With the news that GCSE’s and A-Levels will ‘absolutely’ go ahead – our Headmaster Dr John Price reflects on the past year but believes the pandemic has merely brought the subject to focus. Education reform is long overdue.
It’s no secret that our young people are likely to have a variety of careers in their lifetimes – working differently to their parents – where work is something you ‘do’, not somewhere you go. And so employers are looking for far more than just results. Emotional intelligence, adaptability, resilience – these are the transferrable skills that are key across every industry and increasingly so.
Is the national curriculum really providing that?
Our life skills and co-curricular programme are a key part of our offer and as much emphasis is placed upon these additional opportunities as it is on academic input. The world is changing and education reform is sorely overdue. Teaching children that academic results are all that matter destroys confidence and pupils switch off. How can you possibly get the best from that child?
Our teaching is designed to build confidence and resilience - that’s what parents are paying for when they entrust their children to us.
In order to do this, we must create an environment in which our young people feel safe to express themselves both academically and vocationally. We have a team of staff here that are keen-eyed to recognise the talents and individuals quirks that make students unique, and instill a sense of pride in individuality giving our students the confidence to excel.
Our key advantage in tackling curriculum diversity and being able to recognise areas for improvement is that we are an independent school. This means that we aren’t constrained by the national curriculum. Ultimately, our curriculum allows us the flexibility to react to individual student needs where we can to develop an education that works for them. We believe that happy children in schools are more engaged, focused, and can help them to develop a sense of confidence in and out of the school environment.
With a subject such as reform, we cannot rule out the impact that mounting concerns are having on young people’s mental health. It’s been an intense situation and there is severe pressure on young people at the moment. We ensure our students have timetabled one-to-one support with their tutors, as well as creating a sense of community at our school that students feel they can reach out to any member of staff to receive support.
We are actively offering a developed curriculum at Worksop College and we are confident that our offer is one of student-focus and it is important to us that our approach as a non-selective school is beneficial to every young person who comes through our doors.
To inspire change in the world, we need to be the change that we hope to see. We believe that the curriculum as a whole needs to be more exciting, more fit for purpose and we need to ensure that we do all that we can so that students are fit for employment in the 21st century.
To find out more about life at Worksop College, view our student stories here.