BVC Newsletter - Spring 2019

Spring 2019 Issue 28

News

The magazine of Bottisham Village College

Inside this issue Wellbeing Award Celebration Evening House news Arts & Sports News & lots more news and information

Achievement through inspiring, caring, enriching 1

Message from the Principal

Bottisham Village College Lode Road Bottisham Cambridgeshire CB25 9DL Tel: 01223 811250 enquiries@bottishamvc.org

I do hope that you have all enjoyed a restful Easter break and are looking forward to a warm and sunny Summer term.

As you can see from our newsletter, one highlight of last term was gaining our Wellbeing Schools Award of which we are very proud. This award celebrates work by the whole community over many years and students in all year groups are keen to see this work continue ranking wellbeing and mental health as their top priority in recent leadership interviews. Working alongside partners in the NHS to access training and expertise in the area of positive mental health has been an absolute pleasure and we look forward to continue working on our ambitious plans in the future.

All student groups have also been involving themselves in local and global community issues resulting in an interview with Lucy Fraser MP before Easter. It is always wonderful to see so many students express their passion for what they think is right and put their heart and soul into trying to change things for the better. A group of students who have had huge impact on the college this year have been our group of students leaders. We could not do without their support, ideas, energy and creativity to help drive our school forward.

In academic matters, I would very much like to send my congratulations to students in years 10 and 11, undertaking mock examinations. The exam season offer students a huge challenge, both in terms of the breadth of content but also in the skills and sheer stamina that they have to demonstrate for long periods of time. Pleasingly, I can say that both year groups approached their mock exams with a positive, diligent mindset and have reaped the rewards.

Looking forward, visitors to the college will notice that our building work has now come to an end and has left us with a bright, spacious spaces which our whole school and local community are enjoying. We are planning an open day later in the summer term which you may like to attend. You will be able to see our new Sports facilities which now include a food kiosk and covered seating area, see the school in action, find out what adult learning courses or workshops you may like to join, see our wonderful new community library and explore our sculpture trail.

As always the Summer term is full of exciting opportunities and we very much look forward to Activities Week, Celebration Day and Leavers’ Ball, Arts and sporting events. Thank you to parents for your continued support, especially our school governors, parent forum group and PTA who give up so much time for the children and staff at the college. We very much appreciate all that you do.

We hope you enjoy reading our Spring newsletter.

Best Wishes,

Mrs Jenny Rankine

Dates for your diary Summer Term 2019

Autumn Term 2019

Tuesday 23rd April - Start of Summer term Wednesday 1st May - Year 7 Parents’ Evening Monday 6th May - May Day Wednesday 15th May - Year 10 Parents’ Evening 27th - 31st May - Half term 8th & 9th July - Year 6 Induction Days 8th July - Year 6 Induction evening for parents 8th - 19th July - Year 10 Work Experience 15th - 19th July - Activities week Wednesday 24th July 1.25pm - End of summer term

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Monday 2nd September - Training Day Tuesday 3rd September - Year 7 only Wednesday 4th September - All students in school Thursday 3rd October - Training day and Open Evening 21st October - 25th October - Half term Friday 29th November - Training day Friday 20th December - End of autumn term

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We are delighted to have been awarded the Optimus Wellbeing Award for schools.

This reflects the ongoing work which we are doing as a school community to support the wellbeing and positive mental health of our students. We firmly believe that the mental health and wellbeing of our students and staff is 'everybody's business' with all members of our school community, including governors, students, parents, teaching, admin and support staff having a role to play in its promotion.

As part of the 18 month long accreditation process, we have had to audit our wellbeing provision, and develop an action plan to develop our provision. To date amongst many thing, we have worked hard to:  Create a mental health policy  Appoint a Mental Health and Wellbeing lead who works alongside a team of school community Wellbeing champions.  Raise awareness of mental health, through assemblies, PSHE days, group work, staff training, parent information sessions, newsletters and articles.  Provide excellent mental health support from our dedicated pastoral team; providing 1 to 1 sessions and evidence based group interventions.  Allow students to take a lead in developing what they feel is most important for their wellbeing eg. The creation of SafePlace.  Develop a wellbeing programme for staff  Work with other agencies, professionals and forums.

This action plan that we have put in place does not end with us achieving the Wellbeing Award. We are excited to further embed and extend the work that we are doing to ensure that the mental health and wellbeing of the school community remains of the highest priority.

“As a school we are committed to promoting the wellbeing and positive mental health of our students and staff. We recognise that all members of our school community teaching staff, support staff, governors, trust colleagues, parents and the students themselves have a role to play in ensuring that mental health is ‘everybody’s business’ and we thank them all for their involvement in supporting this priority for the college.

Promoting and supporting mental health at Bottisham Village College is seen as an integral part of our day to day life and we shall continue to work closely with wider organisations, such as CAMHs, Cambridgeshire County Council and the Department for Education to ensure that our mental health provision at Bottisham Village is constantly developing and improving to meet the growing needs of our young people.”

by Jenny Rankine, Principal

The “Wellbeing award for schools” by Optimus, with which Bottisham Village College has been accredited, is a wonderful and thoroughly well-deserved achievement.

It fully acknowledges the journey which the school has undertaken to develop a sustainable “whole school approach” as a way of promoting the emotional health and wellbeing of both pupils and staff. Research has also clearly shown, that, where this is in place, there is significant improvement in academic attainment.

The school has engaged with the CAMH Learning and Development Team within the Cambridge and Peterborough Mental Health Trust over a number of years. The team regards the college as a model of good practice in the way it has recognised and responded to increasing mental health needs among students.

Particularly outstanding is the way in which it has encouraged student involvement in discussions and decision making and fostered peer mentoring which has led to an all- important sense of belonging to the school community.

I know that the college will regard this award as another stage of the journey rather than an end in itself.

Their hope will be that other schools will be inspired to reflect on their ethos and culture in relation to emotional wellbeing and mental health, supporting young people to build the life skills and resilience they need to face life’s challenges.

by Helen Bates, CAMH Learning and Development Consultant

BVC’s success was also commended by Jon Culpin, Chief Executive Officer of Anglian Learning, Bottisham’s Multi-Academy Trust: “Anglian Learning is extremely proud of the award received by Bottisham Village College for their pioneering work on mental health and wellbeing. Anglian Learning is also mindful of the pressures upon our hard working staff, that we need to look after their wellbeing too and this work undertaken at BVC is something that we shall build upon and develop further in all of our schools over the next year.”

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NEW Student Leadership Team

An insight into politics

We have to thank our outgoing Year 11 SLT, as they hand over to focus on their final term at Bottisham. The following students have been outstanding in supporting the College; Annabel Cuthbert, Jodie Lawler, Summer Dowling, Claudia Cable, Grace Johnson, Louie Bristow, Jade Andrews and Jo Beaumont. They have led work to inform students across the school on a range of issues for example, promoting positive mental health and preventing peer on peer abuse.

Year 10 students have been through a challenging application process to take up the reins and we are delighted to appoint Sam, Nelle, Dale, Sophie, Alice, Dion, Anya, Daniel and Jacob as the 2019-2020 Student Leadership Team.

On 22nd March, thirty Year 8 students got an insight into politics and how they could affect change in their communities through a visit by Lucy Frazer, MP for South and East Cambridgeshire.

Students will be continuing to build on the work done by the previous SLT and we also look forward to developing new priorities and initiatives that can be embedded across the school.

All of the students involved had written letters to Lucy as part of their Enrichment lessons. She read through all the letters and felt she wanted to respond in person. Lucy began the session by talking a bit about her career so far, saying she was inspired to get into politics to leave the world a better place for her children. The students wasted no time in asking tricky questions with, “How are you going to stop a hard border with Ireland,” being the first question.

Lucy spoke on homelessness, law creation, animal rights, knife crime and Brexit. One of the final questions was, “What does politics mean to you?” to which Lucy responded, “Politics is everything.”

The students enjoyed meeting Lucy and it gave them a great insight into the role of an MP and how they can make their voices heard as young people in society.

News from the *NEW* Library We’ve had an excellent term in the Library, now that we’re properly settled into our fantastic new space. The Library has been full of students every break and lunch, with loads of teachers bringing their classes in for lessons.

she asked her mum and dad decided that her dad would go into the deepest darkest jungle. My rating: 10/10 Best Book Ever!”

Hugh recommends The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien “This book is about a young hobbit and a band of dwarves who set out under the influence of Gandalf the Wizard to reclaim the dwarves’ homeland. I would recommend this book as it is fun, creates new worlds and is enjoyable to read.”

Our Book Fair last term smashed our previous records, raising over £200 to spend on new books for the school! Thank you so much for your support, it really does make a difference - not just because we get new books for the school, but because students are able to browse and buy new books to take home and cherish.

Leona recommends Fairytail by Hiro Mashima “This book is about a guild of wizards and witches who would go through hell and back for each other. It’s so interesting and amusing, it makes me get lost in the story! Everything about it is perfect.”

Lily recommends My Mum Tracy Beaker by Jacqueline Wilson “Tracy is looking for someone to settle down with. She finds someone and something bad happens! I would recommend this book for people who like Jacqueline Wilson.”

In March, we held a book review competition for World Book Day’s ‘Share a Story’ initiative and had a huge range of entries. Our winners would love to share their recommendations with you:

Ms James - Library Co-ordinator

Bradley-Ryan recommends Holes by Louis Sachar “When Stanley Yelnats is wrongfully convicted of stealing an orphanage donation, he must choose between going to jail or Camp Green Lake. He decides to go to camp, which turns out to be a brutal place. I recommend this book because it is about an adventure and it is a funny book.”

Harvey recommends Fing by David Walliams “This book is about a girl called Myrtle and she always gets what she wants whenever she asks. One day she says she wants a Fing. So when

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House News …. House News …. House News …. House News ….

INTERHOUSE DAY 2 Our 2nd Enrichment Day (aka Interhouse) took place back in March, with each year group taking part in activities in different faculties to the last time.  Some Year 7 and 8 students took part in a production of The Jungle Book, with elements of dance, drama and music.  Years 9, 10 and 11 took part in Interform sports competitions, including football, cheerleading and swimming  In art, students had a go at noodle doodles.

In food technology, students worked in teams to put together various elements of afternoon tea.  In geography, students took on the roles of different countries and carried out a mock United Nations, trying to solve a global crisis in teams.  In English, year 7 and 8 took part in mass spelling bees, cheering their houses on with posters and chants!  And in languages students invented new languages. (More about this activity below) Congratulations to all the students in VENTUS house for being crowned overall winners on the day, by earning the most house points.

Additionally, the day took place during careers week and students had the opportunity to listen to a variety of guest speakers from a multitude of different careers, including: forensic science, the motor industry, catering apprenticeships, getting involved in TV and radio, life at university, the pharmaceutical industry and many more. We would like to thank all 18 of our guest speakers for giving up their time, and would welcome other students in the future to share their career stories with our students.

Our next Enrichment day will be in July and will have a sports focus.

Mr Anderson - House System Co-ordinator

New language created!

Our second enrichment day saw students from years 9, 10 and 11 creating their own languages! Taking inspiration from made up languages such as “Dothraki” from Game of Thrones and clips of celebrities talking about their childhood made up languages, the students were also treated to a live performance of “Sausage and Mash” by Mrs Blake and Mrs MacAulay.

In groups, the students studied an actual English based creole called “Tok Pisin” spoken in Papua New Guinea, “Yoda Speak”, the made up language from the film Star Wars, “Pig Latin”, a slang used by children, and “Tennis Schmennis”, an English reduplication pattern.

The students were then asked to come up with their own languages in small groups. They had strict guidelines to follow, and they then had to perform a short dialogue in their language. We were greatly impressed by the manner in which they threw themselves into the task with such interest, enthusiasm and flair.

Finally, the groups performed their dialogues in front of their peers. The judges were overwhelmed by the creativity, grammatical knowledge, dramatic performances, complexity and sheer variety of the made up languages.

All were worthy winners, but overall, Aether won for year 9, and Terra House (or “Terra Husi”) for years 10 and 11 with their language called “Eaglia”, in which “slazgas” means glasses! Of particular note, were Tom Harvey and Sam Clifford for their language “Sidiscript” which was so confidently delivered, and Jacob Stoodley’s group gave us an oscar-winning performance of their dialogue. There were also many impressive contributions from hitherto undiscovered linguists!

We are all now looking forward to seeing some of these languages feature in the hit TV series of the future! You heard them first at BVC!

House News …. House News ….5 House News …. House News ….

CREATIVE DESIGN & PERFORMING ARTS @ BOTTISHAM

Dance East is our local dance agency that work to create links with the community and to raise the level of ability, awareness and interest in dance in the area. To build on this, the dance department offered students the opportunity to challenge themselves further by taking part in a workshop led by DanceEast Academy.

A group of year 10 students (me included) had the fantastic opportunity to take a hip-hop dance workshop at DanceEast in Ipswich. We took the train to Ipswich together and walked a short distance to the astounding DanceEast studio building. Before even starting all of us were already extremely excited!

The workshop taught us all about hip-hop: the dynamics, its origin and how to do it ourselves. The instructor, Joseph Toonga, was entertaining, friendly and a great teacher as well as an incredible dancer. We learnt a range of hip-hop phrases which we put together to form a dance. It was an amazing day out. Everyone that went (including the 2 teachers who joined in) agreed it was an incredible trip and an opportunity we were grateful to have been given.

by Nelle, Year 10

MIRROR CRACK’D 45 students went to see Agatha Christies Mirror Crack’d at the Arts Theatre Cambridge last month.

They thoroughly enjoyed the performance which had a range of twists and surprises. Afterwards the students got the chance to meet the cast and ask them a series of questions in preparation for their GCSE drama exam. They finished off the evening with pizza at Pizza Express!

Year 7 & 8 Drama Club After Christmas, friends and family of year 7 & 8 Drama club were treated to a performance of A Nightmare Before Christmas. The creation, led by the year 11 GCSE Drama students, was the final performance before the drama leaders handed over the reins to the year 10 leaders, who have been shadowing for some time.

The drama was comedic and fun, and parents enjoyed the creative effort put in to the staging, technical elements, costume and ‘ghoully’ make up. The Drama club are now working on their own adaption of Narnia, which they hope to perform to Bottisham Primary School in the summer term.

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On Friday 8th March, I went on the Move It trip at Excel, London along with many other year 9 and 10 students. I was very excited to have been given the chance to experience something new and express my love of dance in a different way other than dancing. This trip allowed me to watch many incredible dancers perform as well as looking around the many stalls from different dance studios. These stalls included clothes, hairstyling and glitter for the face. As well as this, there were classes you could attend for free or that you booked in advance which was a good opportunity to have fun or practise skills. Watching other dancers perform has certainly inspired me for any future choreography I will have to do in dance and has reminded me how much fun dance is. The highlight of the trip for me was seeing singer and dancer Aston Merrygold. He is a famous singer and dancer who was in the band JLS and is now an Ambassador of the dance company, Base Studios. Another act to feature was duo Harry and Eleiyah who performed in The Greatest Dancer.

I am very glad I went to Move It and would definitely recommend to the Year 9s and 10s next year, as it opens up new ideas for the future, especially if you like dance. It was by far, a great trip and if I had the chance, would be sure to go again.

by Hermione Year 10

Bedford Uni Workshop

Energise Performance Festival GCSE dancers were excited to perform as part of Energise Dance Festival on Saturday 9th February.

Having worked incredibly hard on the demanding Jazz style choreography, students evoked their inner ‘sass’ to communicate a lively, 1920’s, confident piece. The festival took place at Swavesey Village College; giving students the opportunity to watch other dance schools and perform in a new venue. We hope to do our final version of Hey! in the Performing Arts Showcase on the 30th April at BVC.

GCSE dancers had the privilege of working with Dance degree students from Bedford University during the last half term. The University of Bedford Dance degree requires their 3rd year undergraduates to run a touring Dance company in preparation for life as an employed dancer. The undergraduates all had a different role and our workshop was started by a fast paced hip hop warm up by one of the male dancers. The workshop quickly moved on to learning repertoire from the Undergraduates touring piece.

Portrait Drawing Workshop

If you would like to find out more about the Degree course at The University of Bedford please follow the link: https:// www.beds.ac.uk/howtoapply/courses/undergraduate/ next-year/dance-and-professional-practice

The year 10 GCSE art students took part in a drawing workshop on Friday 22nd March. Tutors from the Royal Academy Outreach program came from London to spend the day teaching portrait drawing in a range of imaginative ways. The workshop was very successful as all who took part were enthusiastic and open to trying new ideas.

On the 11th February eighteen students went on a trip to Bletchley Park in Milton Keynes.

My groups favourite part of the day was walking around the mansion, the library was the best room and stuffed full of books. The code breaking session was really good and we got to use an original Enigma machine. Overall we had a great time and even made some friends from Soham Village College on the coach.

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CREATIVE DESIGN & PERFORMING ARTS @ BOTTISHAM

Bedford dancers split themselves up to work independently to teach GCSE dancers part of their solos; this was a challenge for GCSE as they had to embody another dancer’s movement. After the workshop, we had the pleasure of watching two pieces performed in the Evans Auditorium. Both pieces were completely different to each other and students enjoyed being able to see some of the movement that they had learnt earlier. Bottisham hopes that the relationship with The University of Bedford Dance Degree continues and we hope to have a repeat visit next year.

This special evening took place in February and gave us the opportunity to acknowledge and celebrate the exceptional talents and achievements of so many of our students, some of whom we feel go unrecognised.

Students and their families packed the Evans Auditorium to enjoy an evening of dance, drama and musical performances as well as a music video featuring all the award winner’s names. Refreshments were made and served by Year 9 students in the new dining hall where there was also a fantastic display of art and sculptures from our GCSE art students. The prizes awarded covered a broad range of qualities such as engagement, attitude, endeavour, progress, leadership, enthusiasm and dedication.

Prizes were also awarded to the top scoring boy and girl in each house and ‘Power for Good’ certificates for reasons such as ‘helping new students settle into the school’ and ‘Fantastic all round contribution to the college and wider community’. The evening was such a success we hope to repeat it again later in the year.

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A selection of the Art Work on display and from winners of arts awrds

The special award for inspirational support for students (Hannah Roberts trophy) was presented to Matilda Manning from Year 11 for setting up ‘SafePlace’. This is very popular by students in younger years and is overseen by Year 11 students.

Students can meet at break and lunchtime away from the hustle and bustle of the main school, eat their lunch, talk, get some support, play games and make new friends. The year 11 students who run it have had a variety of training including safeguarding and some are anti-bullying ambassadors.

Last year a group of my friends and I noticed that there wasn’t a place for people to eat their lunch away from the sometimes frantic nature of breaks and lunches. We felt that this was something that was necessary, because everyone should have a place to go where they feel comfortable and safe so we decided to make one ourselves! We called this place Safe Place.”

by Matilda

During half term week, the college took part in the Cambridgeshire Area Young Artists Competition (CAYAC). This is an annual event, now in its fifth year, and is sponsored by the Arts Society. Schools in the county can submit a selection of their students’ work for the exhibition, from pre-school through to A level, and the standard of work entered is always very high. This year 47 schools took part, submitting 167 pieces of work, and more than 400 people visited the exhibition.

We were delighted to have Ella win the runner up prize in the highly competitive KS4 category, with her amazing artwork.

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Careers News

opportunities in these areas. There are many employers locally who fall into this category and we are keen to raise students’ awareness of what could be possible in the future.

March came with more opportunities for our students.

Healthcare related apprenticeships were brought to the attention of some of our Year 10 Health and Social Care students when the work experience team from Addenbrookes visited them in their lesson. Nursing is one of the routes available now as an NHS apprenticeship so it is wonderful that our students are gaining knowledge about this pathway from employers in this field.

Hello everyone! As ever, the careers team at BVC have been very busy planning and delivering a variety of different activities to support our students’ career development. We began in January with our Year 11s participating in a Mock Interview Day. Eleven interviewers from the world of business offered our students the chance to respond to interview style questions and receive feedback. The students really enjoyed the experience and comments included “Great experience, helped me understand what employers want from me”, “Helped me gain knowledge about interviews, and what to expect in the future”, “helpful to get feedback and boost confidence” and simply “it was fun!”

Enrichment Day fell in National Careers Week and the Careers Team made the most of the opportunity! During Period 5 every student in the school had the chance to visit a career talk delivered by a variety of different speakers from a variety of different industry areas. 17 career talks were on offer, which I’m sure you will agree was pretty amazing! Our talks ranged from orthopaedic surgery, academic research, catering and hospitality, recruitment, the Institute of Motoring Industry, Manga, forensic science and more! Students also had in-class activities provided to make sure the hour was fully utilised for careers work. The founder of National Career Week, Nick Newman, toured the school with me and was really impressed by what he saw, making sure the message got out via twitter. The team will be compiling a case study for next Year’s National Careers Week website to hopefully inspire other schools to take part in this important careers event. It has to be said that everyone in the school got involved in the week and staff, including the CEO, admin, finance and the site team all put posters on their doors saying what they wanted to be when they were younger. The corridors were buzzing!

On the first PSHE day of the year, our Year 10 students took part in CV Writing Workshops delivered by Rebecca Sussex of the Skills Service and two volunteers from industry. Rebecca, with a background in journalism and working on national newspapers, has a wealth of employability knowledge.

Students were able to start compiling their first CV which over time, as they gather experiences, can be developed into effective documents.

Those Year 11s who are interested in the Apprenticeship route had the opportunity to attend a bespoke workshop with AIM Apprenticeships. We were very fortunate to have two members of AIM staff to support our students who with expert guidance, were able to explore apprenticeship opportunities, and a few also submitted applications!

Everyone agreed the activity had been of real help and the Careers Team will be offering the students the chance to have a follow-up activity where they can find out about useful employability documents to help their job seeking.

Year 9 students visited Anglian Ruskin University for the annual ‘Eyes on the Prize’ event. They were able to tour the campus and visit a careers fair where employers and post 16 providers advised them on local education and employment opportunities.

As I write, we are planning future events for our PSHE Days as well as another visit to ARU. The ‘Volunteer it Yourself’ organisers have been in touch to enable students to visit a construction related workplace. I am also interviewing Year 10 students, advising them on opportunities post-16. I think you will agree it has been a very busy term. As we move forward, we will be looking to build our Alumni and notices will be coming out soon to ask our past students to support the career development of current and future students. Your stories have the potential to change lives, inspiring and motivating young people to reach their fullest potential.

If you are interested in supporting our students and would like to find out more, please contact me on:

In February the school launched Year 9 ‘Pathways to the Future’ GCSE options. Subject areas included career-specific slides in their presentations to students and I spoke to parents about the different post16 pathways.

careers@bottishamvc.org or lsimpson@bottishamvc.org Don’t forget you can also follow us on twitter @bvccareers

Year 7 and 8 students had Launchpad STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) assemblies, organised by the Science Department, to raise their awareness of the

Thank you for your support The Careers Team

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Final New Build Update

Phase 2 of our extensive Capital Build programme has recently come to its conclusion. Adding to the teaching and learning facilities built during phase 1, the college now boasts a new adult learning facility to further develop the

well-established links and history with community education. Additionally, there is a new administration block including reception area at the front of the college to welcome visitors.

“Never in its 80 year history has the college undergone such significant physical change. However, our village

college ethos and commitment to providing our community with an exceptional educational experience remains the same and allows us to develop further aspirations for the future.” Mrs Jenny Rankine, Principal

With a final word from

Our time here is now complete! What a journey it’s been!

Casting your eyes back eight months ago when we released the handover to the new ‘Morris Wing Extension’ in July 2018 to now in March 2019 completing the refurbishment section of the front area of the school. This has allowed us to create a space in which the school can gain great use from both functionally and safely.

Works here comprised of knocking walls down, building additional walls, creating openings, incorporating steel members, creating higher ceilings and larger areas as well as constructing a new reception area with aesthetical cladding to match the schools’ colour preferences.

You can now admire the new front entrance area steps and handrails with a range of footpaths which lead you to the new

reception entrances, areas of parking have been provided for Disabled drivers and a new boundary fencing which provides the schools’ safeguarding line, fundamental to the school’s needs.

Throughout the two years and us being here on site, we have managed to provide the school with work experience opportunities, careers fairs and assembly talks on ‘careers in construction and the built environment’.

We are proud that these have supported the school towards now offering a BTEC level 1 in Construction and the Built Environment. This will put the students in a great position if they go on to college and pursue a career in construction.

There’s a saying ‘one man’s junk is another man’s treasure’. During the course of the project we have been able to give a variety of materials to the DT department and in the last week of the project we donated most, if not all of our cabin office furniture that we had used on the project. It was just so satisfying to see them going to use rather than being just being thrown in the skip!

On behalf of all the Morgan Sindall team at Bottisham, it’s been an absolute pleasure working with your college and councils greater team over the last two years. Long may this relationship continue!

We have had a very busy start to the New Year in catering department. We had a new food kiosk arrive on site which opened after half-term. This is to help relieve queuing in the dining hall and to offer greater choice to the pupils.

Our brand new breakfast service that started after Christmas, this offers a healthy choice of breakfast options for the pupils to help start their day in a healthy positive way. Choices include  Bacon or sausage in Roll £1.15  Fresh fruit salad 85p  Natural yoghurt or porridge with choice of toppings 85p  Freshly baked pastries 90p  Plus much more We have both Cold and Hot Meal Deals available every day for £2.40 and lots of exciting new products on offer over the next few months including homemade fruit smoothies.

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Littering is destroying our planet! We ( the BVC ECO WARRIORS ) are here to change that for good. Our group was set up after it came to our attention that the school could become greener in a number of ways. One schools contribution may only seem like a small thing but will hopefully inspire others to make a difference. Our short term plan is to minimise the plastics in the catering department and generally just use more recyclable materials to pack our foods with.

Furthermore, we have noticed that students unnecessarily buy bottled water from the canteen which then goes on to be littered over the school grounds. To prevent this, our long term plan is to introduce reusable water bottles. Each student will be given one when buying uniform at the start of the pupils’ time at BVC. These bottles can then be filled up from our water fountains in the dining hall.

These plans are only a fraction of what we are anticipating to do, alongside with some fundraising events.

One person can make a difference, be that person! by the BVC ECO WARRIORS

and the future of year 10 and 11 planners Since last year, Bottisham teachers, following the lead of colleagues across the country, have been setting homework on Google Classroom. Despite the odd teething problem, this has proven to be a very successful system. Students, in focus groups, have spoken about the advantages of knowing that they can look in one place to find out what their homework is, and have said how much they appreciate the feature by which teachers can make available the resources used in the lessons, along with other resources such as videos and reading lists that deepen and extend understanding. Year 11 are finding this particularly helpful when it comes to revision.

As the use of this platform has become embedded, we find that planners are becoming increasingly redundant. Because of this, we have decided to discontinue their use in Years 10 and 11. We do recognise, though, that a small number of students do not have access to computers, or prefer to use planners. We will therefore keep aside some planners for these students, and, as always students will be supplied with hard copies of any resources that are needed.

We are confident that this change will very much support the learning of students, and represents an example of technology enhancing the educational experience that children get.

by Mr Andrew Gee, Assistant Principal

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Thank you for all staff and students involved in the Red Nose Day fundraising. At BVC this year, the fundraising events took place across an entire week with Interhouse fundraising events running daily.

Congratulations to Mr Dove and Aqua house who raised the most money by running the traditional Staff vs Staff dodgeball match. closely followed by Mr Midgley and Ventus who sold sweets and popcorn. There were also netball and football events, cake sale, non-uniform day, hula hooping and a staff raffle, with all of this fundraising raising a fantastic total amount of £1,639! This will be helping to support vulnerable people and communities in the UK and internationally.

Trip to Bletchley Park

MathsFeast

On the 11th February eighteen students went on a trip to Bletchley Park in Milton Keynes. My groups favourite part of the day was walking around the mansion, the library was the best room and stuffed full of books. The code breaking session was really good and we got to use an original Enigma machine.

Overall we had a great time and even made some friends from Soham Village College on the coach.

On the 25th of February, two teams of four year 10s from Bottisham competed in the MathsFeast competition at Linton Village College. The first round of the competition was doing questions as fast as possible. One of Bottisham teams got 51/60, the highest out of any team. Two more perfect rounds and a break later, Bottisham still had a team in first place! Unfortunately, this lead was lost in the final round, meaning we dropped to second place by just one point.

by Caleb, Year 9

Despite not coming away victorious, it was still a fun experience for all, and 2nd place is not too bad.

by Tom, Year 10

The aims of the newly-established Parent Forum are: • to inform parents of changes to school systems and policies, and seek their feedback • to discuss issues that are causing concern to parents and, where possible, address these issues • to allow parents the opportunity to discuss new ideas that will bring benefit to the students or the wider school community • to establish how we can strengthen the link between learning at school and at home The group, which comprises a parents from all year groups, met for the first time on 13th February. The main discussion item was how we can further develop our tools for communicating with parents. We will be meeting again in the final week of the Spring term to finalise plans for the first of a planned series of community-based parent drop-ins; these will allow us to provide advice and guidance about how parents can support their child’s learning at home. We will also be discussing how we can develop our primary school transition programme.

If you are interested in hearing more about the work of the Parent Forum, please contact me by emailing mmerry@bottishamvc.org

by Mr Matt Merry, Assistant Principal

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Golf George White, Teddy Hall and Luie Hall represented the school at the Cambridgeshire Schools Championships at Peterborough, Milton on Monday 25th March The team just missed out on qualification for the National Final but excellent performances from George and Teddy have put them in line for a place in the Cambridgeshire Scratch team to compete in the NASUWT South East Championships in June.

Teddy won the recent British Junior Golf Tour event at Maylands on Sunday 31st March with a gross 73. He was placed as overall runner-up and the lowest gross score. As a result he has qualified for the Word Finals in San Diego America later this year. We wish him the best of luck in this and all his upcoming competitions.

Rugby

Bronze for Niall Year 10 student Niall Hooton is continuing his successful career in Gymnastics.

Niall won bronze for his floor routine at the English Championships in March and most recently competed in the British Championships.

His next competition will be at the Eastern Region Pipers Vale Cup in May, followed by a week at a training camp in Portugal.

In August he will compete as part of the Huntingdon Gymnastics team at the British Teams Competition, followed by the London men’s Open Championships.

We wish Niall the best of luck in all his upcoming competitions and look forward to hearing how he gets on.

What modern sport is also ancient warfare, requires upper body strength but is easy to learn, builds mental toughness but is great fun?

Answer… Archery!

With over 40 archers trained through the Extended Schools Archery Club in the last eighteen months, the number of students involved on a weekly basis has grown significantly and their performance has too. Most recently with Jasper and Scarlett Watts winning gold at Peacock Archers WA18 competition in January and Jasper taking gold in his age group at the County indoor championships in February.

For some, a couple of terms of archery is enough and they move on to try other sports.

For others it sparks what turns out to be a lifelong interest in the sport and the coaching team from Peacock Archery (Mary & Philip) along with Kate Watts from Peacock Archers are there to support and develop that interest.

Why might you want to get involved? Well it really is the sport for everyone (and it doesn’t require any running around!), it is competitive but social, relaxing but challenging, builds strength but is easy to get started and is a great way of forgetting about school work (at least for a couple of hours!)

Why not sign up for Archery next term and give it a go.

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Secondary Adapted Multi-Sports Event Back in February, we took eight pupils, Harvey, Oliver, Sami, Logan, Guy, Ben, Kai & Hanna, to the Secondary Adapted Multi-Sports Event at Impington Village College. They competed in pairs over four events; New Age Curling, much like the real curling but without the ice! , Boccia which is similar to bowling, Table Cricket where a miniature game of the real game played on the table top and Polybat which is a hockey game played on a table tennis table. After the four events the scores were all added together and the pairings of Kai and Oliver, and Harvey and Sami had scored enough to represent Cambridge schools in their respective events at the County schools games in March.

This was held at the St. Ivo Indoor Leisure Centre and the boys competed as part of the Cambridge City partnership against 3 other partnerships. Oliver and Kai finished 3rd overall in the Table Cricket, and Harvey and Sami won the Boccia event. Overall that meant that Cambridge finished 2nd behind South Cambridgeshire schools. They all had a great day and were exceptionally pleased to receive certificates, games t-shirt and a medal.

We look forward to the next event which will be athletics in the summer.

Football

Game of our Own

Year 7 made a strong start of their first school season. They have played a handful of friendly fixtures and have shown great potential taking many wins along the way. They eventually finished 4th in their district tournament, qualifying for the top tournament in Year 8. This places them in the top 8 schools in the district.

Year 8 have made some steady progress to the start of their school season, they’ve seen mainly wins in their friendly fixtures and have just competed in the top tier pool District football tournament where they were very competitive against some very strong sides. The A team finished 6th in their tournament, making them 6th out of 16 teams across the district. They have had a practice match against Soham to prepare them for 11-a-side games in Year 9.

The Game of Our Own programme is trying to increase the participation of girls in football by creating fun and engaging clubs which all girls can join and feel comfortable in.

Some girls from Years 8 & 9 were chosen to be football activators and it became our job to encourage more girls to join a football club and help boost their confidence. We were split into two strands: marketing and delivery. I was part of the marketing strand, and got to go on a trip to Bedford International Stadium where we were guided through how best to set up and advertise our club and eliminate certain insecurities about playing football. As for the delivery strand, they were taught different drills and activities to do during training. This day was led by the members of the FA. I speak for all of us when I say that we had a lot of fun that day, learning and socialising with other football activators.

We are currently in the process of setting up a girl’s football club which will be launching on the 25th April. We urge all girls who are considering joining to do so and please feel free to ask any questions you may be having.

Year 9 - The road to the Abbey has been the focus this season. The Year 9s, led by Jonah, have gone from strength to strength, picking up form along the way. Despite a tricky start to their season, losing Dom to a broken leg, the breadth and depth of the year 9 players has meant there has been opportunity to rotate players and try different formation along the way.

Wins along the way have been 2-1 win against Impington in tricky conditions, a draw with Netherhall on a dubious pitch and defeating Chesterton and Linton in other friendly fixtures. They are now through to the semi-finals of the District Cup. Years 10 & 11 – At the time of writing, both the Year 10s and 11s have progressed through to semi-finals of the district cup.

by Marija Year 9

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Roy Burrell Awards We attended an amazing evening at the Roy Burrell District Sports Awards on Tuesday 12th March at Netherhall School. The awards were founded in memory of Roy Burrell, who was Deputy Headmaster at Chesterton Community College, Cambridge, until his untimely death at the age of 49. He was passionate about engaging young people in sport and the awards celebrate the excellence, participation and sportsmanship that is characteristic of sport in the county. The annual awards evening celebrates and showcases the achievements and efforts of Year 11 students within the district.

Students were honoured and received medals from sporting superstar Helen Richardson Walsh the former Great Britain Hockey captain and Olympic gold medallist, who gave a very inspirational speech on the evening.

Izzy Armitage—Athletics Henry Newell – Swimming George Whitehall - Golf Owen Bentley - Judo Hugh Dow - Athletics Maddox Colby - Cricket Will Newcombe - Athletics

Olivia Chan - Badminton Molly Mercer - Equestrian Orla McElhone - Equestrian Mia Biggs - Equestrian Holly Wooley - Equestrian Fin Wilkinson - Football Jonny Peters – Football

Amy McClean – Football Annabel Cuthbert - Football Matilda Manning - Netball Becky Marsh – Greg Alvey Award (contribution to school sport)

Congratulations all our Year r 11 students who received awards. A special mention to George and Amy who were nominated for the main awards of Sportsman and Sportswoman of the Year Massive congratulations also to the Year 10 & 11 girl’s Football team who won team of the year. Deserved recognition for their two national cup finals.

Amy McClean, Annabel Cuthbert, Grace Muffet, Becky Marsh, Elise Revell, Sasha Pachett, Ellen Fuller, Anna Botham, Megan Flaherty, Harriet Loveridge , Melissa Townson, Katie Levitt, Amy Fullwood & Rachel Barker.

Cricket On the first couple of Mondays of this term we entered two teams into an Under 13s and 15s indoor cricket tournament run by the Ladies Taverners. Ladies Taverners are an organisation that aim to enhance the lives of disabled and young women through sport.

The U15s narrowly missed out on qualifying for the County finals, after late heartbreak against Linton. In their first game they comfortably beat Impington after setting a big total. When it came to Linton the girls batted extremely well, demonstrating good batting technique to keep their fast bowler out. The team then got to grips with the rest of the bowlers and went about setting a good score. The team bowled and fielded superbly, and with 4 needed of 2 balls, in returned Linton’s number 1 batsmen who struck the winning runs with 1 ball to spare.

The U13s managed to win 3 games to qualify for the County Finals. They beat NCA and Impington comfortably, before showing resilience and determination to get over the line in the final game against Chesterton.

Katie Spiers leading the fight with the bat, supported well by Amelia Martell after an early collapse saw us lose 3 wickets for 0 runs. With Impington up with the run rate, the bowlers kept the game tight and it took excellent fielding from the girls and 4 wickets from Liv Richardson to see the game out. The girls now progress to the County Finals.

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Year 4 Winter Festival On Thursday 21st March over 200 Year 4 primary school pupils arrived at Bottisham Village College full of excitement and energy to participate in the rebranded Year 4 Festival. The festival included participation in football and capture the flag based activities. All primary school students were led through activities by our brilliant Year 8 sports leaders. The morning was split into the opportunity to learn and develop skills with the sports leaders before playing friendly fixtures against other schools.

The year 8 sports leaders prior to the festival attended a training session as part of a newly formed Football Young Leaders Programme with Cambridgeshire Football Association. All the sports leaders for both Capture the Flag and Football were brilliant, inspiring the participation for all the primary students.

Congratulations to all that took part.

We look forward to welcoming the primary schools back for many more sports festivals during the summer term.