Sixth Form News
- Category: Sixth Form News
The Art Department create so many fantastic opportunities and new experiences for our young artists! One of these opportunities took place last weekend, over to Mr Bowen, Head of Art:
We live near an OUTSTANDING place. And we live near an OUTSTANDING artist. Why not combine both?
Two lucky Year 13 keen landscape artists, Anastasiia and Tymur, had the opportunity to work with Sky Arts Landscape Artist, Paul Whitehouse, on location at Wittenham Clumps over the weekend.
They came (walked up the Clumps), they saw (they looked and saw and looked some more) and CONQUERED (used oil paint to capture their unique visions.)
Thank you, Paul, for all of your expertise. These young artists will continue to use these ideas for a long time yet. And what beautiful paintings!
Thank you Anastasiia and Tymur for the two days of creativity and, quite probably, a fair bit of stamina. It's been VERY worth it!
- Category: Sixth Form News
We are tremendously proud this morning of all of our Year 13 students as they receive the results for their A Level and BTEC courses. The results are excellent and a tribute to their hard work, talent and ambition.
Destinations are wide and varied and almost all students have managed to secure a place at their institution of choice with students going on to study a fascinating mix of competitive courses at universities across the country. Equally, those who might be having a gap year or going into work-based training are very well-set for future applications and options.
We are particularly proud this morning of our group of students from Ukraine in this cohort. These young people joined our school in the spring of 2022 with little or no English and were completely unfamiliar with the education system in this country in addition to the significant trauma they were experiencing. They have all achieved impressively and now go on to further study having worked tremendously hard and brought much to our school community.
In summary, for the students in Year 13 this year:
• 8% of all entries gained A* grades
• 24% of all entries gained A*-A grades
• 54% of all entries gained A*-B grades
• 97% of all entries gained A*-E grades
A huge thankyou must also go to the staff at Wallingford School who have supported these young people over the past two years and also to their families who have shared their journey for every step of the way.
Congratulations to each and every young person who has received their results today and we wish them well for their undoubtedly very bright and promising futures.
- Category: Sixth Form News
We are tremendously proud this morning of all of our Year 13 students as they receive the results for their A Level and BTEC courses. The results are excellent and a tribute to their hard work, talent and ambition. This is a group of young people who did not sit GCSE examinations due to the pandemic and are now experiencing a “reset” of grade boundaries to pre-pandemic levels and the way in which they have coped and performed in this context has been hugely impressive.
Destinations are wide and varied and almost all students have managed to secure a place at their institution of choice including at universities such as Oxford and Cambridge and a fascinating mix of competitive courses at universities across the country and abroad.
Our students are going on to study courses ranging from Medicine, Mathematics and Veterinary Science through History, Geography and German to Computer Science, Chemistry and Natural Sciences, Marine Biology and Economics, Aerospace Engineering and Product Designand many more; courses in sport and nutrition, business, marketing, media and the creative arts are strong threads which run through many of the destinations. In addition, students are going on to foundation courses, competitive higher level apprenticeships and excellent opportunities in work-based training.
In summary, for the students in Year 13 this year:
• 8% of all entries gained A* grades
• 31% of all entries gained A*-A grades
• 59% of all entries gained A*-B grades
• 86% of all entries gained A*-C grades
• 100% of all entries gained A*-E grades
A huge thankyou must also go to the staff at Wallingford School who have supported these young people over the past two years and also to their families who have shared their journey for every step of the way.
Congratulations to each and every young person who has received their results today and we wish them well for their undoubtedly very bright and promising futures.
- Category: Sixth Form News
Last term, head students Archie and Emily visited Merchant Taylors' Hall for a Digital Wellbeing Conference. Over to Emily for her account of the day:
The Digital Wellbeing Conference on the 24th May was the first event Archie and I attended as head students. Despite an early start to catch the 7am train, we were excited to be back at the beautiful Merchant Taylor’s Hall, where we competed in the Livery Academy Awards in December of last year.
The premise of this conference was to explore the challenges, but also opportunities, digital technology presents and to take part in workshops to develop strategies for improving digital wellbeing in our schools.
The first speaker began by discussing the amazing things our devices can do for us; a new use for my phone, I discovered, is the ability to tell when a steak is perfectly cooked! However, we were also reminded that, whilst the assistance and entertainment our devices provide has become an integral part of day-to-day life, it is important to remember they can work against us, and not for us, if we are not careful.
The second talk was sobering, as we heard stories about children and teenagers being coerced and pressured into producing self-generated images. As student leaders, we hope to implement some ideas the speaker gave, such as working with small groups of students and delivering educational sessions to help prevent this exploitation from occurring.
The final talk was given by a clinical psychologist, who encouraged us to reflect on the amount of time we spend on our devices, and informed us about the dangers of 'doom scrolling'. The importance of digital detoxes was emphasised as a way to support our mental health and improve our productivity.
Going forward, the student leaders intend to set up student focus groups to find out what the student view is of the digital landscape and what worries and concerns they have. We will use this information to form part of the groundwork for creating a digital wellbeing charter. We thoroughly enjoyed our day in London and thank the Merchant Taylors' Company for the opportunity to learn more about digital wellbeing.
- Emily Dunn, Year 12, Wallingford School
- Category: Sixth Form News
Last year our A Level Product Design students were asked to design a new gateway to lead from the new housing estate in Warborough to St Laurence Primary School. The group of six based their ideas on the winning designs from the primary school students (you can see one of the many models created during the design process in the photos below) and collaborated with a team to get the end result.
Yesterday Mr Holden and Miss Walker took the Year 13s to see the finished gate and the students were very impressed with the outcome. We were told that there have been many lovely comments about how great it looks.
Local projects within the community are a fantastic way to introduce design students to real life design processes and get them interacting with end users and stakeholders.
