XP School Trust Ltd is seeking an experienced firm to supply external audit services to our Trust.
Please see our Invitation to Tender letter below. If you would be interested in providing this service to our Trust please return your tender to Cat Blair, CFO ([email protected]) no later than 5pm on Tuesday 30th April 2024.
It is a privilege to work at XP Trust but I don’t reflect enough on the wonderful things I see and experience every day as I work alongside students, teachers, colleagues and other stakeholders in, and across, our Trust. As one of our Design Principles is ‘sharing our stories’ I have made a commitment to share my stories on the Trust website so that those moments are captured and celebrated more often.
So, here we go!!!!
One of the highlights for me in January was the Festival of Learning organised by XP University. The event took place on a Staff Day as staff from across our Trust gathered together as Crew to explore, critique and contribute to our newly proposed Trust wide Teaching and Learning model. The model draws together best practice from across the Trust and from other schools so that we have a consistent way of talking about, sharing and developing high quality learning experiences for all our young people and staff.
The model is underpinned, crucially, by five fundamental principles that inform our lesson design. These are:
In addition, we proposed using a simple but effective methodology to inform lesson planning that ‘Activates, Constructs, Demonstrates and Consolidates’ learning or AC/DC for short!!! Staff worked through the model in a series of practical workshops and made a commitment to develop and embed this practice in every school across the Trust.
Check out this short clip that shows highlights from the day!
It was a fantastic day and showed how dedicated and determined our staff are, across the Trust, to ensure our kids create beautiful work, grow their characters and achieve academically.
To conclude…
Last academic year saw a huge amount of beautiful work from our students studying Spanish across the XP Trust – here’s just a few examples of the incredible products they’ve created!
In Term 2a G28 were answering the question ‘Am I ready for a break?’.
Students discussed holidays they have been on in the past using the preterite tense. They included where they went, who with, and gave opinions on their past holidays as well as modes of transport and various holiday activities.
You can watch all the videos here
The product for this expedition was a notebook which included text and artwork to describe where you can go in and around Doncaster, answering the Guiding question. Each student received a copy, which will be used when this topic is revisited, to carry out a series of Do Now activities in session. All of our Primary schools also received copies to encourage their language learning.
During both 21-22 and 22-23, Year 7 studied a range of guiding questions of their first year of their study – these two products are the culmination of that learning!
Here’s a selection of the beautiful work, seen in our schools and beyond! You can find our students’ work in the Frenchgate centre in Doncaster!
Following up on our experience and journey of producing and delivering last year’s XP Y11 Christmas Carol Study Guide, which culminated and in a beautiful CoL at the Dickens’ Museum in London, I just wanted to acknowledge and celebrate the contributions made by the students after their initial artworks and written work/reflections had been submitted for us to begin pulling the Guide together.
The extra work that the students all put in, from the beautiful illustration and writing redrafts and provision of additional content as needed and as we specified, to coming into Comms and sitting alongside us, getting an appreciation of what we do with their work, and using their voice to critique and input on our design work and styling, made for a truly purposeful, inclusive, impactful and rewarding experience for us all. It resulted in a truly beautiful product, and, from a Comms perspective, it was truly refreshing and to have that face-to-face connection with the students.
As a consequence, and having spoken to several Heads and Expedition Leads in recent weeks about the positives and mutual benefits of such an experience, I genuinely think that exploring any opportunities for Comms to work closer with the students throughout the entirety of their expedition product journeys, whether through more rigorous and regular check-ins, specific workshops, or simply just allowing students to come into Comms and critique what we’re doing, as we’re doing it, would have huge benefits and lead to even more beautiful work.
One of the greatest aspects of working in Comms is our involvement with final products. As one of the conduits between the beautiful work the students produce and the outside world, we get to see tremendous amounts of well crafted, high quality activism before it lives out in the community.
This time of year is especially exciting for that reason. Not only are products culminating and being celebrated all up and down the country (two of us were in Newcastle this week to help launch yet another incredible book from XP Gateshead students) but planning and preparation has begun for Expeditions for the new year!
It has been great for Comms to work with staff on this, who through the process of Jeff’s Law actually model and make the product themselves first – if it’s good enough for our students, it’s good enough for us! This crucial stage allows the seeds of activism to be planted early on in the process – it means the students can engage with their learning knowing that their teachers have grappled with the product they’ll be making too!
Over the last few weeks, we’ve been in countless meetings and been privy to lots of really inspiring conversations about what our students across the Trust will be working on in September. We can’t reveal too much (because that’s what immersion and hook week are for!) but the prospect of supporting products full of beautiful stories, artwork and music that connects with all sorts of communities around the world is very exciting!
I for one can’t wait to see the impact the work will have on the world! Let’s do this, XP Trust!
XP Trust has welcomed over one thousand visitors, from all over the world, to our eight schools over the last two years. These visits, whether a couple of hours or a couple of days, have been experienced by people from all walks of life.
For example, we have had visitors from as far as Australia and America, some from India, Israel, Norway, Spain and other countries, as well as many visitors from across the UK.
They come to XP schools to learn How We XP. They learn all about ‘Crew’ and why it is so important throughout a child’s life at school. They learn how Expeditionary Learning is planned, delivered and celebrated throughout our students’ educational journeys.
Having people visit our schools allows us to share and reflect on our work, provide professional learning opportunities for our staff and students as well as encouraging feedback and critique of our model.
Our students learn how to be ambassadors for their school by having the opportunity to speak with visitors. They share information about our Trust, show their work, talk about ‘Crew’ and Expeditionary Learning. They learn how to speak to visitors, grow in character and become confident when speaking to the public.
At XP Trust we are all very proud of our schools and would love for children all over the world to experience the XP way of learning.
The Second World War may feel like several lifetimes ago to some of us, but there are still thousands of people for whom it was a lived experience, something they will never forget.
Years 3 and 4 in all the Primary Schools across our Trust, have through their recent expedition Lest we Forget: How does war change Lives? examined the lives of local people and national figures – all of whom have stories that deserve to be shared.
Four beautiful books have been created, capturing times both traumatic and remarkable.
From Pat Grainger, who lives in the centre of Doncaster and remembers the Corn Exchange cellars being used as an air raid shelter, or Harry Hewitt who as a child helped the war effort by being a runner – delivering messages between the Home Guards.
The research for these books has been thorough, the original poetry and illustrations adding so much to the work that has become a valuable and treasured resource of stories from a time past, but part of our history and community.
Last week’s Comms Crew curation day at Norton Infants and Juniors to install products, Trust displays and signage was from a personal point of view – both rewarding and productive in equal measure.
The visit was purposeful in many ways, but mainly because it emphasised to me how important it is that we celebrate our student’s beautiful work wherever and whenever we can.
This was made clear when I witnessed at first hand (and on more than one occasion – whilst levelling up a wonderful painting of Martin Luther King Jr. and adjusting the position of a large green caterpillar – the reaction of the children in seeing their amazing work being displayed in all its glory on the walls of their school.
Sadly I didn’t manage to photograph these priceless moments, which would’ve enhanced this blog ten-fold, but to say they were delighted would be an understatement. I could still hear the excitement in their voices when they reached the opposite end of the corridor.
I must mention the feedback that Rick and I received from Laura (LPA) and Andrea (ATU), which was very kind indeed and mutually appreciated. It is such a lovely atmosphere and environment to go and work in and we were both massively impressed by the general immersion displays across both Norton schools.
So it was a delight to be able to add to the already lustrous feel of the corridors and spaces.
All the displays and signage look incredible – they are in keeping with us as a campus whilst still celebrating everything we are as part of XP trust. The time, care and effort that has gone into your work is hugely appreciated by our whole school community. Beautiful work in action!
Laura Parsons
If you have – anywhere across the Trust – for example an unfortunate looking wall or frightful cupboard door that requires some love, then here’s the link to our Comms request form (click here). Or, if you simply would like more of the children’s beautiful work displayed then please put in a request for that instead.
After all, we all have stories and beautiful work that needs to be shared.
The XP Climate Conference was a huge success last night, welcoming huge crowds of parents and students to listen and learn about the importance of sustainable energy in the effort to stop climate change.
The event included talks from students about the impact of climate change on the world, as well as drawing attention to the threat that climate change posed in Doncaster and surrounding areas. It was eye-opening to discover the consequences that climate change could have a bit closer to home, and the passion the students spoke with definitely inspired the audience to take more action.
There was also a performance of ”Dear World”, the song written and performed by the children of the XP Trust, about how we need to protect our world because “there is no Planet B”. The CD of the song is now available to buy from our Trust Primary Schools
There was also a fascinating Q+A section of the conference, led by year 10 student Mollie Butler, speaking to local businesses Equans and Vossloh on what action they were taking as large scale companies to combat climate change. Both businesses had already begun to make beneficial changes such as installing more energy efficient LED lights in their factories and investing in electric company cars – and this is only the beginning! There is a long way to go yet, but both companies are confident that their efforts will reduce carbon emissions each year, and contribute to a safer, greener world.
The climate conference was a student-arranged event, on the back of their most recent Expedition, ‘Power to the People’, focusing on the key question “why do we need a sustainable energy plan for the Planet?” They learnt about energy and how it is used to create electricity, as well as fossil fuels and organic chemistry. They then took this information to put together the conference, aiming for impact and to connect with the people of Doncaster.
Three of the students involved, Beth Sprakes, Kiera Leaver and Mollie Butler, spoke to me about their contribution to the conference, for example writing and critiquing their own speeches and questions heard in the conference. It’s clear that these students feel strongly about climate change, explaining how they’ve always been aware of climate change, and how they make their own efforts to be more environmentally friendly, such as being vegetarian and changing the lights in their rooms to more energy efficient ones!
