The focus of the day was to educate our students about respecting each other within our community.

Julia Wilkinson from ‘Brave the Rage’ ran a ‘Solutions to Personal Wellbeing’ training workshop. During the workshop students took part in activities designed to help them learn about emotional resilience using confidence building techniques. “I learnt that I am the best” said Year 7 student Ashley Agblemegah as self-belief was clearly evident after the session.

Proving very popular with our Year 7’s was the visit of our Upper Academy Anti-Bullying Student Ambassadors, who led thought provoking sessions & set various role-play tasks. It was a great opportunity for our older students to share their experiences and give advice to their younger peers. “

Anti-Bullying Ambassador Liviu Verman, Year 10, commented; “The Year 7’s were a little apprehensive of the activities at first, but they soon become really involved. They understood the importance of the topic and most importantly how to act upon and report bullying incidents.” Year 7 student Connor Adams said “It was a fun way to learn about anti-bullying and respect. They talked about things that I already knew but I learnt a lot more too.”

The third session of the day was dedicated to looking at the important work done by the charity UNICEF and in particular understanding children’s human rights. Students were tasked with preparing a newspaper article or designing a poster highlighting what they had learned. Year 7 student Riley Lay found the session very informative, commenting: “I learnt a lot about children’s rights.”

Pastoral Manager Tracy Martins was very pleased with how well our students participated in the activities and engaged with our guests throughout the day; “It will be good to see the students practising the techniques and skills that they learnt, particularly around managing theirs and others emotions in a variety of situations.”

The last word on the impact of the day went to Year 7 student Ellie Hubbard who said “I feel safe at the Academies because all of the teachers take care of us.”