Contact

Merchants’ Academy

Gatehouse Avenue

Withywood
Bristol
BS13 9AJ
t: 0845 6442145
t: 0117 3015000
f: 0117 3015002

e: info@merchantsacademy.org

Academy Aims

Our curriculum will seek to implement the aims of the Academy:

To develop in each of our students, the qualities of enterprise, respect and aspiration and an interest in lifelong learning.
To give our students the vital skills, knowledge, understanding and confidence to enable them to take an active part in an increasingly diverse, complex and global society.
To provide for the moral, spiritual, social, cultural and physical developments of all our students.
To launch our students into further and higher education and/or a career path that will realise their full potential and exceed expectations.
To reach standards of achievement, attendance and post-16 staying on rates which are significantly above local and national levels.
To serve and support the Withywood and wider Bristol communities.

ICT

There will be a state of the art ICT infrastructure and this aspect of the curriculum will be available online for students, staff and parents.

High specification ICT will be installed in every teaching venue to provide the most up to date facility for teaching and learning.

Years 7 - 9

The Merchants' Academy does not have to follow the National Curriculum. We do not believe it represents the whole of the curriculum which should be available to each student. We will have a strong commitment to co-curricular activities. However, students will cover the following subject areas:

English
Mathematics
Science
Technology
Humanities
Performing Arts
Physical Education
Business Studies
ICT
Modern Foreign Languages

In addition, Religious Education, Personal, Social, Health and Sex Education and Citizenship will be delivered as part of the entitlement curriculum.

Years 10 - 11

Merchants' Academy will continue the curriculum offered in Years 10 and 11 by Withywood Community School. This will include both GCSEs and BTECs.

Years 12 - 13

Merchants' Academy will offer both the International Baccalaureate and vocational qualifications.

Student Entitlement

Merchants' Academy recognises that students are entitled to a curriculum which is characterised by breadth, balance, coherence, relevance, differentiation and progression. The Academy attaches the following meanings to these terms and expects Departments to contribute to them within their individual policies.

Breadth - A broad curriculum will bring students into contact with the full range of learning (knowledge, understanding of concepts, skills and attitudes) and the areas of learning experience (aesthetic/creative, human and social, linguistic and literary, mathematical, moral, physical, scientific, spiritual and technological).
Balance - A balanced curriculum will ensure that each area of learning and experience will be given appropriate attention in relation to the others and to the curriculum as a whole.
Coherence - A coherent curriculum will be planned as a whole and will embrace the different areas of learning and experience, so that these do not appear as discreet and unconnected but as contributing to overall progress and achievement.
Relevance - A relevant curriculum will take account of the previous learning of students and their readiness for new experience.
Differentiation - Differentiation involves matching tasks to students, balancing challenge with likelihood of success for each student across the ability range. It often implies a need for variation in teaching approaches and classroom organisation.
Progression - There will be separate policy documents on Recording, Reporting and Assessment available.

Methodology

Merchants' Academy places emphasis upon the notion that teaching and learning processes are as significant as curriculum content in determining student progress and achievement. To this end we seek to develop shared experience, between teachers and learners. We also recognise the importance of shared experience between learners themselves and the value of non-formal learning situations. We see the curriculum as a whole. Features of effective teaching and learning enable students:

to have a basis from which to make informed and realistic choices and decisions at all stages;
to have an informed perspective about the role of the individual in the community, society and the world of work;
to have a flexibility of attitude and willingness to learn, sufficient to cope with future changes in society, technology and career patterns;
to exhibit a set of personal values based on honesty and trust, tolerance, understanding, caring and respect for others which allow the establishment of effective personal and social relationships;
to have an appreciation of the spiritual dimensions of human existence;
to appreciate the need to advocate the basic rights of others, particularly those who are not well placed to promote their own needs;
to appreciate and value the plural, multi-cultural and multi-faith nature of society;
to understand the causes of inequality of opportunity and treatment afforded to many people on account of ethnicity, gender, social class or disability and the need to remove any discrimination;
to have political and economic literacy sufficient to be able to contribute to the development of society and participate in it;
to understand Britain's place within the European and World dimensions.

Homework

Homework will be set on a regular basis throughout the Academy. At the beginning of each academic year students will be informed of their homework timetable by their personal tutors and letters are sent to all parents/carers giving this information. With very few exceptions, the pattern of homework set should follow that indicated on the homework timetable.

Complaints

Arrangements for the consideration of Complaints about the Academy Curriculum and related matters are available from the Academy office.

Parents/carers should contact the Academy office if they wish to make arrangements to see any of the documents or regulations held at the Academy including those relating to the curriculum and other curricular policies.

Vocational Qualifications

Students will be able to study vocational qualifications at the Academy.