Our Specialisms
Science Academy Status
As a Science Academy we aim to create a challenging environment which will raise standards of achievement and the quality of teaching and learning in science and mathematics for all students, leading to whole school improvements in performance.
We will:
- Provide a centre of excellence in science and mathematics.
- Be an active contributor to local and national developments within science and mathematics.
- Encourage young people to pursue science and mathematics beyond the age of 16, providing them with appropriate learning pathways so that they develop the skills needed to be active citizens within an increasingly scientific world and to progress into employment, further training and higher education according to their individual abilities, aptitudes and ambitions.
- Be an active partner in a learning society with local families of schools and their communities, sharing resources and disseminating good practice.
Applied Learning Status
As a high performing school, Greensward was redesignated with Applied Learning Status for September 2008. The additional funding that this specialism attracts is dedicated to developing an ethos and achievement within a vocational framework. This is achieved by:
- Improving all students’ access to quality vocational qualifications. The Academy now delivers BTEC in subjects as diverse as Retail and Bricklaying, NVQs in Salon Services and Beauty and Applied GCSEs in Business and OCR National Diplomas in Applied Science.
- Improving the quality of professional development for all staff so that the benefits of vocational education can raise students’ attainment across the curriculum.
- Improving students’ access to work related learning and offering the Academy’s expertise to other schools and colleges wishing to develop similar vocational pathways. Our staff regularly speak at national conferences on the benefits of vocational education.
- Seeking to promote the benefits of vocational education to all learners regardless of their academic background.
Leading Edge Status
The Leading Edge Partnership programme has been established to identify, extend and spread innovation and excellence in the secondary sector so that standards of teaching and learning continue to improve in schools across the country. Schools in the programme, of which Greensward Academy is one, are at the forefront of the drive to reform secondary education.
Schools working within the programme will lead the way, helping to transform the face of education in their local areas. Schools at the cutting edge of innovation and collaboration were selected from amongst the country's best schools to act as a lever to transform secondary education, to engineer the growth of collaborative learning communities and federations, and to promote innovation, research and development to push the boundaries of current teaching practice.
Training School Status
Training School status supports the development and extension of all teacher training activities, enabling us, in particular, to promote the employment based route into teaching, through the Graduate Training Programme.
It enables the Academy to directly address the need to recruit and retain good quality teachers and ensure that our students are taught by competent and inspiring classroom practitioners.
The key aspect of our Training School initiative is the use of new technologies in the training programme, whereby the setting up of ‘virtual classrooms’ will enable trainees to observe exemplar lessons, taught by skilled, experienced teachers. At the same time these, and lessons taught by trainees, will be recorded for future use as training materials.
SCITT Consortium
Greensward is a member of the Mid Essex SCITT Consortium and works in collaboration with eight other schools in Thundersley, Chelmsford, Billericay and Brentwood to train new teachers in subjects such as English, Mathematics, Science, ICT and Modern Foreign Languages.