As a school which prides itself on inclusion and striving for excellence for each and every student, I would like to commend all of our young people on behalf of myself, all of the staff at Bluecoat Aspley and right across Archway Learning Trust on their hard work and perseverance in achieving their well-deserved results. In the last few years schools and their pupils and parents/carers have had unprecedented challenges, and we at Bluecoat Aspley have always prioritised our exam year groups over these periods of uncertainty to ensure that they can maximise their potential and unlock doors for the future.
Working across diverse communities in Nottingham city we have a number of individuals who have achieved the very best grades, including students with multiple grade 9 and 8s through to those achieving Entry Level qualifications.
Santosh Jaisi
Santosh has worked hard to achieve his grades and has achieved the highest progress for a boy in his year group, achieving 7 x grade 9s and 3 x grade 8s. He said that lockdown had been a challenge, especially online learning but through his hard work and help from teachers he felt confident sitting his GCSEs. Santosh wants to go into engineering as a career.
James Hillyard-Austin
James has a diagnosis of autism and struggled at times lower down the school finding the return to school after lockdown as a shock to the system. James and his Mum value the support provided by his key worker who made a real difference to his education and classroom experience, highlighting what can be achieved when students are supported properly. Next year James is planning on going to Brackenhurst in order to achieve his dream of being a zookeeper. Both James and Mum put this down to the support he received from staff who showed him what courses are available and when you have the confidence to believe in yourself and what can be achieved.
Freya Jepps
Freya whilst studying for her GCSEs was also heavily involved in enrichment activities with gymnastics training on a Monday, Tuesday and Friday, as well as on a Wednesday and Thursday working as a young leader at Rainbows, Brownies and Guides. As such, fitting in GCSE revision was hard and she recommends that students take every opportunity given to them by teachers to support with revision as it will all help. From September, Freya will build upon her Level 1 coaching award as she starts her apprenticeship and Level 2 coaching qualification as well as preparing for the Eurogym festival in Norway next year.
Kylah Cross
Kylah identified the challenges this cohort faced due to lockdown and Covid. Schooling paused in the 2nd term of Year 8 until they returned to a very different school in the September of Year 9. This year group were the first to experience online learning which Kylah describes as being difficult as she was stuck at home not really wanting to do any work and it was a real challenge to stay on top of work and learning. Returning to school was a real shock and highlighted the gaps in knowledge due to lockdown and meant that you didn’t always understand what was going on – however, teachers were supportive in filling in these gaps. Kylah found the exams difficult due to the impact of Covid on classroom time. Next year, Kylah hopes to stay on at Bluecoat Sixth Form and study Maths, Physics and Biology.
Charles Ogbanna
Charles said that lockdown was tough but when he came back, he made sure he put everything into his work – “I did hours of studying every single day and it has paid off”. Mum was incredibly proud and screaming with joy as she danced in celebration, “Charles has worked really hard and made a massive improvement – he has always worked so hard – I am really proud of him”. Charles is staying on to Sixth Form to study A Levels and enter Medicine. Charles achieved at least 1 grade above his target in every subject – a highly impressive 2 x grade 9, 5 grade 8s and a grade 7 in Maths and Merit distinction in Sport.
Robyn Mugati
Robyn is another example of the hard work and resilience that our students have had to show to overcome the gaps in learning caused by Lockdown and online learning. She worked incredibly hard during Year 11 and has achieved at least 2 grades above her target grade in every subject, including grade 8 in History and English language and grade 7s in Combined Sciences, Literature and RS.
As students reflect on their results and consider their next steps, we look forward to welcoming a significant number of our own students, as well as students from right across the city, into our Bluecoat Sixth Form. Students will benefit this September from our new and improved curriculum offer, with access to a full range of course choices from A Levels to Vocational Level 3 and Level 2 options. We are also excited to offer our new Level 2 Sport course has been developed in a new partnership with Nottingham Forest Community Trust, two brand new T Level qualifications in Health and Early Years and we are also offering Level 3 Criminology for the first time this year.
