On Friday 19th October, Local Councillors were invited into school, as part of ‘Local Democracy Week 2018’ to offer Year Seven Students the opportunity to pose questions to a panel of County Councillors.

Councillor Beynon, Councillor Towns, Councillor  Byard and Councillor Tebbbutt were keen to engage with our students and offer an insight into their own roles as well as tackling local issues. This project was delivered in collaboration with the Northumberland Youth Service.

On Friday 5th October, Year 8 students entered the world of work and for the first time ever, the annual Careers Conference took place at Linden Hall.

The core purpose of the day was to provide students with the opportunity to engage with employers from a range of different sectors.  The day is a central part of the careers programme for Year 8 students as they will soon embark on their journey towards high school education and be required to make GCSE choices very early on.  We hope that this day. along with various other planned events in Year 8 will help prepare the students to make informed career choices for the future.  The event highlighted alternative careers pathways such as apprenticeships as well as the more traditional routes into employment.

The careers speed dating session involved students grilling employers and Business Ambassadors from a range of local employment sectors to get a flavour of career pathways and typical working days.

The afternoon workshops were delivered by Northumberland Fire and Rescue, Police, RAF and the Navy.  The workshops highlighted all of the different roles in various organisations as well as key skills needed to be successful and addressed common misconceptions.

Liz Kinninment, Headteacher at Newminster Middle School, gave a keynote speech to launch the day’s activities.

“At Newminster we are committed to encouraging students to think about their future careers from a very early stage.  Being able to offer students the opportunity to experience a live working environment like this is invaluable.  The experience certainly opens their eyes to the possibilities available and will hopefully help inspire their future career choices.”

The conference day was delivered in partnership with Northumberland Business and Education Partnership and we would like to thank all of the businesses that made the day a success.

Contributors for the speed dating activity included

• NCC
• NCC Apprentices
• Newcastle College
• Interserve
• Newcastle University
• HMRC
• RAF
• Northumberland Fire & Rescue Service
• Police Service
• British Army
• Robertsons

Here is what the students had to say:

“There are a lot more job opportunities in some jobs that you wouldn’t expect”

“It was an inspiring day”

” I have a new understanding of my future career”

Congratulations to all of our Big Bang Fair Competition Entrants – on Thursday 4th October they presented their CREST STEM projects to judges at the Regional Fair, which was part of the ‘Bring It On’ exhibition at the Beacon of Light in Sunderland. Pupils spoke confidently about their work, the judges were extremely impressed and two projects were awarded with prizes. One of our projects will be representing the North East at the Big Bang Fair National Finals 2019 at the NEC in Birmingham, and these pupils have also been invited to a special event at Parliament next month. Well done everyone, we are very proud of you.