Clifton High School case studies (30)

Impact of partnership work done in 2023 (ISC annual Census 2024)

• 7 state schools involved
• 501-1000 state school pupils involved
• 250 staff hours given

Academies or free schools sponsored

• Oasis Academy - Banke Leaze Primary School

Impact Statement

Sports Facility Share: To allow maintained schools in the area to use the facilities at the Coombe Dingle sports complex. The facilities at Coombe Dingle Sports Centre include: Fourteen indoor and outdoor tennis courts, netball courts, two floodlit artificial astroturf pitches, one floodlit 3G football and rugby pitch, grass football and rugby pitches, cricket pitches and cricket nets, rounders and softball pitches, grass athletics track, changing facilities and bar/cafe area. These partnerships have been in place for many years. Our goal is to continue to share the exceptional facilities on offer in order to assist maintained schools to fulfil their teaching commitments under the national curriculum. All partners use the facility weekly during term time as well as at other times for specific events such as Fixtures, Tournaments or Sports Days. Partners: 12 maintained primary schools. Pupils from Years 4 - 13. The pupils are also invited to take part in our annual Festival of Sport which involves 23 maintained schools in the area. Clifton High School also hosts an annual Netball Tournament for local primary schools at their Coombe Dingle sports complex.

Swimming Pool Share: Use of our newly refurbished indoor swimming pool, with changing facilities and viewing gallery. Pupils from 1 local maintained primary use Clifton High School's indoor onsite swimming pool weekly during term time. Each year Clifton High School also hosts a Junior Swimming Festival, for 6 local maintained junior schools. Rotary Clubs of Bristol and Clifton Swimarathon is an annual event at held at Clifton High School's swimming pool. It is a day-long event and raises in excess of £10,000 each year for both local and international charities. A variety of teams participate including pupils from other schools.

Masterclass Bus: The School has purchased and made bespoke a 'Masterclass Bus'. The aim of this project is to deliver free bespoke masterclasses to local primary schools and youth organisations, sharing the expertise and knowledge of our pupils and teachers. Every week pupils and staff members take the bus to primary schools in and around the Bristol area.  Masterclasses are tailored to suit needs and requests of the schools and provide a unique educational experience from which staff and pupils, both at Clifton High and the schools visited, benefit. During the year 2018-2019 seventeen maintained primary schools were visited.

Sponsorship: Clifton High School sponsors the Bristol Museums' Annual Education Programme. The Education Programme is now one of the largest in the South West and delivers formal teaching and learning activities and programmes to children and young people, parents, teachers, school and related organisations within the National Curriculum from Early Years and Foundation to Key Stages 1-5. The museums have also established a regular programme of curriculum-related learning opportunities, offering adapted sessions for home educators and their children, together with specialist training for the CPD of teachers. Working in partnership with specialist teachers, Bristol Museums also offer adapted sessions for children who are disabled or have special educational needs. To assist, through sponsorship, the Bristol Museums to reach out to all schools in the city of Bristol, and help raise attainment levels in areas of special need or social deprivation, providing workshops to targeted schools for a minimal charge.  Supplying use of school minibus to transport children to and from events.

Sponsorship of Bristol Schools Nature Reserve Club: As a Double Green Flag Eco-school, Clifton High School is delighted to sponsor membership of the Bristol Schools Nature Reserve Club, which is an environmental education project launched at the Festival of Nature 2017 by the President of the RSPB. The Club has a wildflower meadow that can supply seeds for school projects and offers workshops to local primary school pupils to explain the importance of pollinators and assist with setting up the reserves. It also provides plants for 1 local primary school's eco gardens as well as on-going dated ecological, educational material. The aim is to inspire maintained schools in the Bristol area to take up the idea of creating their own community nature reserves to help stop the decline of wildlife populations in the UK.  

Sponsorship of Southmead Hospital Charity’s Creative Companions project: Clifton High School is sponsoring Southmead Hospital Charity’s Creative Companions project which trains volunteers to deliver creative art activities such as painting and drawing to the hospital’s older patients at their bedside. Creative Companions is part of the Fresh Arts programme at North Bristol NHS Trust.

Use of facilities: Each year we host a Rotary Clubs of Bristol and Clifton event called Youth Speaks.  Around forty pupils, aged between 11 and 17 years and from maintained schools in and around Bristol take part.   The German department at Clifton High School regularly invites pupils from maintained schools in the Bristol area to German film evenings and German plays by visiting professional drama groups.  The Head of Department has also run a German literature workshop with sixth form students from a local maintained school.  6 local primary schools are invited to participate in an annual Mathematics Challenge event held at Clifton High School and hosted by its staff.  Pupils aged 10 and 11 years.  The Head of Classics runs a weekly after school Minimus Latin Club in which pupils from a local maintained primary school participate. 

Use of Teaching Staff hours: 1) Deputy Head is a Community Governor for Bristol Brunel Academy, Speedwell, Bristol, where she is the Chair of the Policy Approval Committee. 2) Head of Advanced Learning Departments is Special Educational Need and Disabilities Governor of Bristol Cathedral Choir School, College Square, BS1 5TS. 3) Teaching member of staff is Governor of Sefton Park School.  Clifton High School releases these staff to attend training meeting and school visits.

Fund Raising and Volunteering:  Clifton High School has a House Charity Committee that raises thousands of pounds each year, solely through pupil led activities.  In 2019 the charity was is Children’s Hospice South West.  In 2019 Sixth Form students organised an appeal for funds for ‘Feeding Bristol’, a city-wide appeal launched in Bristol to co-ordinate and distribute food to summer holiday clubs, breakfast clubs, sports groups and out-of-hours school clubs that provide food for thousands of children who were at risk of going without food during the summer holiday period.  Staff at the School also generously donated £10 of their July salary towards the appeal and the students were able to purchase and deliver 170kg of food and other essential items to the Charity.  They also collected donations for the East Bristol Christmas Food Bank and, together with a member of teaching staff, delivered a School minibus full of donations to the foodbank. 

As part of the Duke of Edinburgh Bronze Award, pupils are required to volunteer and give up their time to make a difference to the lives of others in the community. Places where they have worked include Riding for the Disabled, Bristol Zoological Gardens, St Peter's Hospice, Help the Aged and Cancer Research charity shops, church youth groups, Rainbows and Beaver Scouts. They have also helped in the community by caring for disabled children, visiting the elderly and joining the St John's Ambulance Service.