Appleton Academy
Featuring:
o Y11 Leavers’ Celebration Evening 2024
o Remembrance Day 2024
o Art department showcase
o Scholars update
o Sport and fixtures
o Bradford Digital Creatives
Together with our community, we can achieve extraordinary things.
Welcome
Welcome to our second newsletter of the year, and the final for 2024! Appleton has been incredibly busy this term with lots of wonderful opportunities for our young people. We have begun working with Bradford Digital Creatives as we gear up to Bradford City of Culture 2025 and our students have been doing some amazing work with a range of new technology. We welcomed back our Year 11 leavers to collect their GCSE certificates and it was lovely to hear what they have been getting up to since they left us. We have had a range of sporting fixtures taking place and even begun to play against more schools with some success! Our art students continue to produce some wonderful work and our budding authors are busy preparing their submissions for their next competition!
If you have things you would like to see featured in the newsletter, please let us know.
Mrs Garlick Head of Secondary
Attendance at Appleton
Improving attendance to school is a national priority and a key focus for the school. We are excited to launch our spring attendance challenge.
The “Ultimate” spring attendance challenge!
Challenge:
6th January to 14th February 2025
6 weeks = 30 school days
Attend school for a full 5 days to get 1 prize draw entry for £50 shopping vouchers
Attend school for a full 10 days to get 1 prize draw entry for £100 shopping vouchers
Maintain an attendance streak beyond 2 weeks and get a prize draw entry for £150 shopping vouchers for each week students keep their streak!
This means that students can earn:
- 6 entries into the £50 prize draw
- 3 entries into the £100 draw
- 4 entries into the £150 draw
- 2 extra entries per week for no lates into the £50 draw!
- This is in addition to the mini prizes available for Perfect 10
You will receive a text message each week to let you know if your child is on track to meet the attendance challenge.
Y11 Leavers’ Celebration Evening 2024
By Mr Martin. On Tuesday 3rd December, we welcomed back our 2024 Y11 leavers one more time for an evening celebrating their successes and for them to collect their GCSE certificates.
The evening was very well attended and it was great to see so many of our students doing so well in their next stage of education and life.
(Above) Bethany collects pupil of the year which was very well received by all and (Right) Cameron was one of two students selected for academic achievement due to his outstanding progress in Y11, outperforming his predictions in many subjects.
Award for academic achievement: Eleanor Leech
Cameron Whitson-Smith
Award for contribution to the Academy community and ethos:
Tia Ashton
Callum Dayton-Gledhill
Josh Smith
Award for pupil of the year: Bethany Leek
Library and Science Update
Writer and Artist in Residence Workshops
Our Artist, Chris Mould and writer, Nik Perring have been working on a scientists through time project with students from Years 7 and 8 . They researched scientists, created posters and news articles and their work is displayed on the science corridors.
Creative Writing and Sketchbook Club
Our clubs have continued this term and students have enjoyed creating their own Superheroes and Villains using character descriptions and cartoon ideas.
Our Year 7 library sessions have featured Tom Palmer's latest book, 'Angel of Grasmere'. Students have listened to extracts from the book and created their own 'kindness angels'
How you use your library
This term, the most popular genre of book taken out from the library was fantasy books. Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction that features magic, the supernatural, and imaginary worlds and creatures.
Young Writers
Once again, our students have been successful Young Writers, having their work published in Mission Chaos Fantastic Fiction and Mission Chaos Beyond the Tale.
We have an astounding 135 students' stories published this time - look out for your stories appearing on the screens in the canteen!
Our next entry into the Young Writers competition will be for the Fight or Flight anthology. Students are busy writing their stories in lesson, and we will be sending entries off over the holidays. We can't wait to see your work in print!
Art at Appleton
Each newsletter we feature amazing artwork created by our students
Year 7 – Line and Tone
This term, Year 7 art students have been focusing on line and tone and exploring this through a variety of media, such as oil pastels, acrylic, pencil and pen. They have looked at the artist Van Gogh and how he uses line to create texture and tone
Dalton
Samuel
Lydia Ena
Sofia
Methdini
Lucie
Art at Appleton Year 8 - Masks
This Term, Year 8 have been focusing on designing masks and where they are used in different cultures. They have explored creating emotion on the masks. They have also looked at designing their own Mexican masks and are currently creating a 3D version of this from one of their designs from paper mache. They have focused on proportion, use of tone and how to draw a skull.
Olamide
Annabelle
Tobias
Lewis
Sienna
Grace
Olivia
Year 9 – Underwater World
This term, Year 9 have been focusing on the underwater world project looking at producing artworks influenced by Yellena James and H R Giger. They have been working on their ink and fine art skills to create their final clay pieces.
Alice
Lucas
Cagan
Abigail
Daisy
Fin
Lillie
Art at Appleton Christmas card designs
Some examples of the Christmas card designs that the students have been creating for the Christmas card competition. If you keep your eyes peeled you may see some these designs as real cards that are being sent out to students via form tutors in the last week. Well done everyone who created one and especially well done to the designers of these brilliant festive images.!
Lacie
Leah
Kai
Savannah
Tobias
SCHOLARS
December 2024
By Ms Lamb.
The
Scholars
programme
at Appleton
Academy provides opportunities for stretching and challenging the most able with a variety of experiences in order to prepare them with the skills and confidence required to succeed in the very best universities or higher-level apprenticeships.
Last half term The Scholars Programme took Year 10 and Year 11 on a trip to York. They were able to get the train from Low Moor to Leeds and then Leeds to York. This was a big step for a lot of our students who had not been on trains before. We then went to the Jorvik Centre where they were transported into the world of York in the Viking era. Through talks with experts who work there and taking part in the immersive ride, they were able to see how far we have come and what life was like for the Vikings.
We had some autonomy time to explore York and see all the architecture and interesting things the city has to offer. We used a “Hop on, Hop off” bus to look at famous statues and buildings as well as the city walls. We finished the trip with a visit to The Roman Bath Museum where the students were able to see what life was like for the Romans and the facilities they used. The students had booklets to complete with challenges and filled with fun facts and games. The students were able to explore a city they may never have been to before and the opportunities it has to offer.
Sport at
Year 7, 8 and 9 rugby
By Mr Young. Our students took part in their first fixtures of the year against Bingley Grammar on 9th October at Appleton. Our Year 7 students were absolutely awesome and won the Year 7 game by more than 8 tries. This was our first rugby win as a school for many years.
Our Year 8 students found the Bingley opposition to be very tough unfortunately and lost quite heavily but of course they gave it 100% and made Mr Young extremely proud. Most recently on 16th December our Year 9’s also defeated Brighouse High 4 tries to 2 in a remarkable match.
If your child is interested in learning how to play rugby at Appleton Academy, or is already playing outside of school and wants to play in more competitions, please ask them to come and see Mr Young in GE2.
Badminton Fixture against Bingley Grammar
On 3rd December 21 of our talented badminton players took part in a friendly fixture against Bingley Grammar. All of our students have been training with Mr Young every week as part of the schools after school badminton club. We lost the fixture overall but most of our students won at least one of their games. William S from Year 9 was the team captain and performed extremely well against Bingley Grammar’s Year 10 and 11 students.
Well done to everyone involved and we have lots of fixtures planned for January so if any more students want to start playing they simply need to attend Badminton club every Tuesday after school.
By Mr Halston
Appleton are working with Age of Wonder / Born in Bradford on a number of projects this academic year, with one being the Bradford Digital Creatives, a scheme designed to bring media technology to our students and allow them to get hands on with professional technology and advice from industry experts on how to get into a career in the media industry. On 13th November the Leeds Young Film company visited school with an array of VR equipment to provide our Year 9 students with an interactive underwater experience. The students then had the chance to chat with the professionals following a presentation. Bradford Digital Creatives are back in school December 17th for another VR workshop with another group of Y9 students and our work so far has been mentioned in this T&A article.
Declan, Y9 getting to grips with his MetaQuest gear
Two cybersecurity competitions at Appleton Academy
By Mrs Harvey. This term students have had the opportunity to enter two Cybersecurity competitions: namely Cyber SwitchUp and the CyberFirst Girls competitions.
Cyber SwitchUp
Year 9 and 10 students took part in an online qualifier for the Cyber SwitchUp competition in their Digital Literacy or GCSE Computer Science lessons. Cyber SwitchUp is a digital and cyber skills competition aimed at students aged 11 to 18 years old which aims to showcase the digital and cyber skills talent of the students taking part while educating and promoting educational and career pathways for young people using those skills. Almost 5000 students took part in the online qualifier with the top scoring 20 individuals from each Key Stage invited to compete against each other in the face-to-face final. Two Appleton Academy students, Ffyon Burnham Y9 and Josh Dunn Y10 were invited to the final of the YHROCU’s Cyber SwitchUp 2024.
The venue for the final was Sheffield Hallam University, with students from schools across Humberside, North South and West Yorkshire attending. The challenges for the Sheffield final were created by IBM and Rayethon, the Civil Aviation Authority, the British Army and BAE Systems. Guest speakers at the event included representatives from Google, British Esports, Online Gamers, Sheffield Hallam University, Cyber First, RTC North, and Creased Puddle.
Assistant Chief Constable Carl Galvin, who opened the event, said: “The talented young people who attended this year’s Cyber SwitchUp final represent the top one per cent of all those who took part. They are the best in the region and to see them putting their skills into action has been immensely impressive. They really have demonstrated their potential to be top cyber talents.”
CyberFirst Girls
Year 8 girls were asked to take part in an online competition which is run by the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) and GCHQ. It aims to inspire girls interested in technology to pursue a career in cyber security. The competition is a team event, with each team consisting of up to four girls in Year 8. The girls had 10 days to tackle a range of online challenges from cryptography and logic to artificial intelligence and networking for the chance to be crowned cyber security champions.
34 of our Year 8 girls signed up for the challenge and took part in their lunchtimes, after school and at home. The winning team included Berenice Ofuifeme, Katie Watkiss and Andra-Elena Albu who scored a massive 3488 points, with Berenice scoring over 3000 of those points! The next highest scoring student was Caroline Pakalaite who scored 1041 points for her team that were in second place. Assistant Head Mrs Harvey said “This is the first year Appleton Academy have entered this competition and I am very impressed with the positive attitude of the Year 8 girls who gave their all. These girls are truly aspirational, showing great problem-solving skills and resilience. They certainly have a bright future ahead of them which could be in a digital or cyber related career”. All the students that took part will receive a certificate and the top 4 will get a prize.
Year 7 Geography Photography Competition
By Mr Young.
Our Year 7 geographers have been taking part in a photography competition organised by the geography team. The theme was “A Physical body of water” and related to their recent learning about rivers and flooding. The students were given three weeks to go out and photograph any physical body of water and then they have to email their photo into Mr Young along with some information about the location they had visited and why they liked their photo.
We were delighted to receive more than 30 entries to the competition. Harrison Stott was the worthy winner with this lovely photo from his caravan holiday in the Lake District. We have now moved onto the Year 9s who have the theme of “Buildings and Landscapes”
Year 9 Positive Choices Day
By Mr Hirst.
In October, Year 9 took part in the Positive Choices workshops. These were delivered by Leeds United foundation. Each group had sessions on the Realities of Prison, Gang Culture, County Lines, Drug Misuse and Joint Enterprise. The presenters had personal experience of these things and educated the students on making positive choices.
Santa and His Elves
Santa and his Elves made a surprise visit to primary. Following a rigorous application process, students from across Key stage 3 were selected to accompany Santa on his visit to primary children.
Student and parent support
In each newsletter we will have a focus on a service or services that can support our students and/or their parents. These services may be something we offer through the school or something that an external provider can deliver. If you have any questions about these services, please contact the school.
Student and parent support
Looking to the future: Alumni appeal
At Appleton Academy we highly value our connections with former students. We like to celebrate their achievements and experiences with students, staff and the local community.
We would love to hear from former students and hope to be able to work with them, in the capacity of volunteer, mentor and/or inspirational speakers. If you are a former student and would like to be contacted about the possibility of working with us, please complete the form on the link below or alternatively