The Summer Term and Brighton Festival begins

I hope everyone across the Brighton & Hove Education Partnership managed to get a break from work over easter. We have an important term ahead of learning and creativity across the city with all the fun Brighton Festival brings, the fabulous Children’s Parade (on the 4th of May), numerous educational trips and the annual sports days. 

May and June is also tests and exam time and I’d like to wish all our children and young people well, but recognise it can be a stressful time for many. It’s important for us all to work together and ensure support is in place for all our children and young people’s emotional wellbeing.

Trans Day of Visibility

Pronoun stickers

In Brighton & Hove, four of our secondary schools and two colleges shared the work they did to mark ‘Trans Day of Visibility’. The International Trans Day of Visibility was a great success at Longhill this year. It provoked many comments from students and staff as to how interesting, thought provoking and uplifting the assemblies and activities were. Amongst comments made by staff who saw students after assemblies were: ‘They were buzzing with it and had loads of questions’, ‘The clips went down really well’

There was a great deal of excitement and interest over the Trans stickers, handed out to students through their Mentors (Tutors) at the start of the day; and the contents of the lunchtime stall kindly hosted by Liv from Allsorts Youth Project. Feedback from the day from our Trans community revealed that they felt the issues they wanted to be raised in our initial meeting had been addressed. It was a day of mutual support, warmth, kindness and focus on our diverse community celebrating its differences and valuing its solidarity.

Curriculum Revisited

A word cloud of the geography curriculum

The School and College Leaders Cross Phase Business meeting this term will focus on the creativity of the curriculum. This is very timely with the new Ofsted framework coming out in the autumn. A group of headteachers are planning with Hilary Ferries (Senior Adviser: Education Partnerships) and the teaching schools to create a positive morning, where we will hear from school leaders and have workshops to share strategies as we consider intent, implementation and impact of the curriculum offer. I look forward to seeing you on 14 June at the Racecourse (please note change of venue).

BAME School Staff 

BAMEed, a national organisation for BAME (Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic) educators, are holding their third annual conference at the University of Brighton in June 2019. BAMEed connects, enables and showcases the talent of diverse educators so they may inspire future generations and open up the possibilities within education careers. We hope that all BAME school staff and interested parties are able to attend this event. As there is a low number of BAME staff in schools, this is an opportunity to be part of a support network, a forum for discussion and a group with shared experiences and interests. 

BAMEed would like to support a regional group for Brighton & Hove BAME teachers and school staff, and hold its first meeting at the conference in June. If you are interested in being part of this group, but can’t attend the conference, please contact John Lynch (Independent Consultant, working with Beth Thomas-Hancock of the University of Brighton to support BAME student mentoring programmes) at jk33lynch@btinternet.com You can book onto the BAMEed conference here . For more information, see the website here 

Syrian Flavoured Ice cream supports children’s Big Read 

Brighton artisan ice cream parlour Boho Gelato has created a new Syrian inspired flavour in honour of this year’s Young City Reads book, ‘The Boy at the Back of the Class’ by Onjali Q Raúf, winner of The Blue Peter Book Award and the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize. The book follows the compassionate story of Ahmet, a young Syrian refugee and a small group of determined nine-year-olds, who go above and beyond the call of duty to make sure their new classmate has a sense of belonging.

Andrew Comben, Chief Executive of Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival said: ‘Young City Reads is such an inspiring way to encourage more children to enjoy reading and express their ideas creatively. ‘The Boy at the Back of the Class’ is a perfect choice for Brighton Festival 2019, as we welcome Malian musician Rokia Traoré as our Guest Director. The book’s messages of friendship, kindness and celebrating difference should be shared now more than ever.'

Congratulations to Cardinal Newman – Rugby Champions 

Newman Rugby Academy have seen phenomenal success this season which culminated in the team winning the National AoC Final at Moseley, Birmingham. The team had worked their way up to the final where they played against Myerscough College who they beat in an exciting game winning 40-5 to crown them National Champions.

Newman Rugby Academy have been working extremely hard to get to National success. The Rugby Academy was created to allow students to develop themselves and play a high standard of rugby alongside their studies. 

Mr Neil Lester-Card, Rugby Academy Coach, said: ‘This is a fantastic result for Newman College and the players. It has been our goal for a number of years and to achieve it in such a convincing manner is a brilliant way to finish the season.’ Well done, Cardinal Newman!

Queen's Park Primary School at the Theatre Royal 

Queen's Park Pupils in ‘Emil and the Detectives’

Mark Storey (Head of Education Standards & Achievement) had the absolute pleasure of attending ‘Emil and the Detectives’ at the Theatre Royal. It was great to see the whole year 5 group getting involved and all were included. They were involved in every aspect of planning and creating this year's end-of-term play, including set design, costumes, lighting, sound, special effects, make-up and designing programmes for the audience - complete with word searches and cast lists. The children also stage managed and operated sound and light for the performances under the guidance of the theatre’s tech team. This is the first time a Brighton school has performed its end-of-term play in their local theatre. Well done Queen’s Park. 

Queen's Park Pupils in ‘Emil and the Detectives’

‘I saw children looking happy; having high expectations of what can be achieved and having an experience they will always remember. It was also great to see children from other schools enjoying the performance too. Thanks to all the staff and children who have been involved, great work and well done’ (Mark Storey) 

Governance Conference: Education Trends 2019: What’s coming now and next?

 Some of the school governors going up the i360

Our Annual Governance Conference was a great success and we were lucky to have glorious weather for the day at the i360 and we have received overwhelmingly positive evaluations . I welcomed the opportunity to attend and contribute to the debate with Pinaki Ghoshal (Director of Children’s Services), Mark Storey (Head of Education Standards & Achievement) and Hilary Ferries (Senior Adviser - Education Partnerships). Governors particularly appreciated how informative and thought provoking Laura McInerney was (Education Journalist & Co-Founder of Teacher Tapp). Laura gave us lots of food for thought and talked about the trends in education that will affect us over the next few years. However, they did also appreciate having the opportunity to hear from the Local Authority panel. We really did get the impression that we were ‘all in this together’ to do the best for our schools, and everyone went away feeling very positive. 

The view from the top. We even managed to conquer a couple of people’s fear of heights!

National quality mark for our Supported Employment team

The work of a Brighton & Hove City Council team that helps get local people with disabilities into jobs and training opportunities has been praised by a national body. The council’s Supported Employment team has gained a kite-mark award from the British Association for Supported Employment (BASE). The team is one of only 11 in the country to have been through a new auditing process being trialled by the association. They are currently working with more than 80 local people, helping them gain and retain employment. The team provides support to the employee, the employer and work colleagues through training, job coaching and advice.

We want all our residents to have equal access to training and employment opportunities. The BASE kite-mark is a very clear sign that we’re doing things the right way, and I hope it will lead to more local employers working in partnership with our Supported Employment team. To find out more about getting support from the council’s Supported Employment team to offer jobs or training opportunities to local people with disabilities, please email SET@brighton-hove.gov.uk or phone 01273 29 5961.

This month Ofsted has been visiting Moulsecoomb Primary and St John the Baptist Catholic Primary schools. I look forward to reporting back next time. 

Welcome

Helena Thomas, Principal at Greater Brighton Metropolitan College

I’d like to provide a warm welcome from the Brighton & Hove Education Partnership to Helena Thomas, who has been appointed to the role of Principal at Greater Brighton Metropolitan College (the MET) following an extensive recruitment and selection process led by the Board of Governors. Helena has been doing a great job already acting in the role for the past few months. We are all looking forward to continued partnership work with Helen and the MET. 

Best wishes,
Jo

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