From Bradford to Sheffield to Downing Street!
When you have a school community as big as ours it can sometimes be difficult to keep up with what is happening right across school and beyond. Luckily, I have lots of you who are incredibly thoughtful and keep me informed as much as possible.
Beginning with more amazing news, we were crowned Bradford Panathlon Champions on Wednesday. Our students, Barisht, Yusif, Caitlin, Jacob, Ryan and Danika, took part in Curling, Ten Pin, Standing Long Jump and Speed Bounce. They amassed 85 points to take the title and will now represent Bradford in the West Yorkshire finals to be held in Leeds in February. Panathlon provides competitive sporting opportunities to children with disabilities and special educational needs and last year alone gave over 65,000 young people the opportunity to take part in competitive sport. Their sporting programmes, which include multi-sports, swimming, football, 10-pin bowling and boccia, give participants the opportunity to represent their school in sporting competition that they are so often otherwise denied. Not at Beckfoot of course! We are so proud of them, and we can’t wait for the trophy to take pride of place in our reception area from next week.
Last week we took over 50 of our girls to watch England Lionesses take on Switzerland at Bramall Lane, the home of Sheffield United FC. They had a wonderful time with many watching live professional football for the first time. They loved every minute seeing their heroes take to the field and come away with a hard fought 1-0 victory to end 2024 on a high. We are hopeful that many more trips will be made available to us because these are the moments that our students will never forget.
Continuing the sporting theme it has been a busy time for Jacob who was part of our Panathlon team. Jacob has been riding his horse Ralph at the Disabled Virtual Nationals where he was 1st in Dressage Class. He became the champion scoring the highest across all the classes in junior and senior sections. He also placed 2nd in Showjumping. Competing and winning at a national level takes a great deal of commitment and hard work but the winning and the rosettes help to keep him motivated for more and we are so immensely proud of him.
Finally, in sport, Emily in Year 9 represented school in Yorkshire Schools Trampoline competition. From this, Emily qualified for the zonal rounds where she will represent our school in Birmingham in the Advanced section on 28th January. This is an incredible achievement and we are so excited for her as she will begin 2025 competing at that level. Well done Emily.
In other news we have been staging our Model UN days for a couple of years now. We have always kept it to our older students in Years 11, 12 and 13 and it has always been a huge success. Thie year we decided to see how our younger KS4 students in Year 10 would cope with the programme. They were quite simply incredible and we need not have worried. The culture throughout the day was special and created by our students because of the mutual respect they showed to one another and the process, their ability to listen, consider and argue in a very controlled yet passionate manner. The theme for the day was the Myanmar genocide with a particular highlight coming from Jack who was advocating for funding for refugees and challenging Myanmar on stripping citizenship rights. It was another special day and one that has convinced us to bring the programme into KS3 and perhaps look at the theme of climate change. We will see.
And so to Downing Street and specifically Arlo in Year 10. Arlo has been taking part in a project at Cartwright Hall as part of a partnership with Bradford Museums and Galleries and the Government Art Collection. As part of Bradford’s Capital of Culture year 2025, he has been working with over 125 young people across the Bradford district to co-curate and co-produce an exhibition which will be on loan from the Government Art Collection, and on show in Bradford from January 2025 – May 2025. As part of Arlo’s work, he provided feedback on the artworks, created a response to the work and helped write the interpretation panels for the show. As part of the project the group are exhibiting some artworks from Cartwright Hall’s fine art collection in Downing Street and were invited down as part of the 125-year celebrations of the Government Art Collection. Arlo visited on 5th December for a tour and afternoon tea and to speak about 2 of the paintings exhibited in Downing Street itself. His speech about a David Hockney painting and was utterly brilliant and very well received. What an opportunity for him and one he took in his stride. Well done Arlo and thank you.
Finally, I must share with you some statistics from our Year 9 and 11 parent evenings this week and last. When I talk about culture and support from our community, I very much mean our parents, carers and families. We could not do what we do at Beckfoot without you. Your support is critical to the success and future of our students and such things as attendance at a parents evening can make a huge difference, a difference that is often just not considered. For over 98% of families to attend both the Year 9 and Year 11 parents’ evenings is incredible. I have worked in schools where we could not get 50% of parents involved and in one depressing case it was less than 20% turnout. My staff and I are so grateful for your care, interest and support. It means the world to us, so thank you.
Next week is our Christmas Concert and I will write a little about that. I will also mention our Red Carpet events and a little about our Spelling Bee competition taking place today.
We have had the most incredible term since the 2 September and I am more excited and optimistic than ever about our school, our students and our future because of the wonderful people that make up the Beckfoot community. Keep an eye out for our Autumn Term Buzz magazine coming out next week. It’s a fantastic read.
Simon Wade, Headteacher
