School Prospectus
Holyhead School Prospectus
Thinking of joining the Holyhead family?
If you are a parent/carer of a Year 6 student, we hope very much that you will decide to choose Holyhead as the secondary school for your son/daughter.
Your child’s present primary school has already sent you information about how to make your choice. You now have to decide.
We know that this can be difficult but you can make it easier by visiting schools. Do not decide before looking for yourselves and asking questions on your visits.
• What are the school’s values and how do they compare to those of my family? Is this a school that will support my child’s development in the way I wish?
• Is this a school where teachers and all staff are challenged and supported to continually seek improvement for the benefit of the students?
• What is communication between the school and parents like, and how easy is it for me as a parent to stay in touch with my child’s education?
• What about examination results and the needs of the most able students?
• Does the school really care about all its students, particularly those with special needs?
• What about opportunities beyond the classroom? How does the school provide students with chances to stretch their learning, develop leadership skills through student voice and to experience things they have never had the chance to yet?
Please note that Holyhead has been oversubscribed for the past nineteen years so it is important that you make Holyhead your first choice if you are to have the best chance of gaining a place at this school for your child.
Welcome from the Principal - Dave Knox
Thank you for taking the time to visit Holyhead School. I am exceptionally proud to welcome you to our school and hope that you will leave with a sense of warmth and confidence that we are the right place for your child to continue their education next year.
We are a school that is proud of our track record in terms of academic performance through examination results progressing to high quality courses and employment beyond Holyhead when our students leave us, and our strong Ofsted reports. More importantly, the local community recognise the value of our work and consequently there is a high demand for school and Sixth Form places.
We are a forward looking, energetic school with a commitment to continually develop our teachers to help to support the young people whose futures we are fortunate to be entrusted with. There is always a high level of interest in our work and I am very proud of the strong reputation that we have both locally and nationally.
Our students are entitled to a first-rate education. Our curriculum is a broad, balanced and inclusive one, designed to reflect our diversity, ensuring that our students can learn and experience the best of all subject areas, and reflects the cultures and stories of our community as part of that. It is global curriculum with a heartbeat in Handsworth.
It is also a curriculum with a high focus on reading, literacy and oracy and has a specific aim of providing an equity of opportunity so that disadvantaged students thrive.
This will enable them to prosper in a competitive world outside our walls. We promote and prioritise excellence, adults equipping students with the characteristics that are necessary for success in a rapidly changing society. We Teach What Matters.
We are not a school that measures itself solely on positions in league tables (although students make excellent academic progress). Instead, we pride ourselves on the children who develop character including confidence and resilience to steer them towards a future where they will contribute positively to their families, the community and wider society. That is our mission.
There is a magic to Holyhead we must preserve and celebrate every day There is a genuine commitment to listening and building relationships that underpins everything we do. Setting and upholding high expectations in all aspects of school life are essential to raising achievement and aspirations, whilst the importance of communicating positively and purposefully with parents and carers is clearly understood as a major factor in the best interests of every child.
We are all working hard to take the school to even greater heights and the real challenge for us is to ensure that the whole community, parents/carers, students and staff work in harmony to further raise aspirations and standards in the years to come.
If you share our vision and values, we would love to tell you more.
Our Mission, Vision & Values at Holyhead
Mission = What is our fundamental purpose at Holyhead? What do we do and how do we do it?
Opening doors and inspiring futures in the heart of Handsworth
Vision = What do we want to achieve in the future (our long-term aspirational goal), and why do we want to work towards this?
Holyhead serves and represents Handsworth and should be its premier school. A culture built on graft, intelligence and a sense of purpose leads our highly committed staff to make a lasting difference to the community.
We tackle barriers and build aspirations, believing every student deserves the best education and can achieve greatness as agents of change in our community and beyond. We celebrate diversity and strive to develop global citizens rooted in Handsworth.
Aligned with Central Region Schools Trust’s mission to promote social justice, our work to ‘Teach What Matters’ must lead to the highest outcomes for all students, both academically and socially.
At Holyhead we pull together, we learn together and we achieve together.
Values = What are the ethics and principles that should guide our actions and behaviour as a school community?
Respect
Respect for self, others and the school environment are key to our relationships, and a shared sense of pride in our school.
Responsibility
Accepting ownership for our decision making, actions and learning is key to our growth and success.
Courage
Excellence
Striving to be our best will help ensure the most positive outcomes for all
We must always seek to show courage, knowing that mistakes are a fundamental part of learning or to always do the right thing in spite of external pressures.
A Level and GCSE Exam
Results 2023/2024
A Level Results
BTEC/Level 3 Results
GCSE Key Categories
Children at Holyhead: The Transition Phase
The transfer from primary to secondary school is a very significant stage in a child's life and needs to be carefully and sensitively planned and carried out.
At Holyhead we take a number of positive measures to ensure that the move is a relaxed and pleasant experience for everyone. For example:
• All students are visited in their own primary schools by at least one of our transition team and by one or more of our Student Transition Ambassadors;
• All students will have visited Holyhead during their final year at primary school for at least two full days and, in some cases, for longer than this;
• The teachers at the primary schools are fully consulted about each of our students with regard to both academic and personal progress.
All of the above steps are taken to ease the process of settling down in a large comprehensive school. In addition, the child's Form Tutor will develop a caring and knowledgeable relationship with him/her and help guide the whole class through all the new experiences and exciting opportunities ahead.
At Holyhead all Form Tutors stay with their class right through the school to Year 11. This helps to create a very positive relationship between teacher and child.
A Caring Learning Environment
Holyhead expects high standards of behaviour and self-discipline in order to enable effective teaching and learning to take place. We seek to create a caring learning environment by promoting self-esteem and mutual respect, ensuring fairness of treatment for all, promoting early intervention with any problems and encouraging positive relationships with parents and carers. We provide a safe environment in which each individual can feel valued and make progress. Disruptive behaviour, violence, bullying and any form of harassment is not tolerated.
In order to enforce these principles a range of sanctions and rewards are clearly defined in our Behaviour Policy and these procedures are rigorously adhered to. We believe that an ethos of positive relationships, encouragement and praise, both informal and formal, to individuals and groups. are central to the promotion of good behaviour and academic progress. This has a motivational role in helping students to realise that good behaviour is respected, expected and valued. Sanctions are employed with certainty to deal with inappropriate behaviour in such a way that students have a clear understanding why the sanction is being applied and what changes in behaviour are needed to avoid future sanctions.
Students are expected to treat others with courtesy, kindness and respect; take pride in themselves and their work and make the most of their time at school. Ensuring these high standards are met is key to our success.
Attendance at school
At Holyhead, we value the co-operation of parents/carers in ensuring that your child attends on time each day
High attendance contributes positively to attainment, wellbeing and the wider life changes of young people, therefore, attendance is a top priority at Holyhead and will be monitored very closely
We will contact you if your child has been absent and we have not heard from you. In addition, we operate a ‘truancy call’ which consists of a text message on a mobile or a message on an answer machine informing you if your child has not registered during their first lesson of the day. This helps you and us to keep a check on attendance and possible truancy.
May we respectfully remind parents/carers that it is, in law, the responsibility of parents/carers to ensure that their children attend school.
What we study, when and how?
Daily timetable
All students follow our timetable which also includes the scheduled times for break and lunch.
8:40 am
8:45 am - 9:10 am
9:10 am - 10:25 am
Gates close - all students on site
Tutor Time / Assembly
Period 1 lessons
10:25 am - 10:45 am Break
10:45 am - 12:00 pm
12:00 pm - 1:15 pm
Period 2 lessons
Period 3 lessons
1:15 pm - 2:00 pm Lunchtime
2:00 pm - 3:15 pm
3:15 pm
Key Stage 3 Curriculum
All students in Year 7-9 will follow courses in:
English Mathematics
PSHCE
Art
Physical Education
Science
French/Spanish
ICT
Music
Period 4 lessons
School ends
Geography
History
Religious Studies
Drama
Food & Nutrition
Homework
At Holyhead, homework is set on a regular basis and we do ask parents/carers to check that students are completing work as well as providing encouragement and support where needed.
In every subject, each student will be a member of a Google Classroom. The deadline(s) for all homework tasks are posted in the classroom, as well as any messages relating to homework.
It is important that students ensure that they check the Google Classrooms regularly as much of the work provided enhances and extends the work completed in school, helping them to be able to know more and remember more.
If parents/carers have any queries about the homework, we encourage them to contact the school to discuss this.
Google Classroom
Google Classroom is the online learning platform we use here at Holyhead School. Your child will have a Google classroom for every lesson and on there you will find:
1. Lesson materials
2. Revision/exam practice materials
3. Homework (All homework activities should be posted on Google Classroom)
4. Enrichment and extend your learning (Includes relevant videos, extended reading articles, links to websites to help with your child’s learning.)
Chromebooks
All students coming into Year 7 will receive a Chromebook on loan from the school. They will be expected to bring the Chromebook into school every day, ensuring they have charged it the night before if required.
Parents/carers will be invited into school around early September to collect their child’s Chromebook. This involves ensuring that they understand the terms of the loan, and signing a Holyhead School Chromebook Loan Agreement before we can issue them.
The Chromebook remains the property of Holyhead School during the period of the loan, which will last until the end of Year 11 (Year 13 if your child joins Sixth Form with us).
Reading at Holyhead
At Holyhead, reading lies as a core feature within lessons throughout all subjects, developing students' disciplinary literacy. In addition to this, we are also keen to promote students' love of reading. Students are assessed twice a year for their reading ability and this is used to identify any barriers to learning and provide support through a wealth of intervention programmes.
All Holyhead students have access to a wealth of resources in our school library, reading books in tutor time as well as an online library via Sora. This is a user-friendly app that students can access on their chromebooks, phone or tablet. This gives access to thousands of online books and audiobooks through our virtual online library; for both reading for pleasure and for class based assignments. For more information, please see our website: http://www.holyheadschool.org.uk/parent-carers/reading-for-pleasure
Enrichment Activities
Enrichment is a big part of Holyhead’s ethos and culture and we endeavour to ensure all of our students have a wide range of enrichment activities to participate in.
The are many and varied enrichment activities on offer and they are open to all students. These take place at lunch time as well as after school.
An Annual Enrichment Fair is held to which all students in Year 7 are invited to go along and see what activities are available. They are encouraged to sign up to attend and are given special passes to enable them to access the activity/activities.
A full list of enrichment activities will be available on our school website : https://www.holyheadschool.org.uk/about/enrichment-activities
Visits and Trips
Character Education is another key part of our Personal Development work and students follow a coherent plan for their year group.
As a part of their personal development, we believe that visits and trips away from Holyhead are very important as part of each child's development. We continue to arrange and subsidise trips and visits and ask that parents/carers continue to support them. We believe that a residential experience can be extremely beneficial to all students and we endeavour to provide at least one such experience per year during your child’s time with us.
Behaviour and Attitudes
At Holyhead, we Teach What Matters, to foster a community spirit centred on respect between adults and children, and built on the foundation of strong relationships. We expect students to take responsibility for their learning, effort and personal organisation, as well as their behaviour across the school. We seek to develop student resilience, knowing that mistakes should be learned from in the search for our best at all times. We want a culture where everyone not only strives for excellence, but has the support to achieve it too.
We believe exceptional attitudes, behaviour and relationships will be achieved by:
● Developing character and positive attitudes through RESPECT, RESPONSIBILITY and EXCELLENCE
● Encouraging self-regulation
● A clarity of expectations being consistently applied through well rehearsed routines
● Staff creating a positive climate for learning enabling all students to succeed
● Staff and students being proud to be part of the Holyhead community
Students will have the opportunity to participate in everyday life at school which will enable them to receive a range of positive points celebrating their achievements and successes. On the flip side poor/negative behaviour is not tolerated and will be sanctioned by reflective conversations and detentions.
Reflective conversations are at the forefront of our approach to improving student behaviour. It is important that students are able to have reflective conversations about how their behaviour has impacted their own learning and the learning of others. Such conversations will allow both parties to have their say but more importantly, they will give an opportunity for actions to be formulated that will avoid the repeat of negative behaviours and allow for a fresh start next lesson.
Further information about the Holyhead’s expectations regarding student behaviour is detailed in the Behaviour Policy which is available on the school’s website.
School Rules
Rules and routines at Holyhead play an important part of our culture around high expectations, consistency and certainty. We do insist that our students are polite and respectful at all times and hard working and attentive in class. We emphasise the importance of Respect, Responsibility and Excellence at all times with students and staff alike.
We take bullying very seriously at Holyhead and any incidences are dealt with swiftly by staff as we take a zero tolerance approach to such behaviour. We urge students to tell a member of staff or Senior Student immediately if they feel that they have been bullied and ask that parents/guardians inform us if they feel worried about any such incidents.
Mobile Phones and Devices
The school rules are that student mobile phones must not be visible anywhere on the school site.
Mobile phones, earpods or headphones must be ‘off and away’ as soon as students enter the school site and at all times, any mobile phone or device seen or heard will be confiscated, this includes mobile phones on display in shirt pockets etc
Should a student be seen using a mobile phone on the school premises it will be confiscated and handed back at the end of the day for a first offence. If a student has their phone or device including ear phones/pods confiscated more than once in a half-term they will need to hand over their phone at the start of each day for the remainder of the half term.
Should a parent/carer wish to contact their child in an emergency, we ask that they please ring Reception who will ensure a message is delivered to their child or where necessary will make arrangements for the child to speak to their parent/carer on a school phone.
We encourage students to take responsibility for their phones and only to use them outside of school. Our mobile phone and devices motto is very simple - “See It, Hear It, Lose it!”
Further details about Holyhead’s expectations regarding mobile phones and other electronic devices for all students are contained within the Mobile Phone Policy which is available on the school’s website.
MyPoints
Holyhead uses our MyPoints system to monitor behaviour of all types. Members of staff can award points for achievement and/or effort in the curriculum, for positive contributions to the school or local community and for extra-curricular activities. Points can also be deducted for certain inappropriate behaviours and appropriate sanctions are issued.
The total number of MyPoints awarded to your child can be accessed using Arbor. You will need an active Arbor account to see MyPoints (details of the Arbor information system is in the following section).
Communication at Holyhead
Accessing information through Arbor
The School uses a management information and communication system called Arbor to support us in our regular communication with parents/carers, as well as enabling parents to access relevant information on their child’s progress.
All new parents/carers are set up on Arbor and will receive a welcome email from Arbor Once this is received they are asked to follow the instructions to create their own password.
Once successfully logged into Arbor you will be able to:
● Switch between their children (if they have multiple children at Holyhead)
● Add and amend information
● See their child’s timetabled lessons
● Download Report Cards
● See their child’s attendance figures
● See their child’s assessment results
● Track their child’s behaviour in relation to positive / negative myPoints
● Book a Guardian Consultation (for Parents’/Carers’ Evenings)
● See their child’s exam information and timetables
● Sign their child up for clubs and trips as enrichment activities
Student reports
In Year 7 parent/carers will receive two Academic Profiles during the year detailing the progress of your son/daughter following on from our assessments in the Autumn and Summer terms.
Parent/Carers also have the opportunity to discuss their child’s academic progress with subject teachers during a Subject Parents Evening which is held in July
Contacting your child’s teacher
Holyhead welcomes opportunities to meet parent/carers in order to discuss their children's progress and development. In addition to an annual Subject Parents/Carers Evening, we hold Parental Information Evenings for each year group in the first half term. Parents/Carers are encouraged to contact teachers and members of staff whenever it is needed, but if you hope to meet in person please do try to make an appointment so that we can be prepared with the necessary progress report and any other information that we may need.
Whatever the issue you are concerned about, meeting you and working with you is very important to us and we assure you we will do all we can to address any concerns you may have.
Holyhead uniform
At Parent/Carer evenings and on other occasions when we meet together, parents/carers have expressed their support for a distinctive form of clothing for Holyhead students.
In response to this request, we always provide information about the Holyhead School uniform and our high standard of personal appearance expected of all students. This is detailed in the School Uniform Policy which is available on the school’s website.
We regularly review and consult with the Student Council about the uniform to ensure that families are able to receive the best value for uniform items.
School
Shop and
Preloved Uniform Shop
Here at Holyhead we have our own school shop where students and parent/carers can purchase a range of stationery items as well as pre-loved uniforms at a fraction of the price. Our collection of pre-loved uniforms have been donated by our parent/carers and students. They are quality checked, cleaned and packed.
The School Shop is open to students every break-time at 10:25am to 10:40am and is also open to parent/carers at all Parents Evenings.
Student Identification Card
Student Identification Card / Biometrics
All students have been provided with an identification card which enables students to make purchases at break and lunch times without the need to carry any cash. This operates alongside the option for payment using biometrics (fingerprint scans).
The school provides the ID card free of charge, but should the student lose it the parent/carer is expected to purchase replacements via ParentPay
From September 2024 Holyhead School will begin a move away from ID Cards and instead will be using biometric identification systems for cashless catering. Biometric identification is one of many systems used within the school to provide a more efficient service to our students as it enables a reduction in queuing time and administration time and cost dealing with lost or forgotten cards/passwords/PINs.
Meals at Holyhead
The school enjoys modern and extensive kitchen facilities and a cafeteria service for light refreshments is available at morning break from our Dining Hall and Food Pods.
The school runs its own catering business with the emphasis very much on ‘Healthy Eating For All’. The catering staff provide special ‘Meals for the Day’ alongside a wide variety of other choices. There is always a full salad bar, fresh fruit and water available. We therefore ensure that everyone has the opportunity to have a healthy, balanced diet. Students are not allowed to leave the school site at lunchtime.
Cashless system
At Holyhead we use ParentPay which is a cashless system for the canteen service, purchasing items of uniform, stationery and trips/visits.
How does the ‘cashless system’ work?
Account details will be sent to parents/guardians when your child starts school and you can log in online at parentpay.com. Look for the ‘Login’ button at the top right. If you would like to use ParentPay on your smartphone, just bookmark the login page to your home screen for easy access. ParentPay has been designed from the ground up to work great on tablets and phones as well as desktop computers. Don’t worry about compatibility either The vast majority of Android, iOS and Windows Phone devices will be able to run ParentPay
Once your child’s lunch account is topped up, your child will use their school ID card to purchase food and the amount is deducted from their account.
Is your child entitled to Free School Meals?
Your child is entitled to a free school meal if your family is in receipt of benefits. An online Free School Meals Check would need to be completed by parents/guardians prior to your child commencing at Holyhead.
Students who received free meals in their primary schools will have to re-apply online to ensure continued entitlement when they start at Holyhead.
Please visit the information stand located in the Space Reception
ParentPay - School Payments System
Holyhead uses ParentPay as its payment system. Once your account is set up you will be invited to set up and activate your account.
What can you do with ParentPay?
● School Dinners – View menus and check dietary and nutritional information. You can book and pay in advance or let your child choose in school.
● Trips – Pay for school trips through ParentPay. Schools can send out invitations to the relevant parents; who can respond with parental consent and provide medical information.
● Clubs – Receive advanced notification of clubs, so you can secure a place, book and pay early.
● Online Shop – Whether it's uniform (ties, lanyards for instance), equipment or student photographs, you can purchase items online. Check item information such as the size and colour prior to purchase.
important messages from school via email and text. edit cards, American Express and PayPoint from over 28,000
ou and your child during the course of the Open Evening or personal tour is available through the QR code or on the school
