Science Faculty at Helena Romanes School

The Helena Romanes School Parsonage Downs, Great Dunmow, Essex CM6 2AU Telephone: 01371 872560 Facsimile: 01371 874632 Website: www.helena-romanes.essex.sch.uk Headteacher: Simon Knight B.Ed (Hons), MA

Physical Education Faculty

Staffing The PE Faculty at Helena Romanes is currently staffed by eight full and three part-time Teachers of PE and Dance. We are well supported by parents who help at extra curricular clubs and sixth form students who assist in lessons and at clubs.

Staff Induction and Development As typified by the award of the School’s Training School status, the PE Faculty has always placed a strong emphasis around the training and development of staff at all levels. The faculty have had several trainees; from the mid-Essex ITT consortium, and a number of students from the University of Bedfordshire. In addition, it has supported several very successful NQT PE teachers, using the nationally recognised Essex Partnership for the Induction of NQTs. The school has an extensive programme of support and development for all staff and there is a wide range of opportunities for career development within the faculty.

Facilities We have a large playing field catering for football, rugby, cricket, and rounders pitches as well as a 400m Athletics track and gymnasium. There are three floodlit netball courts and a floodlit astroturf pitch. The school is in partnership with One Life and has the use of the Great Dunmow Leisure Centre which is situated on the school site. This comprises of a sports hall, 25m swimming pool, fitness suite, dance studio and squash courts.

In addition all PE Staff have a desk in a dedicated PE Office and all full-time members of teaching staff are given their own laptop.

The PE Curriculum

Key Stage 3 In KS3 our pupils have two hours a week and take part in a wide range of activities. They cover fitness, dance, swimming, short tennis, badminton, basketball, athletics, netball, hockey, rounders, football, rugby and cricket.

Key Stage 4 We are very conscious of the need to offer appropriate courses for all of our students and at present we offer three routes through KS4 PE.

PE is a very popular option and we have continually achieved a pass rate higher than the national average in both PE and Dance. We currently deliver the Edexcel course for GCSE PE and the AQA course for GCSE Dance. We run two BTEC Edexcel Level 1 and 2 First Award courses.

Our core PE programme allows pupils to choose which sports they undertake in both single and mixed gender groups.

We are keen to continue to develop this personalised learning approach. Post-16 We are very proud of the breadth, success and popularity of the PE courses which we offer in the Sixth Form. We have good sized groups in PE and Dance in both AS and A2 classes. We also run the Diploma in sport (development, coaching and fitness), which offers a vocational qualification for those wishing to extend their GCSE qualifications.

Extra-Curricular We offer a wide range of sports to our pupils at all levels in our extra curricular programme. Clubs are run at lunch and after school and we have numerous fixtures throughout the year. We play friendly fixtures against local schools as well as competing in two districts and at county level. Our teams have performed well over recent years, participating in district and county competitions in a variety of sports.

The faculty run many trips throughout the year including Twenty20 Cricket, international netball, rugby and football matches and numerous dance trips to London. In addition to these we organise biennial overseas sports tours and this year are due to visit Singapore and Malaysia.

Culture and Ethos The faculty functions very much as a team of teaching staff and technicians with excellent communication. Staff regularly discuss student and development issues. The staff are extremely hard working, talented, energetic and demonstrate a high level of professionalism. Innovations are often suggested by staff which are then developed collaboratively by the team. The School as a whole and the faculty in particular place a heavy emphasis upon staff development.

Lorna Booth - Head of Faculty June 2014