Student Support

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Arrangements for student support and care at RSA Academy Arrow Vale have been designed to provide a holistic approach to addressing the personal, social, emotional, intellectual and spiritual needs of every young person.

Looking after and supporting the development of the whole child

Young people are encouraged to make the most of their time at school and every effort is made to remove obstacles to successful learning and to equip young people with the confidence and skills to be effective learners and responsible citizens.

All members of the school community have a role to play in assisting young people to be safe, nurtured, healthy, achieving, active, respected, responsible and included. It is the responsibility of the Year Team Leaders and Heads of Year to ensure that this is done consistently and professionally thorough out the school; they work with parents, carers, members of the community and outside agencies to ensure that RSA Academy Arrow Vale students receive the care and support needed to be successful.

Support Structures

We have a support structure at Arrow Vale which provides all students with personalised support whenever it is needed.

At every stage of their school career, each pupil has a Form Tutor, Year Team Leader and Head of Year, all of whom have a key role in monitoring and supporting them in every aspect of school life.

Form Tutors, assisted by Year Heads, see all members of their form on a daily basis and write individual reports. They also organise tutor group activities and deliver our Learning for Life programme, designed to teach our students life skills and an understanding of the wider world. Form Tutors are present at all Parents’ Evenings and should be the first point of contact for any academic or social concerns.

The Year Team Leader supports the Form Tutor to monitor progress across the year group, ensuring that they are on track to excel in all academic achievements.

In addition, the School Nurse provides invaluable pastoral support, as well as addressing medical issues and participating in the personal, social care of students.

For further information and contact details please click HERE to the School Health Nursing  – High School Leaflet

Learning for Life SMSC

Underneath the Learning for Life umbrella we are committed to providing high quality learning opportunities for all students regardless of gender, academic ability, social background, religious belief or ethnicity.

Through assemblies, tutor sessions and learning for life lessons we such we are well placed to contribute to students’ Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural education. We actively encourage our students to consider each other, their school community, their local community of Redditch and   the wider world.

Through a variety of learning and reflective opportunities our students are encouraged to develop a moral conscience and the ability to consider ethical, economic and spiritual issues.  For example every week there a theme for the week which is encompassed within each assembly and as moral centre point for tutor sessions.

Running concurrently with this we run Learning for Life tutor sessions that look at, through a variety of activities, Team, Reflective, Independent and Creative (TRICS) learning. Also students attend one lesson per week of Learning for Life lessons and are given the opportunity to discuss and debate topics related to morality, discrimination and prejudice, matters relating to  health, sex and relationships, finances and Religious studies.

Learning for Life teachers enthusiastically inspire students to discuss and debate SMSC issues outside the classroom. We ask our students to enquire, consider and question in lessons and beyond so they may become more rounded individuals whose opinions are valued and listened to.

Student Support:

Mrs E Kkama (Vice Principal)

Year Team

Year Team Leader : Mr Ian McNally

Mr McNally shares his time between teaching PE and Maths. He has a strong academic focus ensuring that students are achieving their expected levels of progress and reaching their academic potential. Mr McNally will address any curriculum based issues and ensure that the appropriate strategies and interventions are put in place to ensure that the student succeeds.

Year Team Leader : Miss Rawson

As well as being a Physical Education teacher, I am the Team Leader for Year 10 and my role is support pupils with their academic achievement. I liaise with pupils, staff and parents to help ensure that all pupils are on track and meeting their full potential. I also analyse data from our Key Assessments regularly throughout the year to provide an overview of the year group’s developments and the levels of progress. It is my role to ensure that all barriers to learning are removed to enable outstanding learning can take place.

Outside of school I enjoy going to the gym and also fitness classes. Despite being a PE teacher and liking to keep fit, I am quite a girly girl and enjoy doing my hair, nails and make up.

Year Team Leader : Miss McCullough

My name is Francesca McCullough and it’s my job as Year Team Leader to ensure that students are achieving their full academic potential and making optimum progress. My daily work in partnership with Mrs Williams is to remove the barriers which get in the way of students learning; to build resilience into students so that they can tackle issues for themselves and to ensure that they are being fully stretched and challenged within their lessons. My main goal as a Year Team Leader is to instil the ability for students to accept the mistakes they make along the way and ensure that tomorrow is an even better day than yesterday.

In addition to working within the Student Support team, I am a passionate English and Media teacher here at the school and have been here since joining RSA Academy Arrow Vale in 2012.

Outside of school I am a keen netball player, Aston Vila supporter and lover of skiing!

Head of Year : Mrs Hossack

Hello! I’m Mrs Hossack, part of the Student Support Team and the non-teaching Head of Year for year 9. The focus of my role is to ensure that whatever the circumstances all students are working towards achieving excellence in their learning. We all know how crazy life can be, but my role is about working towards a solution and finding a positive way forward whatever the situation. Behaviour and attendance is a big part of my role as students have the best opportunity for success when their attendance is high and their behaviour for learning is good. Historically I have worked in support roles outside of mainstream education and firmly believe that school is the best place for a young person to be as it offers the highest quality education and best prospects for the future.

Head of Year : Mr A Hall

Head of Year : Mr R Woodward

Houses

At RSA, Arrow Vale we run a hybrid house system that allows us to be in a vertical mixed tutor system or a horizontal year tutor system.  At specific times and events we will run either system.  This allows our students to benefit from year interventions and peer mentoring. When in the vertical system students will be grouped with a mix of all years but aligned by our houses.

Following the huge success of the house system and the way in which pupils have engaged with it we have decided to re-launch our houses giving each one their own identity and mascot so making the houses more colourful and vibrant.

The houses are as follows:

The AIM HIGH Alligators

The DISCOVER Dragons

The EXCEL Eagles

Each member of our school community is allocated to a house and can gain points for them respectively.

Points are awarded by staff for Achieving in lessons, Attending on time, Extracurricular, Community activities, doing lunchtime activities and Supporting others to name but a few.

Throughout the year students take part in a number of competitions from sports to academic tests to quizzes and competitions in specifically identified house weeks that add points to their house. These competitions coincide with a sports day that acts as the decider for which house will take the coveted Governors trophy but more importantly will have bragging rights within the school for the next year.

With the re-launch also comes the introduction of house captains, these students leaders selected from our sixth form will ensure that moral remains high, the rest of the students are kept informed about the progress of their house and that come sports day their houses have the biggest and best banners, their face paints are applied correctly, and they cheer the loudest!

House Points are a huge part of enhancing learning and behaviour at RSA Academy Arrow Vale they are awarded to students to recognise hard work, high attendance, good/improved report comments and key assessments, work experience participation, taking part in after school activities (belonging to a team, taking part in the school show, intervention etc.), doing something out of the ordinary….in fact anything you think warrants recognition for effort.

Points must be given to….

  • show that teachers recognise achievement
  • ensure students know that their efforts are being recognised
  • share and celebrate success in a variety of areas
  • encourage more competition between students
  • generate a sense of belonging to a tutor group
  • bring a sense of worth and belonging to a house
  • encourage students to participate in whole school and community activities

Five Points – RSA card (Recognition of Student Achievement):-

We all should be rewarding achievement equally (to ensure a level playing field):

RSA cards should be available during ALL lessons and tutor times (given for achievement NOT behaviour)

  • Tutor group attendance/punctuality (weekly) – cards don’t need to be written for this, a tutor can enter these straight into the spreadsheet)
  • Quality of work (achievement) and participation during lessons (not behaviour)
  • Quality of work (achievement) and participation during tutor time/Learning for Life (not behaviour)
  • Doing something out of the ordinary
  • Helping someone (putting yourself out)
  • Tutee of the week
  • Student of the week
  • Attending intervention

Twenty Five Points:-

Students often receive achievement certificates for other types of achievement (for attendance, Iris credits etc.) These should be given to the form tutor and twenty five points should be added.

Also, a tutor will often be able to reward students for their efforts in other activities. Those organising such activities should ensure they have certificates to give out

  • Attendance Certificate (termly)
  • Reports on track to reach all target grades (progress)
  • Improvement in Key assessments (progress at each key assessment)
  • Participation in extracurricular activities
  • Work experience (good effort during work experience week)
  • Supporting any school events (i.e. on parents evenings)
  • School responsibilities (i.e. ICT monitors, prefects
  • After school projects
  • Partaking in after school sporting activities (playing for school teams)
  • Partaking in assemblies (end of term)

SMSC, Learning 4 Life and TRICS

TRIC day is a day designed for Year 9 to show how they use their…

…in an unusual and different type of Academy day. This year the theme for TRICs day was “What does it mean to be British?”  In the light of recent terror attacks in Paris, Belgium, Turkey and the very recent BREXIT vote this was a timely and important day. Sessions included:

Each session was led by a member of staff, supported by small groups of staff.  Every single Year 9 student took part not only with the right attitude but were also able to use their TRIC skills to show how much they have grown as a year group since joining us last September.

From looking at and understanding that ethnic diversity makes our communities stronger, through sessions on respecting and caring for our elderly – including learning to dance in an old fashioned way! As well as making bowler hats, Stonehenge, the Houses of Parliament, Big Ben, Crowns and a local hospital!  All Year 9 students took the day in their stride and were a thorough pleasure to teach and be with. I know that Mrs Wardley and Mr McNally were very proud of their achievements – well done year 9!

Transitions and Taster Days

At Arrow Vale we endeavour to ensure all pupils feel welcomed, secure and nurtured before they join us in year nine and throughout their first year of high school.  The transition to high school can be a very turbulent time and it is our job to make the move as smooth as possible. To make certain that children feel confident all pupils visit the school for the transition days in July however. To compliment this we offer Taster Sessions to help ensure that everyone has a positive transition to high school by experiencing all that Arrow Vale has to offer.

Sessions have previously run from 9am – 11am Monday – Friday and consisted of Orienteering, Resistant Materials, Nail art, Hair dressing and many more. The sessions are designed to help the students from all the different feeder schools; (Ipsley, Church Hill, Birchensale, Ridgeway and St Bede’s, Woodfield, Walkwood and Studley High School) meet and familiarise themselves with each other before the transition days. Each group is between 10– 20 pupils, thus giving an opportunity for teaching staff and the Head of Year and Year Team Leaders chance to acquaint themselves with the new pupils and, most importantly, a chance for pupils to see that they have made the best choice in choosing Arrow Vale.

From September onwards the sessions will run throughout the year with year 8 pupils and year 7 pupils. Recently, Gifted and Talented pupils from Ipsley and Church Hill Middle schools visited Arrow Vale to take part intwo sessions based on team discussions and problem solving. The aim was to demonstrate to pupils how lessons are carried out at Arrow Vale. The experience is thoroughly enjoyed by all.