Melbourn Village College

Melbourn Village College Community Survey 2011

Melbourn Village College is dedicated to providing its students with a high quality education.

What you may not know is that they also provide a high quality adult & community learning programme too. With the economic decline this service has suffered, like most others, in reduced class numbers. Is this the economic decline or are we not providing you with the courses/ services you would like? The draft copy of the Village Plan indicates that Melbourn residents still need community facilities and services so please let me know what you want.

Please find the time, if you would, to fill in this short survey and return to: Mrs Julie Harradence, Community Office, Melbourn Village College, The Moor, Melbourn, SG8 6EF.

Have you ever attended an adult learning class at Melbourn Village College? YES NO

What class/es did you attend?

Do you use the facilities at Melbourn Sports Centre? YES NO

Would you prefer: (circle all that apply)

Daytime classes Evening Classes Taster classes 1-off classes

Demonstrations Talks Day schools Workshops

Special Evenings Certificated courses Leisure courses

Anything else?

What class/es would you like to see at Melbourn?

What age group are you? 18–25 26–40 40–50 51+

Do you have primary school aged children? YES NO

Do you use the Library in Melbourn? YES NO

Please complete the following if you are at retirement age or approaching retirement age.

What would YOU like to do with your new ME time?

Can we help you to achieve this more effectively by offering a class or talk on this subject? i.e. Computing, Cake Decorating, Gardening, Basic Plumbing, DIY, Basic Electrics, Woodwork, Bird-Watching, Floristry & Flower Arranging, Decorating, Car-Maintenance, Keep-fit (Yoga, Pilates, Tai-chi, Self Defence, etc)

What would YOU be interested in?

Any Other comments or suggestions?

Thank you for your time. Julie Harradence

Melbourn Village College

Mrs Stephenson has recently confirmed her intention to leave Melbourn Village College at the end of the Summer Term to become a partner in her family business.

At a time when there is much change taking place in education, the Governors are committed to continuing the success of recent years whilst maintaining a sense of continuity. To this end, Mr Holmes will take over as Acting Warden from September, with a full time appointment being made in due course.

In her letter, Mrs Stephenson wrote, “It is always a hard decision to leave a school because so much of the job is about the people in the institution. I was appointed to raise academic attainment and am pleased that I am leaving the College at a time when the hard work and support of students, staff and parents has resulted in just that; in terms of student progress moving the College from the bottom 15% of all schools nationally to the top 20% for two consecutive years is something we can all be justly proud of.

Having worked in a range of schools during my career, I can honestly say that the talent, sense of community and support and guidance at Melbourn Village College are outstanding and the College is now well-placed to take the next step in its development. I wish all students every happiness for their future and am confident that they will all be successful in whatever path they choose”.

On behalf of the Governing Body, I would like to place on record our thanks to Mrs Stephenson for all the hard work she has done in raising achievement over the four years she has been Warden. Her enthusiasm and dedication to the Village College principle have ensured that she leaves the College in a strong position to begin the next phase of its journey. We all wish her good fortune and best wishes for the future. Andy Smith Chair of Governors The College has received congratulations from the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust for our performance in the 2010 GCSE examinations. At a ceremony in London, the College received recognition for meeting the following demanding criteria: 60% (66%) or more 5+A*–C results including English and mathematics; 65% (72%) or more 2+A*-C results in science subjects; and 40% (42%) or more 1+A*-C results in modern foreign languages in the 2010 GCSE or equivalent examinations.

The Specialist Schools and Academies Trust is one of the country’s leading education organisations and represents more than 5,600 academies, schools and colleges. Elizabeth Reid, Chief Executive of the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust said, “These national awards recognise schools which have achieved excellent exam standards in a wide range of academic and other subjects. These schools are enabling more young people to reach their full potential and succeed, by teaching them to good standards in maths, English, science and languages”. As we approach another round of examinations we wish all of our students taking examinations every success. Elaine Stephenson Warden

Performing Arts

The performing arts have been busy as usual at MVC. The Spring term saw a very successful series of performances with the drama showcase evening organised by Miss Goode, Dance Fever showcase by Miss Patterson and the Music Tour and performance evening back home by Mr Belbin. As usual our students really impressed with their talent and hard work and a big well done to all who took part.

Talented Young Musicians Tour Belgium

Thirty-one students aged from 11 to 16 from Melbourn Village College completed a successful tour to Belgium over Easter playing a mix of contemporary and big band music to very appreciative audiences at three different venues.

MVC’s Dance Talent Showcased

Melbourn Village College dance competition squad performed at Energise, the South Cambridgeshire Dance Showcase in February along with PADCO, the primary dance group run by Miss Patterson. Both performances were very well received by a sell out audience at Swavesey Venue.

In recognition of the talent of MVC’s dance group, the students were asked to perform at South Cambridgeshire District Council’s Chairman’s Arts Award Ceremony at the end of March. The Awards Ceremony is for volunteers who have shown an outstanding contribution to the arts in South Cambs. Acts invited to perform are considered to illustrate high quality local talent so being invited to perform is fantastic achievement for our dancers. MVC dancers also won the Grafton Centre Style Challenge for Comic Relief. The dancers mixed fashion and catwalk with music and dance. They won best choreography and overall winner, beating sixth form dance students!

John Lewis Cambridgeshire Music Awards

MVC received a grant to purchase some portable PA speakers from the JCLM trustees. MVC students, Mr Holmes and Mr Belbin received the cheque from Dr Nigel Brown OBE (High Sheriff of Cambridgeshire) at an event in April. The new speakers will allow MVC singers to perform at venues outside the college with the accompaniment of a full band and take the excellent sound of MVC concerts to local primary schools and other venues. Mr Holmes

BBC News School Report 2011 In March, students from Year’s 7, 8 and 9 all over the country participated in the BBC School Report. For the first year in its history, MVC have taken part in this project. And for the first time, we students were given the chance to create our own news stories mostly independently, thus not only learning an immense amount about the importance of news and deadlines, but about how news is made, whilst all the time having a great deal of fun. We, as the group of students first met with Ms. Varney a few weeks ago to look over current stories, and we first began to consider what we ourselves could report on. Watch the great results for yourself at www.mvc.org.uk Ed Mallen 9

Melbourn Village College’s Team of Journalists: Joseph Weavers, Ryan Lees, Sam Bedlow, Alex Crockford, George Mcdermott, Robert Fox, Dani Friel, Elise Harbud, Sophie Payne, Jeremy Brindle, Ed Mallen, Amelia Edwards, Jasmin Coles, Courtney Cox. Technical Advisor: Luke Hebditch With thanks to: Lynn, Mrs Stephenson, Mr Houghton, Vanessa Mann, Georgie Bullen, Jackie Bullen, PC Claire List, Susan van de Ven, Kirstin Bicknell

Maths

This year the Mathematics Department took part in world maths day. The aim of world maths day is to unite the world in a celebration of numbers. 5.3 million students from 218 countries took part in the 48 hour event. The event involved taking part in live games of mental arithmetic against students from around the world. Each game lasted 60 seconds and the student who answered the most questions won that game. Students could take part in a maximum of 20 games at 5 different levels of difficulty. In total 428,598,214 questions were answered correctly around the world. Melbourn Village College students answered 33,376 of these.

In February 60 students from years 9 to 11 took part in the Intermediate Maths Challenge, a national competition organised by the United Kingdom Maths Trust. The top 40% of students in the country receive a certificate, be it Gold (top 7%), Silver (next 13%) or Bronze (next 20%).

Three students in Year 9, Conal Trevanion, Oliver Black (both of whom received gold certificates) and Abigail Proudfoot (silver), were invited to take part in a follow on round, competing against students in over 30 countries worldwide.

Royal Institute Mathematics Lectures

Over the course of the past two terms students from Year 8 have attended the Royal Institute Mathematics Lectures in Cambridge. Held in Girton College and in the Centre for Mathematical Studies, these sessions are intended to extend these Gifted and Talented students with enrichment beyond the curriculum taught in class. Congratulations to all those students who attended the sessions.

Humanities Bringing the Past into the 21st Century – Introducing 101 Smooth FM and www.mvchistroy.co.uk. The year 10 history group was assigned the task of creating a podcast related to the vagabonds of the Middle Ages. Student Jonathan Cooper is the founder of the website. You can check the website to see Jonathan and MVC History students work.

MVC Science Department

The spring term was an eventful and exciting time in Science! As part of National Science and Engineering week students were involved in Science challenges, quizzes, and talks at school. A Guest speaker came in, from the Department of Physiology, Cambridge University to give an interesting talk, titled ‘Cracking the egg’. Year 7, 8 and 9 all participated in separate challenges and science quizzes. Elaine McHugh (Second in the Science department) Recently a group of Melbourn Village College students had the chance to experience both another language and another culture. QiaoQiao Wang, a native speaker of Mandarin from Hills Road Sixth Form, came to present a slide show on Chinese food and traditions. Next came a brief introduction into useful phrases, idioms and Chinese names. The Chinese characters that QiaoQiao wrote for us were really intricate. My personal highlight was the game at the end, in which girls teamed up against boys, trying to pick up skittles with chopsticks. This is a game of great precision and concentration and the girl’s team came out victorious. It was a great chance to learn new skills and try new things, and I hope similar taster sessions run again. Jessica Finn Year 10 (MFL student)

Sports

The Spring term has seen many things going on in the PE department with basketball fixtures, cross country championships, the start of the football and netball season and the Roy Burrell Awards. Mr Walker

Sports Ambassadors

As the young sports ambassadors for MVC, part of mine and Paige’s (Collingbourne) role is to talk to primary school students about sport and to try and inspire them to get involved in a new sport, not only to stay healthy but also to simply have fun and learn the very important skill of teamwork.

There is no better way to inspire young people about sport than the 2012 Olympics in London. We have been giving assemblies to primary schools all across the area (a few are Meldreth, Melbourn, Fowlmere, Barrington and Hauxton) talking to them about what the Olympics is, what it means and why we can learn from the games. For example, as we regularly say to the children, it’s not about being the one who can throw the ball the furthest or be the one who scores the most points/goals. When you strip away the competing, all the skills and practice; it’s all about having fun and enjoying what you do.

That’s why I started up the basketball club after school with another sport’s leader (Matt Davis) to try and get people to try something new and see if they enjoy it. So, to those of you who came and enjoyed it well done on finding a new sport! To those of you that didn’t, it’s never too late to try. Sam Robinson

Art

Year 10 students watched the video of Anish Kapoor show at the Royal Academy in which wax was shot out of a canon onto the walls of this historic building conjuring up images of war and aggressions. Students in textiles responded in a variety of media including fabric, paint and hot wax to try and replicate the energy and speed of the wax shooting through the air and hitting the wall.

Students in Year 9 have been producing self-portraits inspired by the woodcut portraits created by the Expressionist artists, such as Kirchner and Heckel. They have also looked at how cartoon art is inspired by the use of line and shading similar to woodcuts of the Expressionists. Students then went on to produce an Aboriginal lizard in pottery with traditional aboriginal patterns and symbols painted on them. This allowed students to tell a story of the lizard’s journey using aboriginal stories.

Here is an example of the journeys the students made up for their lizard:

Aborigine art Well my story begins at Ayre’s rock. Rocky, the lizard is asleep when loud footsteps awake him. He sees a tribe of people which lead him to a stream around which are huts and children playing and training at night. They all sit down at the fire and tell stories about where they have been. Rocky finds a nice tree and goes to sleep. He starts to dream about ancient Tingari settlements of the ancestors of the aboriginal people. He sees himself going there and in the middle of the temple He sees his own ancestor. He follows her and does not wake up. As he floats above the earth he looks down on his own still body and realises that it was his last day on earth. Connor McCormick and George Way

Over the past year a number of MVC students have contributed to Melbourn’s public art project, Unpicked Meadow, based in Riverside Park, Stockbridge Meadows, Melbourn. Artist Jo Chapman has been working in Melbourn getting to know the area and local community as part of this project. Last year KS3 Art students had a workshop with Jo, contributed ideas for the design of the ARTIVAN project caravan and made ceramic number plates. Their designs and ceramic art works were exhibited in the ARTIVAN over the summer.

KS4 textile students and gifted and talented KS3 students had another workshop with Jo Chapman this term to produce sections for the Stockbridge Tapestry, a community art work. They were given a preview of the final permanent art work Jo is producing and found out more about her work and career. They then produced some fantastic pieces which were showcased as part of the final celebration for the project

MVC’s Wysing Young Artist

Congratulations to Mollie Gorman who has been accepted onto the Wysing Young Artists talent programme. Wysing Young Artists is a pilot programme for talented young people age 13–19 years interested in a career in art. Mollie has so far spent 3 days at Wysing Arts Centre working with 6 different professional artists. She created an art installation with a group of 10 other young people in her age range, which was featured in the Cambridge News. Over the next few months Mollie will be receiving mentoring by professional artists at Wysing and trips to art galleries with the other young artists

MVC has been working in partnership with Wysing Arts Centre so watch this space for more projects with our students.

Religious Education

In Key stage three Religious Education, we investigate lots of different religions. We look at the various beliefs, where those beliefs stem from and why traditions and rituals are so important to religious people. Students create lots of brilliant work to show their findings in the form of a leaflet, poster or role play.

Year 7s are currently learning about Hinduism. They have been looking at the exciting ways in which Hindus worship, the gods and goddesses they worship and also the life and teachings of Mahatma Gandhi. Some of the students thoroughly enjoyed being in the ‘hot seat’ pretending to be Gandhi and answering questions in ways they felt Gandhi may respond.

Year 8s are currently working on a topic that discusses whether or how Jesus saved the world. They have produced some excellent work that shows they have a good understanding of how Christians view Jesus and his work in the world.

In year 9, religion becomes a little more philosophical! Students have recently been looking into different ideas of what is behind good and evil. Is it the devil? Is it a force? As humans, have we created good and evil ourselves? What would life be like if there was no evil? Would we understand what good is without it and vice versa? The year 9s produced some excellent power points showing the different opinions of good and evil ‘Little Hands’ was recently inspected by Ofsted and found to be outstanding in all 17 areas assessed, a very rare feat. I’m sure that those village residents with pre-school age children would like to know that their village Nursery School is ‘Outstanding’!

and offered their own interesting views about good and evil!

In year 10, students have just completed their first GCSE Ethics paper for which they have achieved very pleasing results! Well done to Katya Lukina who achieved full marks! They are currently working on Religion and the Media and how Christianity is portrayed in the Media. We have had some very interesting discussions about the Pope’s recent visit to the UK and how this had been portrayed as both positive and negative. The students are working hard and preparing for their final Ethics GCSE paper this June.

Poetry

Eleanor Ferrie in year 7 at Melbourn Village College wrote the following poem in response to reading Michael Morpurgo’s novel Private Peaceful. The novel is about two brothers who are divided when they fall in love with the same girl in rural England but who are reunited when they sign up to fight in the First World War. Eleanor beautifully conveys the contrast between their love of the English countryside and their horror at the trenches.

Friend or Foe I remember a time when daffodils sang, The golden sun in the perfect blue sky. The cool, clear water of the brook Rippling with the giant golden pike. The laughter of children running In the bright green grass of the meadow, With rainbow butterflies tickling our ears Just Charlie, Molly and Me.

But now; I hear the whining of shells that bite anyone too close Like a guard dog on duty. I look up to a gun-metal sky with rain so cold falling That never- ending rain drums down on my head. The river of thick, oozing mud knee-high In the hills of the dead. The rattle of guns abusing the ears, The screaming of men so silent as they run in their fear Only to be knocked down like skittles by remorseless bullets. Bodies fall around me like discarded toys, I look around at the world left behind; Not Charlie, Not Molly, …Just me.