By Mrs Day (Co-Curricular, Charities and Community Outreach Manager)

This year, our Lower Sixth students have demonstrated their continued commitment to volunteering at Marston Vale Middle School working with selected Year 6 students, supporting them with their reading and comprehension skills in preparation for their recent SATS Exams. Each week the students have worked one-to-one or with pairs of students from Marston Vale building positive relationships whilst supporting them with their practice SATs exam papers. 

As the Year 6 students recently sat their exams, the school kindly invited us back to join in with a celebratory tea party. All the students from Marston Vale and BGS enjoyed this time chatting and enjoying some delicious cakes to mark the end of the support for the year 6 students. It was a delight to see how the confidence and positive relationships had grown throughout the year. The outreach programme continues through the summer term as we will now start working with Year 5 students in preparation for them heading into Year 6 next year.

The outreach programme and partnership with Marston Vale have had a positive impact at the school with the Acting Head, Mr Simon Wathen commenting that their mock SATs results prior to the real exams had shown a 25% increase in students reaching their targets. We look forward to hearing the overall impact of our support once they receive their SATs results in July.