Yesterday Crew Young competed in a range of inter-crew sports events held at the athletics stadium, beginning with 6-a-side football mini tournament. The quality of sportsmanship,  commitment and participation were self-evident, as was our enjoyment of our annual sports day.

Today Ella brought a copy of the anthology of poems that includes her creative prose, and shared it with Crew Young. Superb work Ella, as you now have two of your creative pieces of writing published in a book. Congratulations.

This rounds off a successful term and academic year for Crew Young, and we continue to grow in stature and character some 40 weeks after we began Year 8 going Outward Bound in Aberdovey, Wales. Until we circle-up as Y9s towards the end of August, we’re checked out…..

What a fabulous result towards the end of the academic year!

It is with immense pride and to my professional satisfaction that I post the results of the third Data Drop assessment of Y8/E24 HOWLs. In all three areas – work hard, get smart and be kind – Crew Young lead the way, topping the leaderboard in their Habits of Work and Learning.

This is down to sheer hard work and to the collective effort of each and every member of our Crew. But it is only part of the story, and it encouraged me to reflect on the individual successes – academic and otherwise – that contributed to our cumulative grades during this academic year:

Adam – overcoming significant personal difficulties and now making concerted attempts to close the gap between his MEG and current grades.

Louie – featuring on round two of our student pledge successes board, Louie led a highly -organised Crew session demonstrating admirable sports leadership qualities.

Lewis – showed quiet determination to honour his pledge to volunteer more of an oral contribution in Spanish, justifying his position on round one of the student pledge successes board. Lewis is also justly proud of his excellent 100% attendance record for the year.

Eleanor – exceeding her MEG in Data Drop 3 for maths, science, English and history, Eleanor has consistently demonstrated a secure grasp of the concept of HOWLs. She also routinely volunteers her time to help out at FXP events, all selflessly for the benefit of other students.

Maclaren – Making it onto round two of our student pledge successes board, Maclaren has worked hard to widen his social circle, and he is also developing confidence through the mountain biking club.

Ella – Showed integrity in her latest SLC, and an awareness of her strengths and areas for development. Ella led a very powerful Crew session on mindfulness and had one of her poems published from amongst 8000 entries in a national competition.

Alesha – Alesha has an excellent 100% attendance for the whole year. Latest Data Drop assessments show she continues to exceed her MEGs in four areas and her HOWLs are consistently above 4.0. Another outstanding year for this highly industrious student.

Isabel – A recent addition to round three of the student pledge success board, Isabel has now accelerated her progress and attainment and is currently exceeding her MEG in English, maths and science.

George – George hosted his SLC yesterday and made his mother extremely proud of him, especially when she discovered that he had absolutely smashed his MEG in STEM…..exceeding it by a huge 0.9 grade. What a way to end the year George!

Keisha – I’ve lost count of the multiple spontaneous peer appreciations for compassion that Keisha has received in Community Meetings this week! Academically, Keisha has made it to the pledge board on account of her exceeding her MEG in HUMS, maths and history. She’s also a member of the Eco-Crew.

Aaron – Another member of the Eco-Crew, Aaron has offered countless positive contributions in session, and this year he has improved his fitness by regularly joining the mountain biking club.

Nathan – Nathan has often been prepared to set up and take down sports equipment, and he has frequently “bought into” the extra-curricular sporting provision on offer after school. He plays football for his club at the weekends.

Dominic – Out of school Dominic has secured his black belt in Mixed Martial Arts and delivered a very interactive Student-Led Conference recently. He doubled his HOWLs grades from term 1 to term 2 and he is now beginning to widen his social circle.

Our recent HOWLs are the best grades we’ve had so far…..but like any “personal best” they are there to be beaten, and they’re still not as high as they could be, just yet.

I expect even more of my “Youngsters” next year, and I’m confident they will rise to the challenge. Great work, Crew Young. Enough said.

This should, of course, read: “demonstrating Final Product in his SLC” as this afternoon Dominic chose to invite his parents to try out his Final Product in STEM – an electronic buzzer – during the course of his Student-Led Conference.

Dominic concluded his SLC by also sharing a time-lapsed video recording of the creation of his propaganda / fake news collage. Whilst I am so far very pleased by the high quality discourse used by Crew Young to articulate their learning and progress, I was delighted with how Dominic used digital media to help justify his inclusion of the propaganda collage amongst the work in his portfolio that he is proud of, shows mastery, and requires improvement.

Well done, Dominic!