Batley Buzz

July 2022 Edition 11

Ensuring exceptional outcomes for all.

Our Trust Vision Every young person, regardless of their starting point, or background receives a high quality education, including first class care, guidance and support.

Our Primary News

Cultural Ambassadors St Michael’s C of E School in Wakefield reached out to our Year 6 children to help with their Faith Day, knowing that we have confident young people who are willing to share their faith with others.

Ten children, accompanied by Miss Daji and Mrs Farid, spent the day presenting to the whole school, explaining how important Islam is to them and what it means to their everyday life. They received so many compliments on the way they conducted themselves with confidence and respect. In the future, we would like to invite their ambassadors to Field Lane. This event has proved to be the start of something quite special!

University of Leeds Project Work Year 4 were incredibly lucky to have taken part in a 6 week project conducted by the University of Leeds on infectious diseases.

We have grown microbes in Petri dishes, created our own antibodies complete with an antigen key and antibody prison, studied the effects of pandemics over time and completed independent research on vaccines and the scientists who pioneered them.

Everyone involved loved this project and learned so much. We look forward to seeing our work on display.

Believe Achieve Succeed

A Year 4 class took part in Carry My Story and presented the life story of Abed from Syria. We were all in awe of his life and how he has come to live in Kirklees. Empathy, compassion and understanding of others were emphasised in our drama performance, promoting unity in our community.

Thank you to Tesco for supporting our FareShare scheme. Our Head Girl and Head Boy promoted the scheme at Tesco.

Abed with some of our Y4 pupils, Mrs Mould (Class Teacher) and Reverend Green (School Governor).

Year 6 made flying rockets on the school field, as part of their science investigations.

They certainly are flying high!

Year 5 worked with the artist Andy Singleton for the Change Project.

A fantastic display of work was celebrated at Oakwell Hall.

Our Secondary News

Art Exhibition and Awards We celebrated our annual Art Awards last week, in person for the first time in three years, which included a fantastic exhibition of all the amazing artwork produced by our Year 11 and 13 students this year.

It was brilliant to be able to celebrate the success of all the students of Fine Art, Textiles, Photography and BTEC Art and Design. The success of their work, their impressive energy whether at home, in lessons, out of hours, in holiday coaching. Ultimately their dedication and passion, and endless support for each other. Art has meant so much more than a grade to students this year: it’s become, for many, a way to feel connected to one another and the wider community

Honing Textile Skills Year 8 students have been developing a variety of textile techniques including; applique, foiling, embroidery and fabric pen as a culmination of their work with the Keepin It Real Science Literacy Project, working with Dr Briony Thomas, partner and friend to the school.

Partnership Event On 29 June we were pleased to welcome colleagues from across the Trust, partners, school governors, alumnae and community friends for our first ever Partnership Event to launch this year’s annual review. It was a wonderful evening with speeches and student performances to truly celebrate all we've achieved this year and what it means to be a part of BHGS and the wider Trust family.

Gardening is thriving at BGS! Our Thrive Gardening Group has been working hard to landscape specific areas of the school. This has included some bare patches of ground in front of our creative and performing block.

From this experience, they have learned a lot about teamwork and safety as well as the importance of helping others and why they should be proud of how their school looks. The areas are now much improved thanks to the Thrive group. Hopefully we have some budding green fingers in our midst!

Creative Writing Workshop Creative writer Nik Perring came into school to hold a workshop with some of our Year 9 learners.

During the course of the afternoon, learners explored how to start writing with idea inception, and the possibilities of a narrative, as well as learning about 'The Three Cs'; character, conflict and conclusion.

Our learners all went home knowing they can tell a story and they can think like a writer! Nik was excellent to work with and was so impressed by our talented young people.

A school with distinction We are extremely proud to announce we have been awarded an Eco-Schools Green Flag with Distinction.

We will receive our official flag in September, which we will be flying high! A huge well done to the student Eco-Committee and Lisa Woods for making this happen.

Creative Showcase Event At the end of June, the creatives department held their first ever Creative Showcase. The event was a celebration of the creative talents of our learners across art, photography, music and design technology. There were two fantastic live music performances by Year 9 and 10 learners and awards were given to learners across all year groups for their outstanding achievements in creatives throughout this academic year.

It was fantastic to see so many people attending and supporting the achievements of our young people.

Our Sixth Form News

BG6 Immersion Days

Transformation Fortnight

The BG6 team ran a two day session to give prospective BG6 students a taster of what they can expect to experience when they join in September.

The first day was an academic day where students attended their chosen subject areas and got a taster of both A Level and applied courses. The second day focused on skills and raising aspirations, which involved HE providers, sign language, progress module and enrichment opportunities; allowing the prospective students to experience a flavour of the extracurricular activities BG6 has to offer.

After a challenging three years we’re really pleased to resume the BG6 goal of enriching students' experiences and developing their career opportunities and aspirations through 'Transformation Fortnight’. A two-week dedicated work experience programme for every Year 12 student.

Both days were highly positive and productive.

Discussions with students conveyed how much they enjoyed the interactive sessions and how they were given a real insight into the BG6 curriculum offer.

The new cohort displayed positive behaviour and high levels of maturity across the two days. They show a lot of potential and the hard work of staff involved really helped to make this a successful event.

This is a vital opportunity for our students to gain experience of the working world to guide them in their decisions about careers, develop unique learning experiences and transferable skills to make them as marketable as possible for universities and employers.

Students took on work in a wide range of organisations across Batley, Dewsbury, Leeds, Huddersfield and Bradford.

This included; solicitors, charities, West Yorkshire Police, marketing and tech businesses, engineering companies, council offices, accountancy, healthcare and education sectors, and many more!

Our Curriculum Enrichment

Our family of schools offers a wide range of extra curricular activities.

This greatly enriches our young people's educational experience, and also supports their health & wellbeing.

Our Staff Super Heroes

Alan Brown

Jenni Rose Ashby

Field Lane School Staff Team

Huge congratulations to Alan, our Trust Chief Financial Officer on reaching 40 years of service in education and local government, which demonstrates Alan’s commitment and dedication. It really is an accolade to celebrate.

Jenni is an Early Career Teacher at Healey who has successfully completed her first year of the programme, has made a powerful impact with her Year 2 class and, we are pleased to say, will be remaining as a permanent member of staff at Healey.

For their relentless focus on evidence-informed research driven practice and their work around curriculum pathways.

Despite the staffing challenges they have faced, and being a very small school, they have delivered a number of projects from parent outreach to careers and curriculum management, that has informed a trust wide approach.

BGS Year 6 Residential Team A big thank you and well done to Fatima Patel, Jane Jackson and Leanne Pollard for accompanying Year 6 students on their residential weekend.

Their combined patience and enthusiasm ensured our students had an amazing end to Year 6.

Mark Ecclesby

Kate Seaman

Mark works as IT Technician at BGHS and has been absolutely phenomenal during the exam period. He has supported by downloading and ensuring accessibility of files, as well as photocopying of exam papers to ensure everything ran smoothly during a highly pressured time.

Kate is the Trust Finance Manager and has proved to be a vital asset taking on more responsibilities in recent times. Her calm and committed approach has been brilliant.

Our Community Work … really means a lot to us, and we see our Trust and our schools at the very heart of our community. Community Makes Us and it is the unity in community that matters.

The Great Get Together Weekend BBEST BBEST Hub are campaigning to deliver singing, dancing, instrumental and videography workshops across the BBEST school network, with a view to producing a documentary style film to capture this activity as well as the final performance. You can support by sharing, liking and commenting as well as pledging. For crowdfunding 5x £2 pages are more valuable than one £10 pledge so anything you can spare really does help.

Find out more and get involved: https://www.spacehive.com/birstallbatle ystrongerthemusical

A visual snapshot of all the activity that took place 25-27 June in memory of the wonderful Jo Cox, whose mantra lives on in us all; More In Common.

Careers Hub Two of our secondary schools; Batley Girls’ High School & Upper Batley High School, lead on the Kirklees Careers Hub, and offer support on careers information, advice and guidance across all Kirklees Schools.

We are passionate about providing outstanding careers education for all our young people, and raising their aspirations for the future.

Our wider links Our family of schools Works closely with the BBEST Hub. Check out their website for details of local services, support and activities.

https://bbesthub.uk/About-Us/

We are proud to lead the Yorkshire Rose Teaching Partnership - providing high quality primary and secondary teacher training in West Yorkshire.

This consortium includes 15 local schools, Exceed SCITT and local Higher Education Institutions.

Our schools play a key role in the Calderdale & Kirklees Teaching School Hub. This Hub offers support to over 270 schools across our region.

The purpose of the hub is to provide high-quality professional development for teachers and leaders.

https://www.ckteachingschoolhub.org/

Online support & advice for parents, carers and families.

Childnet International has produced a very informative resource for parents to help you keep your child safe online. https://www.childnet.com/resources/online-safety-activities-you-can-do-from-home

For young people;

For families;

Other specialist services;

Childline Providing help & support for Under 18s.

0800 11 11

NSPCC Free support & advice for parents/carers worried about a young person.

0808 800 500

Get it right from a genuine site Find out which sites are legal for downloading movies, music and games. https://www.getitrightfromagenuinesite.org/

https://www.nspcc.org.uk/

Ask about games Advice and online guides about gaming and PEGI ratings. https://www.askaboutgames.com/

https://www.childline.org.uk/

The Mix Provides essential support for 13-25 year olds.

https://www.themix.org.uk/

Family Lives Free, professional, non-judgemental advice.

0808 800 2222

https://www.familylives.org.uk/

Batley Multi Academy Trust

Batley Multi Academy Trust C/O Batley Girls’ High School Windmill Lane WF17 0LD Telephone: 01924 350080 Website: batleymat.co.uk