New academy confident pupils ‘will want to work in holidays’

As revealed in the Yorkshire Post last year, the £8.2m Boulevard Academy, now under construction on the site of Hull FC’s former home, will introduce a range of innovations in a bid to drive up standards and attainment.

They include an extended school year featuring a Saturday school each half-term and a two-week summer school, ending the traditional six-week summer holiday.

The school day is also being extended to begin at 8.30am and end at 4pm.

The academy, which will operate outside local authority control, will offer a challenging educational environment for its pupils, who will wear a black and white uniform in honour of the rugby club with which it is associated.

There will be strict limits on class sizes, with a maximum of 20 pupils per class in year seven, and 25 in years eight to 11, while there will also be a focus on one-to-one teaching.

It is hoped these measures will broaden the school’s appeal beyond its local community in west Hull.

Carol White, one of three trustees at The Boulevard Academy Trust, which is delivering the school, said: “We don’t have a catchment; the catchment is the whole of Hull city.

“In terms of admissions, certain priority is given to any child who lives in Hull, and as we expected the initial interest is coming from families who live close to the school.

“But we would hope as the reputation of the school rises it will attract people from across the city and even beyond if they feel this is the education their children want.”

The academy, which will eventually cater for up to 600 pupils, will begin admitting its first year seven pupils in September, and although it will have capacity for 120 in its first year it is thought the initial take-up will be around 90.

“I think it’s a positive start given that we’ve started from absolutely nothing,” said Ms White.

She said that rather than acting as a disincentive, the quality, variety and effectiveness of teaching provided during the holidays would make children and their parents want to take part.

It has yet to be decided what sanctions, if any, pupils would face for not attending these extra lessons.

Ms White said: “The way we will support these children to get the best possible results is to give them more quality teaching time with high-quality teachers.

“What we will be doing is under normal circumstances there will be an expectation that for two weeks during the six-week summer holiday there will be a summer school. There will also be one Saturday every half-term for extension activities.

“I would imagine the Saturdays will be used for a range of activities and project work and groups of children and individual children will be doing different things in accordance with their particular needs.

“Year seven will be focused primarily on developing their literacy and numeracy skills, ensuring they have got the basic tools of the trade to read and write and understand, to pick up the basic mathematics they need.

“It may very well be on the Saturdays there would be a whole range of extension work, project work and group work linked to their individual learning plans. This is not unusual practice in many schools now.

“The level of which we can require (pupils to attend) is something we are going to have to talk about and take legal advice on, but there will be a strong expectation and I would hope the range of what’s on offer will be such that children and parents would want to participate because they would see what the benefits would be.”

For details on a series of events offering parents and prospective pupils the chance to find out more call 01482 639954.