!
After that, everyone moved to the War Memorial outside school, where the children read ‘D-day Heroes,’ a poem by Roy Palmer – Chelsea Pensioner and Herald. They also sang ‘Sing’ by Gary Barlow, including sign language for the chorus.
As it grew dark, the children each had a glass lantern, and a parade was held through the tunnel of lime trees along the church avenue, ending at the field where a beacon was lit to coincide with the lighting of many others across the country.
The children all showed great respect for this important event, encompassing the values of our schools. Well done to all of you!
Duchy of Lancaster Trip to London’s West End
Children from Duchy of Lancaster School took part in an incredible trip to London’s West End in June. It was truly a memorable experience for their students.
The day began with the children marvelling at the iconic sights of London from the coach windows – the Tower of London, the London Eye, Tower Bridge, Westminster, and Big Ben. Their excitement grew as they approached the heart of the city.
Upon arrival, they walked to Trafalgar Square, where the children’s impeccable behaviour was commendable as they navigated the bustling streets with a group of 60 students. After a well-deserved lunch break, the class was split into two groups for an engaging musical theatre workshop. The students enthusiastically participated in games, learned theatre techniques, and even created their own scenes, fostering their creativity and teamwork skills.
The highlight of the day was our visit to the Theatre Royal Drury Lane to witness the breathtaking production of “Frozen.” As the curtains rose, the children’s jaws dropped in awe, captivated by the stunning visuals and performances. The experience was truly awe-inspiring and will undoubtedly leave a lasting impression on our young theatre enthusiasts.
The journey home was equally memorable, with a stop at KFC for a well-deserved dinner. Despite the long day, the children’s behaviour remained commendable, a testament to their excellent conduct throughout the trip.
Mepal and Witcham Cricket tournament
Mepal and Witcham School had the privilege of attending a cricket tournament with 10 Year 5 and 6 students.
Working in pairs to bowl, backstop and bat, making teams of 8 players for each match, our children worked hard in all areas, especially when cheering each other on! Their dedication to the team was clear, and they achieved second place in their firstround group.
Throughout the competition, the children’s spirits were high, and they demonstrated the school’s CARE values with great pride, so much so that the children were awarded the Team Spirit and Sportsmanship award! They were all given a competition T-Shirt in recognition of their achievement which the children wore with pride.
We are immensely proud of the children and their special award.
William de Yaxley Sports Day
Sports Day was full of excitement at William de Yaxley, the children took part in shuttle, relay, sack, sprint and egg & spoon races. It was a close competition with 3 different teams taking the lead during the day.
Congratulations to Elgar and Sharman classes for a great performance. They secured the win with 1949 points. We also congratulated Adams and Riley classes who were declared overall interform champions
Parents were also invited to take part in Mums and Dads races which proved incredibly competitive and lots of fun. The fabulous FOWDY (PTA) continued to fundraise by providing breakfast and hot drinks.
Thanks to Seb Hayes, their brilliant sports coach, for organising and running such a wonderful day of sport where the children learned to perform in front of a large audience, win or lose graciously, support and encourage each other and never give up.
Well done everyone, a great sporting event!
St Christopher’s STOP PRESS! King Charles’s underpants
found in Suffolk school
St Christopher’s had an extremely busy and exciting start to their summer term when their early years children found a giant pair of King Charles’s royal underpants hanging from a tree on their school field!
Deciding that the best way to speak to the King about this discovery was to send him a letter, they wrote to Buckingham Palace to share the good news.
The children learned, in his reply, that they were in fact his favourite pair of royal underpants (which he saves for only the finest occasions), that had unfortunately been blown off the royal washing-line by a giant gust of wind! They were thrilled to return this prized possession to his Royal Guards (but not before Mr Smith tried them on first!) and were rewarded with a celebratory Royal Afternoon Tea.
Following this, they delved back in history all the way back to 1215 and learned about the tyrant King John and the Magna Carta.
They found local links between the Abbey in Bury St Edmunds and the signing of the document, and then attempted writing their own rules for the classroom.
They particularly enjoyed role-playing, being both a tyrant and a good king, but found following some of the new rules quite tricky!
Finally, they held their own election campaigns with different ‘parties’ each promoting their own ideas as to how they wished to spend some money on new classroom resources.
Once the polling station opened on the last day of half-term, and everyone had cast their vote, we had a clear winner! They all agreed that it was the fairest way to make decisions and were delighted with their metal detectors.
Goodness, how busy you have all been! It sounds like you all learned so much and had lots of fun this term! Well done everyone!
King Charles’s underpants!
Oakington New play space
At Oakington Primary, a lovely new EYFS (Early Years Foundation Stage) outdoor area has been recently installed
They are delighted that Reception children now have a brand-new area to play and learn in.
Work was completed in May and the children have thoroughly enjoyed exploring and playing in their new space. Oakington are looking forward to displaying the new play space to our next year’s Reception families during their taster sessions.
Babraham Residential to Hautbois Activity Centre
This photograph sums up a successful visit to Hautbois for Babraham UKS2 pupils.
For many of the children, this was their first stay away from home, and everyone fully embraced all the tasks and activities. Whether it was making their own bed, paddle-boarding, abseiling, sweeping the dining room floor after meals or performing in a Talent Show.
Together with Thriplow, Babraham are going to the Isle of Wight in 2025 and are booked to return to Hautbois in 2026!
Residential Trips are so important for all our children, as we educate them to become confident members of society. The bonds they form during the time away from home are unbreakable and such important life skills are learned.
Looks like lots of fun was had by you all.
Stanground St John’s Cultural awareness day
Stanground St John’s Primary School held their annual Cultural Awareness Day at the end of May.
They celebrated the diversity of their school by learning more about different languages spoken by pupils and staff: Languages they learned about included Macedonian, Kurdish, Romanian, Polish, Urdu, Portuguese, and French.
As well as learning about the languages and cultures during the day, the children enjoyed a World Foods buffet feast at lunchtime and after school they opened their doors to our families and different foods from around the world were offered to share.
It was a wonderful opportunity to learn more about each other and a very happy event.
Looks like an enjoyable day was had by all! Well done everyone.
Tilney All Saints Going back in time
Otter Class from Tilney All Saints went to Great Cressingham to experience what it would have been like to go to school in Victorian times. in the Victorian period.
Ma’am, Miss North, taught the children reading, writing and arithmetic supported by Miss Gertrude. The children wrote with slate pencils and slate.
As well as having the chance to play with Victorian toys, the children all had a typical Victorian lunch: bread, cheese, cake, and apples, which were all wrapped in baking paper and tea towels.
The girls then made lavender bags and the boys drew pictures of Natural History objects.
It was a fantastic day and the children (and adults) fully immersed themselves, finding it quite surprising how different school was then!
Well done all of you, looks like a highly informative, and fun, adventure!
DEMAT Together
Programme updates
It has been a very busy term for DEMAT Together, as I am sure it has been in your schools!
We very much enjoyed seeing our Art Exhibition coming together and to see the artwork displayed in all its glory was a joy to behold! We had more than 400 visitors over the two days, eagerly seeking out artwork and having their pictures taken alongside their pieces by their proud families. Our visitors enjoyed touring the exhibition and voting for their favourite artwork! Congratulations to our winners but also many congratulations to all our artists for your wonderful work.
No sooner had the Art Exhibition finished than we moved on to our Impossible Questions Symposium. During the year, schools worked with author Isabel Thomas on a series of explorative lectures looking at their children’s impossible questions and whether they actually were possible!
We had a fabulous response from schools who sent in their pupils’ favourite impossible questions. Thirty of those children were then invited, together with parents and teachers, to come to a special symposium held in the prestigious University of Cambridge Computer Science and Technology Department. The children were delighted to meet Isabel, receive a special printed anthology featuring their work and were very excited to be published authors!
A delicious lunch was provided by the University, and we all finished the day sitting in the sun and basking in the delights of the day, bringing the DEMAT Together programme to a lovely finale for this school year.
Next year is looking extremely exciting! We are kicking off (excuse the pun!) with our Football Tournament on 20 September at Ramsey Colts football ground. We will also soon be sharing with you details of a thrilling collaboration for our next celebration of knowledge with National Trust, Wicken Fen. We will be bringing a series of lectures to schools from acclaimed author and TV presenter Ajay Tegala talking about nature, biodiversity and what we can do to help our planet. Watch this space!
We also have our wonderful Christmas Carol service in Ely Cathedral to look forward to on 2 December, bringing all our schools together to celebrate the meaning of Christmas.
As always please do not hesitate to contact me should you have any suggestions for events, I really do welcome them.
Have a restful summer and enjoy time with your family and friends.
With very best wishes
Sally
