Today marked Smestow Academy's Christmas Jumper Day, alongside our second Mince Pies & Carols Event.  Staff and pupils were invited to wear their Christmas jumpers for a £1 donation to Save the Children.   Key stage 3 parents and carers were invited to join us in school for a morning of festivities and refreshments, with performances curated by our Creative Arts department.  We had keyboard soloists, singers, excerpts from "Nativity the musical" and even a pointe solo from one of our Year 9s!  We are very proud of all our performers who have worked incredibly hard over the last few weeks perfecting their performances for today and grateful to those families who were able to join us this morning!

Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a peaceful new year.

#SmestowAcademy #SuccessAchievedTogether #ChristmasJumperDay #MincePiesandCarols #activecitizenship #savethechildren #personaldevelopment #fundraising

On Tuesday pupils in 8X3, 8Y1 and 8Y2 took part in a stem day which involved pupils planning, designing and building prototypes of bridges and testing these to see whether they will withstand the weight. Pupils had team roles such as Project manager, finance manager, designer, structural engineer, community lead and marketing executive. Pupils demonstrated brilliant teamwork, leadership, problem solving, creativity skills and thoroughly enjoyed the day.

Well done to all the pupils who took part an designed some fantastic bridges. 

#stem #engineering #futurescientist

Smestow is officially one of the most improved secondary schools in the country!

I am delighted that we can now officially celebrate our wonderful GCSE exam results from last
Summer as the performance tables have now been published by the Department for Education. As
we thought, we are one of the most improved schools in the country for pupil Progress (21st most
improved Progress 8 score out of over 3000 secondary schools), and we have moved from being 4th
worst for pupil progress in Wolverhampton (out of the 20 secondary schools) to 6th best in the space
of one year! Please see below link:

All schools and colleges in Wolverhampton - Compare school and college performance data in
England - GOV.UK

Please see below table to summarise our Headline figures for last year in comparison to previous
years:

I would also like to thank parents for their support in continuing to help us improve attendance at
school as we have now surpassed the national average figure from, once upon a time, being one of
the worst attending schools in the country. Our 3.5% increase last academic year from (85.4% To
88.9%) has now been followed by a 3.4% increase so far this year to 92.3%. A true example of
‘Success achieved together’, where less of our children will have gaps in their learning and will be
able to maximise their achievements and progress.

As the holidays are nearly upon us, we wanted to share this #wakeupwednesday advice from The National College.

We would ask that parents and carers take five minutes to read the information given in support of maintaining safety over the festive period - this includes road safety, travel plans,  digital and considering stress and fatigue.

We wish all our families and a safe and happy holiday and look forward to seeing you all in the new year!

Smestow Academy are celebrating Christmas Jumper Day on Wednesday 18^th December 2024.  Staff and pupils are invited to wear their Christmas jumper alongside their uniform for a £1 donation in support of Save the Children.

Save the Children is a non-government organisation which was founded in the UK in 1919.  Their goal is to improve the lives of children worldwide.  We are choosing to support Christmas Jumper Day as the charity aligns with our Smestow Values of success achieved together, make a difference every day, equality and respect for all and strive to be our best.  Our fundraising is another example of the active citizenship that we are promoting in school.

Parents and Carers of pupils in years 7, 8 and 9 are invited to join us in school on Wednesday 18^th December for a morning of refreshments and festivities.  Our creative arts department have created some superb work to showcase and we will have a sing-a-long of some christmas favourites to celebrate the forthcoming holiday.  

There is no charge for this event, however, we do ask for donations to our house charities as part of our active citizenship in school.

Please respond to the invite on we-duc or return the reply slip on the letter to reception by Monday 16^th December to confirm how many guests will be joining us.

Here at Smestow Academy, we are very fortunate to be supported by our local mental health support team, Reflexions.  This can be through 1-to-1 sessions for individualised support, group sessions looking at exam stress management or parent support at progress evenings.

Reflexions are holding an open discussion with the National Team whose role it is to inform the Government about Mental Health provision in schools.  It is your opportunity to have your voice heard and put your experiences forward to the team.  

As part of our careers programme in school, we are keen to support parents, carers and pupils with the choices that they have with regards to their next steps.  We have shared previously from Amazing Apprenticeships, but the December edition of the Choices magazine is now available, which showcases the celebrations that took place for the National Apprenticeship & Skills Awards 2024  There is a parent's perspective on apprenticeships, information about assistive technology, the Gatsby Benchmarks and much more!

Choices Magazine - December

Over the past five weeks, 15 of our exceptional pupils have had the opportunity to collaborate with a professional dance company Linden Dance. This project was community-driven aimed at addressing loneliness in Wolverhampton. Linden Dance approached Smestow Academy following a highly successful previous workshop, where they were impressed by the work ethic and dedication of our pupils. Their request to return for this project is a testament to the commitment and skill consistently demonstrated by our pupils. 

The initiative comprised four workshops, during which pupils worked closely with Linden Dance to create choreographed dance pieces inspired by music and core memories shared by the residents of Charnwood Care Home prior to the performance. These personal stories formed the foundation for the dances, adding a profound and emotional depth to the pieces. 

Our pupils found great joy in performing these dance pieces for the residents, with many commenting on how rewarding it was to bring smiles to their faces and evoke cherished memories. One pupil remarked, “It was so lovely to make the residents smile and bring back happy memories, one resident had tears in their eyes.” 

It was truly a privilege to once again showcase the exceptional talent, commitment, and dedication of our pupils to the local community. I am immensely proud of their hard work and the high standard of performance they consistently uphold throughout this project. 

Big shoutout to our YR11 BTEC Sport students this week who have been tirelessly over this half term to complete their final PSA assessment before the preparation for the exam starts. Students have had to complete three different parts of coursework for Component 2 along with being assessed on their practical ability of a sport of their choice and then they have to coach a session in their chosen sport showing clear progress from each activity.

The students have produced some fantastic sessions over this week in the hope of some excellent results adding to their hard work from last year. When being assessed on their practical ability they have to show their skills in isolated practices and then how they perform in a competitive context to show these skills and how they can be effective to overcome opponents.

Well done to all of our students and lets hope that the hard work is all worth it come the summer.