St Mary's CE Primary School

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St Mary’s is a very special place. We are an outstanding school where everyone works hard to encourage children to enjoy learning, achieve their best, behave well, support each other and grow in confidence. We aim to help children to grow into confident, talented, and articulate young people. We are an exciting and vibrant school where children enjoy learning and make excellent progress. In our school, we seek to meet the needs of each child. We celebrate diversity and teach children to recognize and respect people’s differences as well as similarities. St Mary’s recognizes the significant role of parents in helping their children to progress and greatly values the contributions parents make to the life of the school.
All admissions for Reception to Year 6 are managed by Manchester City Council. Even if you have a nursery place for your child within St Mary's, you will still need to apply for a Reception place. In-year admissions are requests for a school place in any year group that are made outside the normal timescales, that is, after the beginning of the autumn term. If your child currently attends another school within the UK, you will need a transfer form that you must fill out and then have the headteacher from your child's current school sign.
Teaching and Learning are “outstanding” at St Mary’s. Raising attainment and achievement are central to the ethos of our school. We provide a rich and stimulating learning experience for all the children in our school. We use a range of teaching strategies, approaches, styles, and activities to ensure all children learn to the best of their ability. Learning is carefully differentiated and pitched to suit learners’ needs. All the staff is involved in assessing pupil progress and targets are set to support and challenge children’s learning. We have themed days and weeks as well as a wide range of extracurricular activities and after-school clubs to enrich and extend learning.
Every school in Britain has a governing body to provide support for the headteacher and staff but also to be a ‘critical friend’ for its activities. It is charged with guiding the strategic work of the school and does not get involved with the day-to-day operation of the school.
The governing body is the school’s accountable body. It is responsible for the conduct of the school and for promoting high standards. The governing body aims to ensure that children are attending a successful school that provides them with good education and supports their well-being. The responsibilities of governing bodies have grown and schools are now accountable for children’s health and well-being in the community and a wide range of extended services provision out of school hours.
The St. Mary’s CE School was set up under a Church of England Foundation which appoints three of the governors including the Rector of St. Edmund’s Church in Whalley Range. We are a UNICEF Rights Respecting School and the Governing Body of St. Mary's upholds the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.
St Mary’s has a strong school council which is elected by the children. Each year councilors and deputies are elected by their class. They are active in listening to the pupils and sharing thoughts and ideas with staff. They are involved in decision-making and present assemblies to keep staff and pupils up to date on issues. Our school council is actively involved in developing our school website. We also have a strongly committed environmental group called “The Green Team” which is responsible for developing the sustainability of the school and educating the whole learning community about the needs of the environment. We actively recycle and are committed to reducing and reusing waste and resources.
Our school is committed to maintaining the Healthy Schools Standard. This includes regular high-quality physical education, drug awareness, emotional well-being, and healthy eating. Healthy and nutritious food and drink are available across the school day. At break time Key Stage One and Foundation Stage children benefit from free fruit to encourage healthy eating. At lunchtime, children are encouraged to make healthy packed-lunch choices and a wide range of healthy school meals is available including vegetarian, halal, and European meals. All children have access to water throughout the school day. Our pupils are encouraged to walk or cycle to school to stay fit and healthy. We also have a “Walking Bus” that picks children up and safely delivers them to “Breakfast Club” for a healthy breakfast to start the school day.
St Mary’s works very closely with parents and we pride ourselves on the close relationships we have developed. Parents are always welcome to speak to all staff about any concerns they may have. We run regular meetings and workshops on supporting children’s learning, developing parents' learning skills, managing behavior with Webster Stratton techniques, and many, many more. We have a Pastoral Leader who is available to support parents with any issues they may have.
The School Improvement Plan is a strategic improvement plan. It should bring together, clearly and simply, the school's priorities, the main measures it will take to raise standards, the resources dedicated to these, and the key outcomes and targets it intends to achieve. The purpose of the school improvement plan is to improve the quality of teaching and learning in the school so that greater numbers of students achieve proficiency in the core academic subjects of reading and mathematics.

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