Charter ED meeting last night

[loveED86]

I could not make it and was wondering what was discussed.

Thanks in advance.

[largeginandtonic]

The focus was on the enrichment activities - i.e. music, sport and after school clubs etc. The key points that I picked up were:

Sport - likely to be an extended school day on Wednesday for sports. Kids will (mostly?) be doing sport at Charter ND but they will be making use of other provision (e.g. Jags, Dulwich Hamlet and Burgess Park). The new sports hall on the hospital site will be built before the other new buildings so should ready in the second year, giving them more options. There'll be various sports clubs/teams. Generally there will be separate teams for Charter ED and Charter ND, partly because most competitions don't allow mixing but also because it is more inclusive. The range of sports clubs will depend partly on what the kids want.

Art - the art teacher showed us what they do in Charter ND which she is looking to replicate. Again, there will clubs. She also said there would be more time for art trips than year 7s might get at an established school. They won't have their own kiln but can use Charter ND kiln.

Music - we heard less about this but choir and bands were mentioned as after-school clubs and the deputy head talked about her personal ambition to have all kids learning an instrument.

Languages - French and Spanish will be part of the curriculum, Mandarin will be taught to about 60 kids who have the capability to try it (they talked about it being more or less compulsory for them, although kids who hate it can opt out). Portuguese will be an after school club. More languages will become on offer as the teaching staff grow.

Drama - new Head of Humanities is a former playwright and actor - definitely a school play and sounds like there would be a drama club.

After school activities generally - on top of the the clubs mentioned above, there will be a range of other clubs, e.g. debating/school council and homework clubs/extra support with Maths and English. There was a lot of emphasis on how Charter ED kids won't have to compete for places in an after school club with Charter ND kids - the idea is that Charter ED will have its own clubs and link up with Charter ND only if the number of kids is small, although some clubs will take place at Charter ND. Although this was clearly the ambition, they did acknowledge that the ability to run all these clubs is going to depend to an extent on the kids being willing to participate in them! They want everyone to do at least 2 clubs. They will talk to the founding cohort of kids before they arrive to see what they are interested in.

There were some other questions from parents about setting (year 7s will be in mixed ability groups, but with nurture groups) and transport (buses at 3 pm when the core day ends, buses to Charter ND when needed, buses home at 4.15 when after school activities finish).

I'm sure there's other things I've forgotten to mention but maybe somebody else can come along and plug the gaps!

[loveED86]

Thanks!

Did they speak more about transport?

At last meeting they were waiting for confirmation where pick up/drop up point will be-possibly dulwich hamlet football club car park?

[largeginandtonic]

I don't think they said - there was just one question from a parent about transport I think, and the question was about whether buses were planned for both kids staying for after school clubs and kids choosing to go at 3 (or end of core day). They didn't ask about the pick-up/drop off point.

[tomskip]

Why will they need special buses?