Pastoral Care

Pastoral care ensures strong foundations on which learning can take place. Recent studies have shown that pupils with better health and wellbeing are likely to achieve better academically.

At St. Francis’, pastoral sessions are not confined to one lesson a week; it is embedded throughout the curriculum and tutor time calendar and fosters a pupils’ personal development as much as their academic progress. Our Personal Development programme (which includes Relationships and Sex Education) teaches life skills that are associated with greater wellbeing and higher achievement, as well as developing character and social skills which will be of critical importance to pupils later in life.

Learning to protect and nourish their mental health is an essential benefit our pupils receive from our Personal Development programme, which equips them with a comprehensive toolkit of cognitive, behavioural, and social skills that are known to generate and protect good psychological health, as well as to recover effectively when challenges are encountered. Once learned, pupils can draw on these throughout their lives.

A key element of the success of our Pastoral provision is the excellent relationships between our staff and pupils. Our genuine community environment and small class sizes mean staff know each pupil as an individual and care about their progress. Our small class sizes and the provision of two tutors per form group guarantee that students benefit from individual attention, fostering a supportive environment to help them reach their academic objectives and potential. Issues are spotted and dealt with quickly, and every pupil will have several trusted staff members they can go to with any difficulties, including the Pastoral Support Officer and a counsellor if a student wishes to speak in confidence about any concerns or worries.