GCSE October and Easter booster programme
Over the October half-term and Easter holidays, we run 3-day booster sessions at Emanuel for Westminster City School (WCS) and St John Bosco College pupils preparing for their GCSEs. The sessions are taught by Emanuel staff. Feedback from pupils is extremely positive. We plan to extend the programme to other partner schools in the future.
Aims
Emanuel School welcomes more than 60 GCSE pupils from Westminster City School, a boys’ comprehensive school on Palace St, and St John Bosco College, Battersea, for three-day booster sessions over the October half-term and Easter holidays, offering a range of activities to stretch, challenge and support the pupils in their learning.
The booster sessions focus on key concepts in Maths, English, Biology, Chemistry and Physics. Supporting materials including questions and model answers for their exam boards are also provided.
Background
Emanuel and WCS are part of the United Westminster Schools' Foundation, an educational charity with its origins in the 1870s. The Foundation’s five well-known schools feature a diverse range of contexts and cohorts, including a mixture of state, independent, single-sex and co-educational schools. The Foundation aims to promote educational excellence and improvement throughout their schools, which all share a common Christian ethos.
St John Bosco College is a partner secondary school based in Battersea.
The programme was planned with the partner schools to support their childrens learning post pandemic and is now part of our community partnership calendar.
Resources
The pupils enjoy interactive lessons covering key concepts in subjects including Maths, English, Biology, Chemistry and Physics each day; concepts range from forces in Physics to Charles Dickens in English. Pupils also conduct practical work in Emanuel School’s state-of-the-art Science labs. In addition to the materials covered in class, pupils are provided with a pack of questions and model answers that match the requirements of their different exam boards.
Emanuel staff, supported by WCS staff, run the sessions. Emanuel staff volunteer to run the sessions. They were all run at Emanuel's site. Access to the Science labs was essential for the practicals and to embed learning.
Sessions run from 8.45 am to 1.45 pm from Monday to Wednesday during the holidays.
Impact
The pupils are overwhelmingly enthusiastic about the opportunity, with many even asking if the three-day programme might be extended to a full week. Thanks to such positive feedback, we are looking at extending the programme to other schools.
Jen Lockyer, Deputy Headteacher at Westminster City School, said:
“This initiative is another great example of collaboration between Westminster City School and Emanuel School, both part of the United Westminster Schools' Foundation. I would like to thank the teaching staff at Emanuel for their hard work in developing such fantastic booster sessions for our pupils during half-term.”
Frequency
Given the success of the programme, we will continue to run it for the foreseeable future.