Every year we send out a student survey so the most important stakeholders of BMS – the students – are able to tell us what they think about the school. The Senior Leadership Team then look at the results in detail and use the information to try and improve things. Initiatives that are now common place which have stemmed from student feedback in previous years include the introduction of ‘The Pod in the Quad’ (a food serving location outside in the quad), refurbishment of the ‘F’ Block toilets, improved IT facilities and the introduction of a Sixth Form Cafe. This just goes to show how important the student voice is at BMS.

As I oversee Teaching and Learning at BMS, I am always eager to look at the results of the student survey and read the comments so I can adapt the staff training sessions accordingly.

To start with, it was lovely to see that 86% of students ‘agreed’ and ‘strongly agreed’ that they are taught well at BMS – this is a 6.3% increase on last year. Also, 88.6% of students ‘agreed’ and ‘strongly agreed’ that they are making good progress at BMS (a 2.1% increase on last year) and 81.2% of students ‘agreed’ and ‘strongly agreed’ that they receive appropriate homework for their age (a 10.1% increase on last year).

Some of the comments from students relating to Teaching and Learning that have interested me include:

“Sometimes the homework could be a bit more challenging. The majority of the teachers give lots of feedback quite often, however a few teachers could give a bit more feedback.” YEAR 8 STUDENT

“We don’t get much homework, only some teachers set it every week.” YEAR 9 STUDENT

“I like what some teachers do, they have 3 options for homework and class tasks: easy, medium and hard. It helps me get more comfortable with the subject and helps me to challenge myself.”          YEAR 8 STUDENT

As a result of this information, home learning, providing a menu of possible tasks for students to select from and providing high quality feedback to students have already been factored into staff training sessions – meaning that improvements will be very likely.

From all of us at BMS, we hope you stay well and we look forward to seeing you soon.