Lockdown catch-up solutions for Blessed William Howard Students

Blessed William Howard Catholic High School, in Stafford, has announced new measures to ensure that its students are not disadvantaged due to the loss of direct teaching time spent in school this year.

There has been a great deal of publicity surrounding national concerns about the amount of learning children have missed as a result of the Coronavirus lockdown and school closures.  To address this gap for the year group most affected (those due to sit their GCSE exams in 2021) Blessed William Howard has invested in two initiatives for its Year 11 pupils.

The school is providing a bespoke tutoring programme which will see students, once or twice a week, receive free tutoring from teaching staff. This will be during after school sessions focusing on an area of need for each child and will be delivered to a small group of no more than three students.

School Principal, Mr Karl Brown commented, “Educational research confirms that small group tutoring can have a significant impact on learning and improving progress but is also a substantial cost to families. A typical tutoring session can cost upwards of £30 per hour. We have, therefore, decided to invest in our students by providing this service in school at no cost to parents.”

The school has also invested in a new state of the art learning platform ‘Century TechTM’ for this year group which will enhance their learning and support them to address any gaps in their knowledge as a result of the school closure.

Century Tech combines artificial intelligence, neuroscience and teaching and learning to assist students to identify gaps in their learning. It pinpoints and addresses misconceptions whilst providing personalised content, questions and pathways.  Students will be able to access this from home and from school.

Mr Brown continued, “We have spent a great deal of time researching what will be the very best solutions to address any learning gaps.  Despite being one of only 11% of state secondary schools that were able to provide remote learning throughout lockdown, we do not wish to see our students fall short of the GCSE grades they deserve.  We believe that these two solutions will mean that our year 11 students will be in a position to feel confident about taking their summer exams.”