School News

School News Issue 23: 6 March 2020

Year 9 PSHE careers lessons Mrs Turner

Highfields year 9 students have been involved in a workshop on ‘Employability skills and the Local Labour Market’ to complement their careers and options programme.

The Work and Pensions School’s Advisor delivered the workshop, informing students about the importance of "first impressions" and how to conduct themselves in an interview. Students then researched job roles in the local area to increase their understanding of why it is important to follow the ever changing job market.

Learning Unlimited have also delivered a workshop on Apprenticeships. An overview of apprenticeships was given along with how to apply for them with examples of “good” and “bad” application forms. The importance of gaining work experience was highlighted to the students.

Useful links for Apprenticeships are listed below:

Learning Unlimited website: https://www.learningunlimiteduk.com/find-your-apprenticeship/what-is-an-apprenticeship/

Institute for Apprenticeships: https://www.instituteforapprenticeships.org/apprentices/

Find an apprenticeship (application website) https://www.gov.uk/apply-apprenticeship https://www.getmyfirstjob.co.uk

Year 9 students have also been introduced to the careers programme START, so they can access further information for their decision making and career planning.

Saltmine Theatre Company perform ‘Switch Up’

This week on Tuesday and Wednesday years 7-10 watched a drama presentation by Saltmine Theatre Company that is currently touring all Derbyshire Secondary Schools called "Switch Up".

Switch Up Meet best mates Dan and Jay, are about to finish school and considering their career options. Dan is a rapper starting to gain exposure; Jay is an aspiring footballer with forthcoming trials for professional clubs. Both are desperate to leave ‘The Wood’, the estate where they live where gangs, crime and violence are the norm. But everything changes when Dan is robbed by a gang and seeks revenge by joining a rival gang – and Jay reluctantly tags along. The pressure is on – rival gangs start to threaten, tensions rise and the boys must decide whether or not to carry a knife. Will this situation force one of them to Switch Up?

The thought provoking performances were well received by the students. The workshops that followed each performance taught students about the practical actions to take if someone is stabbed and demonstrated what a police "Stop and Search” is, why they happen and how to respond if you are stopped.

Although events like this are extremely rare in our area it was really useful information for our students to have explained to them, especially for older students as they are likely to start to explore cities like Derby, Nottingham and Sheffield more independently over the next few years.

The workshops ended with a piece of performance poetry by one of the actors which really challenged students to think about their identity and the person they want to become in the future.

Some visitors from Derbyshire County Council joined year 8 to watch the performance on Wednesday afternoon and it was lovely to receive fantastic feedback from them about the excellent behaviour and mature responses from our year 8 students during the performance.