News@Kimberley
Founded 1925
A record of the life of the school,
its duties and pleasure, its work and play;
a chronicle of endeavour
and achievement
December 2015 Issue 46#
Head’s Lines
The future’s bright, the future’s female
Now that results from across the country are in,
I can confirm that our GCSE results are above the
national average with next year’s results on course
to be even better. An experienced independent
inspector has spent four days in school and has yet
to see any teaching they consider to be less than
good. All this is hugely encouraging and there is
more. AS results are in the top 25% nationally, the
gap has significantly closed between disadvantaged
groups and all others, and so on. I could go on with
these positive statistics but there is an inescapable
feature of the results which I desperately want to
bring to your attention.
On average, our boys are not doing anything like as
well as they can. Last summer at GCSE, 46% of our
boys achieved five or more A*-C grades including
English and maths, compared to 61% of our girls.
Yes, that’s 46% to 61%! The same school, the same
lessons, the same homework, the same teachers
and the same extensive support network.
I’m delighted that the girls are fulfilling their
potential. They will use these grades to succeed
and ultimately therefore, quite deservedly go on to
world domination. I wonder if that’s what the boys
want as well? Or is it time for the boys to rise to the
challenge and strike back!
To redress the balance and restore equality to the
future of the country, boys, your challenge is to
settle to an hour or two of study every evening,
follow up on comments made on your work by your
teachers, ensure you stay on top of all deadlines
by doing work when it is set, arrive at school on
time, attend regularly and also get into the habit of
reading. It doesn’t matter whether it’s the paper,
a magazine or books; it will improve your reading
skills and this will have an impact on your
performance across all your subjects.
As a school we are looking hard at ways we can
further support the achievement of our boys, but it
is an inescapable truth that we cannot do it unless
the boys themselves recognise that success in
the world is increasingly driven by exam grades
and many of them, it seems, need to make that
extra effort.
Chris Teal - Headteacher
Newdigate Street • Kimberley • Nottingham • NG16 2NJ • 0115 938 7000
www.kimberleyschool.co.uk
East Midlands
Education Trust