Ethos

Newark Academy has a very clear ethos focused on the achievement and well-being of all our students.

We believe that a school should be at the very heart of the community and place great value on collaboration, partnership and service alongside a range of core values that compliment academic excellence.

Work Hard, Be Kind

We develop commitment, independence and courtesy in all of our students. We expect the very highest standards and in return we value and respect student ideas and opinions.

We are relentless in the pursuit of academic excellence for every student.

We insist on the highest standards of behaviour at all times.

We care deeply about our students and expect them to work hard and be kind.

We encourage staff to be creative, independent and ambitious. We expect them to challenge and inspire our students, providing high quality learning experiences that motivate students to be the very best they can. High standards and academic rigour underpin our daily work.

We promote the development of leadership skills and offer a range of opportunities for students to take an active role in improving their school.

We believe that a wide-range of enrichment opportunities promote independent learning. Students are expected to learn beyond the classroom and to develop the skills and attributes they need to lead full and successful lives.

I pledge to serve my school, my community, my crew. I know that every day I have the opportunity to be GREAT – to be grateful for the learning I receive, to be responsible for the choices that I make, to be excellent in my aspiration to achieve and to be tenacious in committing to this pledge. Because I work to be GREAT, I am GREAT.

Crew is both a culture and a structure that will be used as a vehicle to ensure our GREAT values permeate throughout every aspect of our academy community.

Crew is about taking responsibility for our actions and recognising the impact they have on others.

Crew is about supporting one another to be the best version of ourselves.

Crew is about making the boat go faster. There can be no passengers on our boat.

Culture

GREAT will permeate through our academy and be part of everything we do. It will become part of our common language when celebrating achievements and progress, it will be part of our common language when we challenge our unwavering high expectations and it will become part of our common language as we nurture young people through their challenges and triumphs. Culture is securing implicit opportunities to reinforce what it means to be crew.

Structure

Through explicit activity crew will secure the embedding of our core values throughout our academy to ensure that our entire academy community fully understand and live out our values. The following activity will take place as part of our explicit strategy to achieve a values driven academy.

Mini Crew – ‘Circle up’

Mini crew refers to what we formally knew as ‘tutor groups’. Mini Crew is a structure within crew time where crew leaders and crew members celebrate and challenge one another on their delivery of our core values. Known as ‘appreciations and acknowledgements’ Crew Leaders will navigate discussions to enable opportunities to reflect on the successes and challenges of the week and use our GREAT values to steer crew members in the right direction through reflection. This will be a weekly session with key discussion points being utilised for the Full Crew ‘appreciations and acknowledgements’ meeting.

Full Crew

Full Crew refers to what we formally knew as assembly. Full Crew is a structure where the entire year group crew gather to share their key ‘appreciations and acknowledgements’. Co-ordinated and lead by a member of the senior leadership team/achievement leader, these sessions are designed to publicly acknowledge celebrations and acknowledgements and where crew members are able to ‘make a stand’ against other members who might not be embodying out GREAT values. Full Crew will take place weekly but this particular format is likely to run fortnightly with alternative weeks having intelligently planned and timed PSHE/SMSC assemblies to support cultural capital and character development.

GREAT Weeks

GREAT weeks will celebrate each of our GREAT values. There will be a GREAT week planned each half term where all crew members will participate in various activities designed to reinforce our values and provide opportunities for crew members to reflect, celebrate and rectify on situations that have occurred throughout the half term. Gratitude week for example would consist of random acts of kindness where ‘thank you’ cards could be distributed and a greater focus on saying “thank you” for the opportunities we receive.

PSHE/SMSC Programme

Our programme to support character and personal development will be expertly designed to ensure that our core GREAT values permeate through everything we do. In addition to this there will be specific GREAT sessions designed to reinforce and continually on-board our students about the importance of being part of crew.

Staff Crew Briefings

Our weekly briefings and bulletin will be an avenue to regularly reinforce and role model our GREAT values and common language. ‘Acknowledgements and appreciations’ will be a key foci for securing this. As adults we will demonstrate the behaviours that we expect to see in our children and will support one another to be the best versions of ourselves.

Monitoring Impact

It is vitally important that when considering any change in strategy or approach that we have first of all considered research and that we are clear on how to continually monitor the impact of our work. GREAT values is about character development and supporting us all to develop as kind individuals who work hard for each other. It is also about securing the personal development of people to enable them to be well rounded, confident, articulate individuals who are prepared for the next stage of their education and life.

Attitude to Learning is a large part of our academy Work Hard, Be Kind ethos and is a measure for the development of our student’s ability to be GREAT individuals inside of the academic arena. Through close monitoring of students attitude to learning we will be able to measure the impact of individual students success in this area, but more importantly implement interventions where needed. In addition, we will be able to measure the impact of our work through staff and student voice activity where we can gather feedback on typicality of our interactions. Staff and student voice will tell us the impact of our work and enable us to regularly refine what we do.

Furthermore, there will be a tangible response to unstructured time and those interactions beyond the academic arena. Our school will feel and look great as students take greater responsibility for their surroundings. The immediate and wider community will also feel the impact of the work we do and the presence of our students beyond the school gates will mirror our GREAT values.