What is Personal Development?

How children are to learn skills and realise talents, develop character and resilience, and learn about British values, diversity and mental health & well-being.

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Wider Curriculum & Personal Development

We ensure that our young people learn the following values through both our taught and wider curriculum:

• Aspire - To inspire confidence, ambition and a desire to go further than others might think is possible.
• Care - To be able and willing to help, nurture and support both ourselves and each other.
• Include - To recognise our similarities and seek to appreciate our differences, leading to a feeling of belonging.

Our Core Skills:

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We also aim to ensure that our young people are:

• Healthy - We ensure that students learn how we can respect and care for our physical and mental health, raise awareness of risk and build confidence and agency to ensure healthy and safe decisions.
• Literate - We include a specific focus on vocabulary development, reading (for meaning and enjoyment), speaking and writing within our lessons.
• Learners - We enhance our students’ ability to learn through: Collaboration, Self Management, Creativity, Curiosity, Resilience, Empathy and Reflection.
• Numerate - We include a specific focus on transferable skills including basic arithmetic, graphical skills, estimations, sense of proportion and problem solving. Ensure our students understand financial competence.
• Knowledgeable and Deep Thinkers - We provide opportunities for students to engage in deep and critical thinking, developing a mastery of knowledge and philosophical outlook for each subject.
• Culturally Aware - We include opportunities for all students to develop their spiritual, moral, social and cultural literacy. Including trips, concerts, galleries, plays, sports events and outdoor adventures.
• Ethical Global Citizens - We create a healthier and more peaceful world by engendering a respect for our planet’s precarious future and a deep appreciation of the rich diversity of people living on it, their rights and responsibilities.
• Future Leaders - We develop informed decision making by engaging in relevant and meaningful learning, and analysing some of the most complex issues of our times. As a result, influencing others positively.

What does this look like at The Romsey School?

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The aims above are achieved within the academic curriculum and also within the extensive range of wider opportunities available to our young people.

What is Cultural Capital?

Exposing students to a large variety of subject areas and arts; promoting character-building qualities that lead to creating well-rounded, global citizens, and of course the more typical expectations of education, which is to provide young people with recognised and meaningful qualifications that will open up doors to paths in later life.

Our Weekly Tutor Programme

Our Extra Curricular Programme

https://sites.google.com/romsey.hants.sch.uk/parentzone/afterschool

Duke of Edinburgh Award- Our school is particularly strong with regard to our students’ participation in the Duke of Edinburgh Award at Bronze Level. Each year around 50 students take part in the award and they revel in the adventures that entail.

Additional Academics- There are also many other opportunities for students to participate in competitions which come up through the year. These include the Maths Challenge programme, Poetry Slam, ‘Youth Speaks’, LAMDA and Business Enterprise.

Leadership Opportunities

We are committed to enhancing our students’ leadership skills and behaviours. Students can take part in:

• ‘Student Voice’ - Students can be elected by their tutor group peers to seek and represent their views at Student Voice meetings. Our young people also co-create the agenda for the regular meetings so that they can look at key issues that directly affect them.
• ‘Focus Groups’ such as the Student Leaders of Learning (for Teaching and Learning), The Charity Group and the Environment Group.
• Being an ‘Ambassador’ which includes Year 11 Prefects, Year 10 Peer Supporters, School Librarians, Sports Captains, Year 8 Tour Guides, a Staff Interviewer, an Anti-Bullying Ambassador (as part of the Diana Award), and Primary School Ambassadors.
• Whole Student Surveys to hear the ‘Student Voice’ around key school decisions. These are open to all students and we want as much feedback as possible.

• Each year we appoint four Head Students and a team of Senior Prefects which are high profile leadership roles from within the student body. All students who take part in leadership opportunities can apply and submit evidence for a National Accreditation in Student Leadership with the SSAT at either Bronze, Silver or Gold level. We have had numerous examples of great success in this area.

Habits of Mind

British Culture and Diversity

British Values and Diversity

The school prides itself on its diversity. For example, we celebrate the fact that our student body is made up of students who speak thirty-six different languages (from Albanian to Swahili) representing many different cultures.

We also place a high importance on other British Values such as enabling pupils to distinguish right from wrong and to respect civil and criminal law. These values are written into our PSHE curriculum. We also encourage pupils to accept responsibility for their behaviour, show initiative and to understand how they can contribute positively to the lives of others both locally and nationally.

Careers

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Careers’ Guidance - We pride ourselves on preparing our young people for their future and are the only local school which has a full time dedicated Careers’ Advisor. Miss Phillipps delivers a comprehensive careers guidance programme from Y7 onwards which meets and surpasses the national ‘Gatsby Benchmarks’ of best practice. This includes off-timetable activities such as “The Real Game”, our Enterprise Project, Careers Planning Days and timely input on KS3 and post-16 options including apprenticeships. Employer links are embedded across the curriculum. Miss Phillipps is also able to give individual guidance and support; sometimes into young adulthood after our young people have left The Romsey School.

sites.google.com/romsey.hants.sch.uk/careers/home

Mental Health and Wellbeing

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sites.google.com/romsey.hants.sch.uk/mentalhealthandwellbeing/for-young-people

Trips

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Trips - We believe that travel is one of the best ways to broaden the mind and to develop ‘cultural capital’. As well as providing opportunities for enjoyable and worthwhile experiences, the extra curricular dimension also helps to cement the good student/teacher relationships which are the cornerstones of the success of the school. Therefore we have developed an extensive programme of Educational Visits, with notable trips to Avon Tyrrell and Paris in Year 7 and then an opportunity to visit Iceland, the Jurassic Coast, Kenya and Nice or Barcelona at KS4.

School Trips & Visits Information

At The Romsey School we pride ourselves on the broad range of trips and visits that we offer pupils.
Some trips and visits take place annually or bi-annually whilst others are offered as and when they come available. Costs vary greatly and we are aware that

Romsey School Library

We have a wonderful library at Romsey which is a real ‘treasure trove’ packed full of current and exciting reading material which is constantly updated. Mrs Needs is our dedicated Library Manager and she ensures that the Library is welcoming and inclusive for all. We subscribe to the Hampshire Schools Library Service which allows us to keep very current with reading material. Should you wish to read on your electronic device, we also have online provision. Many of our students use the library during breaks, lunchtimes and after school. Mrs Needs runs a weekly Paired Reading Scheme and Readers Club. She also organises other events which celebrate the love of reading, including our annual Literary Festival and Poetry Slam when visiting authors and artists inspire our students.

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Behaviour and Attitude