St Matthew Academy

[EduCativ]

St Matthew Academy is a diverse, vibrant, Catholic, all through school for girls and boys aged 3 to 16. Our ambition is to provide an environment that stimulates intellectual learning and growth and which promotes excellence. Our motto is ‘Let your light shine.’ It is taken from St Matthew’s Gospel and captures our belief in the unique quality of each individual. We aim to ensure that the talents and strengths of each pupil are encouraged, developed, and celebrated.

Being a through Academy, with our pupils located on one site creates many opportunities and advantages for our pupils. For example, we have created a shared educational ethos that supports children from 3-16 and provides high expectations and consistent pastoral care for all. Having the Academy phases (Early Years and Key Stages 1 to 4) working together enables us to track every pupil’s progress throughout their time with us. This allows us to address the ‘dips’ in learning, usually associated with transitions between key stages and transfers between schools. Our primary pupils have access to the specialisms, resources, and facilities in our secondary phase more easily and in turn, our secondary pupils benefit from taking on mentoring and leadership roles with our younger pupils. Our all-through setting also offers our staff greater possibilities for professional development and learning, this ultimately benefits our pupils positively.

We are a school that welcomes pupils of all abilities those who are academically gifted and those with talents in other areas. We ensure that all pupils can learn, achieve and flourish regardless of their starting point. We believe a great education is not just about what is taught, nor simply about the excellent exam results that pupils will achieve – it also involves first-class pastoral care, an introduction to a wide range of experiences, and instilling a belief in what is possible in every student.

Our motto is ‘Let your light shine’. It is taken from St Matthew’s Gospel and captures our belief in the uniqueness of each individual. We aim to ensure that the talents and strengths of each pupil are encouraged, developed, and celebrated. Our motto is central to everything we do and is encapsulated in our ethos statement:

• Successful, confident learners
• High expectations, outstanding achievements
• Inclusive, caring, Catholic community
• Nurturing talent, cultivating ambition
• Excellence for all

At the heart of our Academy ethos is our belief in promoting an ‘inclusive, caring, Catholic community.’ This means we welcome pupils and staff from every faith and none we encourage everyone to take responsibility for their actions and words we develop our students respect for other faiths and we learn together within the Gospel Values.

Pupils in our school are given a range of opportunities to become ‘successful, confident learners’ both within the classroom and beyond. We also believe that every pupil deserves the chance to develop a range of skills in preparation for their futures. Extra-curricular and enrichment activities alongside targeted academic intervention, pastoral support, and challenges are all important strands in this provision.

‘High expectations, outstanding achievements in all aspects of academy life are striven for daily by our staff and pupils. We expect our pupils to display exemplary behavior our learning environment to be well ordered and pupils to thrive on the challenges presented to them. This enables every child to achieve pastorally, spiritually, and academically.

Our staff and children see themselves as active learners, being part of a learning community that seeks to inspire and motivate each other to be the best that they can be. Working in partnership with parents and carers our staff believes they have a crucial role to play in ‘nurturing talent, cultivating ambition.’

As a result, we promote ‘excellence for all in every aspect of Academy life. Our pupils are challenged to exceed academic expectations through hard work and dedication and are guided by our five characteristics of learning: aspiration collaboration independence persistence and versatility.

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