1. education
2. graduate school
3. college

e of community
to develop a true sens
Working together
Parent Charter
Engaging
with our
parents
and wider
community
Horizon’s
Zombies help
raise money for
Barnsley Hospice
Celebrating the
achievements of
our students
Page 5
Page 6
IKIC Awards
Page 18
Zombie Run
Issue 9
Autumn 2014
That feel ‘GOOD’ factor at Horizon
The exams may have changed, but
the fantastic results continue at
Horizon! Once again 62% of our
students achieved 5 A*-C, including English and Maths.
72% A*-C in Maths and 72% A*-C
in English.
This figure, which continues to
exceed the national average, has
been achieved in what has been a
difficult year for all schools with the
introduction of sweeping changes
to how students sit exams.
Principal, Nick Bowen was
delighted with this second set of
results for the college. “I am so
pleased that all the hard work and
dedication of all our staff and students has once again paid dividends.
“Results day was once again a
real highlight of the year!”
OFSTED visit: we’re GOOD!
Horizon has received a glowing
report from OFSTED, following a
visit at the end of the summer term.
The college was judged ‘Good’ in all
categories.
The report – a copy of which can
be seen via our website www.horizon.co.uk – notes that ‘Attainment
has improved rapidly in all year
groups since the College opened’,
and that ‘…students make good
progress in Mathematics and
English’. In addition the report
states that ‘Progress in all other subjects shows an equally positive picture’.
Proud Principal, Nick Bowen,
said, “We are absolutely delighted
with our OFSTED report and this
year’s examination results. They
both reflect accurately the huge
success that Horizon Community
College is having in raising achievement in this area and the positive
impact it is having on the local
community.
“The very good report and examination results give us the perfect
platform to push on to be outstanding and to really ensure a bright
future for our young people and for
the community of Barnsley.”
The Royal British Legion Group
FESTIVAL OF
REMEMBRANCE
Hosted by Bob Williams
Thursday 6th November at 7.00pm
Horizon Theatre
Horizon Community College
Dodworth Road, Barnsley S70 6PD
ALL WELCOME • FREE ENTRY (by ticket only)
Tickets available now from Horizon College Reception
(People are asked to be in their seats by 6.55pm)
Student
Robyn Bailey
reading her
exam results
on Thursday
21 August.
Photo by Sharon Abbott
www.horizoncc.co.uk
email: [email protected]
[email protected]
2 – The Horizon Issue 9 AUTUMN 2014
From the Editor
Hello, and welcome to the ninth edition of
The Horizon. It seems like two minutes ago
that we were setting up this venture and the
journey we have taken has been incredible.
Special thanks go to our News Team,
Mr Robson and Alan Billingham at the
Barnsley Chronicle for their tireless efforts
to piece The Horizon together
so brilliantly.
By the way, I am
currently reading ‘The
Haunting of Hill House’
by Shirley Jackson.
Thanks
Mr Addy
Your Letters
Dear Mr Bowen,
I’d just like to put on record how
much Ruby enjoyed the summer
school and how much her mum and
I appreciated the organisation,
effort and professionalism of the
staff we met during the two weeks
that it ran. It’s hard to believe that
this was all provided for free, too.
Thanks for setting this up for us.
Regards,
Dave (Parent)
Dear Mr Bowen,
This is just a quick mail to thank
the Kids-R-Loud leaders for the
past week.
Both my children have had an
absolutely fabulous week and
couldn’t believe it when they found
out they were going to Alton
Towers.
They have made new friends and
have learnt new team building
skills along the way.
Thank you again to everyone.
Kindest regards,
Gail Taylor
Dear Mr Bowen, Mr Brammer,
Mrs Marriott and Mrs Buckley,
I would like to take this opportunity to thank you and your staff, on
behalf of my daughter Ellie, for a
fantastic year at Horizon.
We have seen vast improvements
in Ellie’s work and grades in almost
all of her subjects and are very
proud of her achievements. This
can be partly put down to the hard
work of you and your staff.
One of the areas where the school
has excelled is the diverse and
extracurricular activities available.
The school newspaper, Look North
and the enterprise award, all of
which Ellie was involved with, have
been fantastic and Mr Powell and
Mr Robson are to be congratulated.
My highest praise is reserved for
the PE department. As you probably
know sport is Ellie’s passion and
your PE team have really gone out
of their way to help and encourage
her in so many different directions,
from triathlon to badminton, to
athletics to cricket, the list is too
long to go on.
I would like to give special thanks
to Mrs Buckley who has regularly
gone out of her way to contact us
for various events and for also helping us with her TIP application. She
was instrumental in getting Ellie to
the South Yorkshire football trials in
which Ellie was successful and has
since enjoyed many trips around
the country doing what she enjoys
the most and for that I can’t thank
her enough.
Even when there has been various problems she has always been
very calm and polite to me and
other parents and sorted the problem very professionally.
Finally, the sports awards were
the icing on the cake for Ellie and
us, so we would like to thank you for
a great show and wonderful
evening.
Please could you pass this letter
to all concerned?
Kind regards,
Keith and Louise Hawcroft
Bugler
Booth
inspires
students
Kevin Heskett completing his climb to the
summit of Mount Kilimanjaro on behalf of
Teenage Cancer Trust. A big thank you to all
the Horizon students who supported him.
Ofsted’s View…
Attainment has improved rapidly in all
year groups since the college opened.
Getting
the Buzz
in Ossett
By Archie and Jess
We are Trinity Buzz newspaper
team from Holy Trinity Primary
School in Ossett, Wakefield. We
were inspired to create our own
unique newspaper for our school
after seeing the Horizon’s amazing
newspaper.
We wanted to run a school newspaper to spread exciting newas
across school. Every Monday we
meet after school where we plan
our newspaper. We then spend the
rest of the week interviewing children and staff around school and
finding out all the latest news.
We’ve really enjoyed being able to
express our ideas through the newspaper and we’ve loved interviewing
people.
“The best thing about being a
part of Trinity Buzz is looking for
interesting stories for our paper,
finding news stories and typing up
what we’ve heard.” Megan Year 6
“I love the fact it’s actually going
to be published! It’s not something
we are doing that might or might
not happen. It’s definitely going to
happen and people will definitely
read our work!” Marcus Year 6
In the future we hope that our
newspaper will be as successful and
fantastic as the Horizon’s but we are
really proud of what we have
achieved. Our first issue was printed and went on sale in school on
Wednesday 22 October and we cannot wait to get started on the next
issue!
Kingpins Nursery is moving
When?
Our relocation will take place late December 2014
Apology…
The headline ‘Hearing Day’ on
page 18 in Edition 8 was
misleading – we supported
National Deaf Awareness Week
which held a variety of events
raising awareness in school.
A letter from the Chair of Governors
John Bostwick congratulating Year 8
students on their Enterprise Award.
For further details and progress updates contact:
Royal Marine Booth from
Barnsley who gave an
inspirational talk to
Horizon students at the
start of the academic year.
01226 207158 • www.horizoncc.co.uk
New Address: The Horizon Nursery, Shaw Lane, Barnsley S70 6EP
AUTUMN 2014 Issue 9 The Horizon – 3
Bradley Healey 9K interview
First term report
Results and Ofsted
We had the Ofsted visit in the penultimate week of term in July.
We always expected a full visit from
Ofsted in the first two years of the college opening in 2012.
The college are delighted because
we were judged to be “Good” in every
category which is a huge achievement
for Horizon Community College.
From our starting point two years
ago, to get “Good” in every possible
category, is a great accolade. The full
report is on the Horizon website for
everyone to read. My favourite quotation from the report is, “Attainment
has improved rapidly in all year
groups since the college opened.”
The report goes on to say a number
of other positive things including: students feeling safe and happy in their
environment; behaviour being good;
and the quality of teaching being
good, plus many more.
We set our stall out to raise attainment at the college and to be
acknowledged for that is really pleasing. It puts Horizon in a position
where the likelihood is that Ofsted
won’t visit us for another four years.
By the time the next visit is
announced, we want to be in a position to be pressing for “Outstanding”
and students’ progress is so high that
Ofsted can do nothing more than
judge us as an “Outstanding” college.
The GCSE results were very impor-
tant for us, as they always are,
because there is no point in receiving
a good report from Ofsted and then
the results being poor. The results
followed the report and showed that
Ofsted had got their judgement right.
62 percent of students got five GCSE
results including Maths and English,
which is higher than the national
average and significantly higher than
the previous two schools achieved.
Highlights for me were English and
Maths where 72 percent of students
got an A* to C grade in those subjects
and that was really pleasing. There
are areas where we still need to
improve in the school, and that is
why we are “Good” and not
“Outstanding” because we haven’t
cracked it all yet. Within the two
years which the college has been
open, the Ofsted judgement and the
GCSE results speak for themselves.
Schools are ultimately judged on a
number of things, but primarily the
judgements go on two things and
they are results and Ofsted and we
have made good progress in both of
these.
Expectations and Aspirations
going forward
For this academic year, it is very
much ensuring that we are not resting on our laurels and taking our foot
off of the pedal. We are talking all of
the time currently about where we
want to be in four years time when
we will be inspected again. Our
expectations and aspirations are
exceptionally high and we are not
going to let the bar drop. It is not all
about inspections, though! I came
here to Horizon to galvanise everyone at the college to redress the balance that Barnsley has experienced
of low achievement in secondary
schools. We are not happy with just
“Good” and we want students to
leave Horizon with significantly
higher GCSE results and aspirations
than they would have done previously or they would get at any other
school. The aspirations for this academic year are to: surpass the examination results of the previous year
and make sure that more and more
students are able to go on to further
education, employment and training; this will then allow more students to make a massive contribution to society.
Early Transition
The two-week transition period for
all year groups really did work and I
am a convert to that now. I was a little bit sceptical, but I have really
come round to that process now.
From a Year 6 point of view, what
used to happen was that the Year 6s
would come up to the college for the
day and get a taste for the school. The
students would then go home and
spend six weeks worrying about their
Mr Bowen, Principal
Horizon Community College
transition. What has happened this
year is that those students have
enrolled at the school for two weeks
before the six-week holidays and
they now know their teachers, their
way around the college, where their
lessons are, where to get their lunch
and they have made new friends. The
year group have instantly settled and
breaking up for the summer having
had the transition period, they could
enjoy their summer without the worries which they might have experienced in the previous process. When
students arrived back into the college after the summer, they were
straight into lessons and there was
no confusion or periods of time
where they were uncertain and it
allowed them to hit the ground running. It wasn’t just the new Year 7s
who had the experience. Every year
group went through the transition
period and every student returned
knowing who their teachers were and
where they needed to be. The previous Year 9s were starting their GCSEs
for that two-week transitional period
and that helped ease them into the
process which is different from Key
Stage 3. From a staff point of view,
they can become anxious too and it
was nice for staff to have their
timetables and meet the students
they were going to be teaching. It was
a really good end to the year and it
really worked for us as a college.
Final Thoughts
I would like to reiterate the ambition which Horizon has for Barnsley.
I have said from the minute I arrived
in Barnsley (where I now live) that we
want to lead the way in transforming
education here so that the town
climbs the national league tables and
the students that come here, and to
other schools in Barnsley, achieve
exceptionally highly. There is no reason why they shouldn’t and that is
our ambition. We talk to students
about flight paths when they first
arrive in school and throughout their
academic careers about where they
need to be in terms of progress and
meeting and surpassing these targets. If you like, we are on a flight
path and I feel that we are ahead of
that flight path and have already
achieved more than what we expected to achieve in that time. Our ambition is huge and over the last two
years we have had to show real
resolve. When you are new and when
you are big, you are often there to be
knocked. As staff, students and parents we have dug deep and there has
been a real shift. The Ofsted report
and the GCSE results have given a
real confidence boost to everyone in
the community with what we are
doing here and we will, in the next 3,
4 or 5 years time, be a college with a
national reputation for giving students a very, very good deal.
Miss Storey reports…
We Rocked You!
Above: Harry as ‘Pop’.
Below: Will as ‘Galileo’.
I cannot believe another year has passed and
that we have held our second Horizon college
production! It doesn’t seem like two minutes ago
since we were performing ‘Les Miserables’ and
now we have ‘We Will Rock You’ to add to our
repertoire. The show premiered in The Horizon
Theatre this July, and was a tremendous success,
receiving rave reviews from packed out audiences. A standing ovation every night left the
students feeling proud that they had done their
job and worked their magic.
When choosing the show, many different
musicals were brought to the table, but in the
end ‘We Will Rock You’ won out because it is so
very different in every way possible from its predecessor, ‘Les Mis’. We wanted to make a contrasting mark on our audiences. The same quality, the same talent, the same passion - but a stirring of different emotions. With a fabulous witty
script from comedian Ben Elton, and the finest
of music supplied by Queen, ‘We Will Rock You’
certainly had a lot to offer and I think our students did a truly tremendous job of bringing
this to life on stage.
I find myself saying this so often as a school
director, but it never fails to amaze me, the level
of talent I find myself working with when coaching the young people of Barnsley. The cast were
a constant delight during the rehearsal process.
I’ll be amazed if we don’t have some big superstars of the future right here within our Horizon
walls. The show opened many opportunities for
the youngsters to perform, including excerpts to
Her Royal Highness, Princess Anne, and at
Horizon’s Celebration of Achievement Awards
Evening, then later on this month they will be
entertaining guests at the Metrodome Leisure
Centre for the Elderly People Day.
We are now already starting to think about
what next year may have in store. Any ideas? Get
in touch and let us know.
Above: Dancers and chorus line.
Left: Darcy as ‘Killer Queen’.
Below: Louis as ‘Kashogi’.
4 – The Horizon Issue 9 AUTUMN 2014
Maryam Mirza.
Will Batty.
May Hutchinson.
Celebration of Achievement Event 2014
Religious
Education
Maths
On Thursday 17 July Horizon Community College held its second
Celebration of Achievement Awards in the stunning 420 seat theatre.
The evening was a success, with students commended for
outstanding achievement as part of the annual event.
Pictured are some of the students with
Heads of Departments and Principal Mr. Bowen.
More photos by Simon Morley on www.morleyphotography.com
History
Molly Lonsdale-Guest receiving her award for Sociology.
Business Studies
AUTUMN 2014 Issue 9 The Horizon – 5
Together we are so
much more…
Here is our draft Charter, please let us know what you think.
We look forward to hearing from you.
Sara Dickinson Family Engagement Coordinator
[email protected]
Jayne Manley Community Enterprise Planning & Development Co-ordinator
[email protected]
Students pictured during their performance.
Memories played
out by students
By Miss Hunt
Working together
to develop a true se
nse of community
On Saturday 27 September our
Horizon Community College students performed as part of the professional piece ‘INTENSE ATTACHMENT’ at The Cooper Cottage.
Created by Barnsley based choreographer and film maker Wayne
Sables Project, composer and musician Hayley Youell and designer
Steve Denton. Performed by Keira
Martin & Johnny Autin.
Produced by Spin Arts Management, with input from Leeds based
Invisible Flock and support from The
Civic.
The students from Years 9, 10 and
11 played the ghosts and memories
of people who have lived in the cottage and led audiences into the interactive experience inside. This was a
really exciting piece where the audience witnessed (in very close proximity) the relationship of the couple
who currently live in the cottage and
have discovered that they are expecting a child; it told a story of the emotions that they experienced during
this time.
Anyone who is into the arts will tell
you this was an experience to
remember.
A Parent’s View…
Horizon College really cares
it continues to be the right place
for us as a family.
Over the last two years we have been
on a roller coaster of a journey with
so many highs documented in our
very professional and successful
newspaper.
We are also fortunate to have amalgamated so well from two Secondary
Schools in Barnsley, taking the best from
both, yet creating our own new culture
along the way. As you would also expect
when developing a new dynamic college we’ve not always got it right and so
have had to make, and will continue to
make, changes along the way to make
our college the best it can be.
We are proud of the progress
achieved so far, with regard to the
improvements we have made, as
OFSTED 2014 reported that ‘attain-
ment has improved rapidly in all year
groups since the college opened’, ‘current data shows students’ achievement
is equal to or exceeds the expectations
for their age’, and ‘teaching is good
across the range of subjects’, ‘there are
rich and varied opportunities for community work for which students
achieve ‘I Know I Can’ awards’ and the
college has achieved the accolade of
‘Most enterprising school in the UK’.
Part of this success is us all working as
a team. So, we hope you agree that
‘Together we are so much more’. With
this in mind we have met and consulted with representatives from ALL
groups of our community to develop
our very own ‘Horizon Parent and
Community Charter’.
Our new Charter is built around us
ALL working together and being the
best we can be; this includes members
of our community; our students, their
families, staff and members from our
wider community, in fact anybody
that visits our College. Our Charter
will hopefully help us to develop our
own learning culture. It focuses on us
working together, to understand our
different points of view, to develop the
most effective methods for us to communicate, to be able to really build
trust, to meet our needs, working and
learning together. This Charter aims to
create the best school for us ALL to be
both as happy and successful as we
can be. Together we are so much
more...
6 – The Horizon Issue 9 AUTUMN 2014
The journey so far…
Year 8 Level 1 Achievers:
Year 9 Level 1 Achievers:
In the last year, over 400 students have taken
part in the IKIC Awards and we have now recognised and celebrated over 200 students’ achievements. Here’s our roll of honour so far:
Charlotte Hollingworth; Callum Stirk; Morgan
Horsfield; Josh Oldfield; Lauren Hawcroft; Grace
Mitchell; Bethanie–Jo Scargill; Ellie Sanger; Ella
Sides; Zoe Savage; Chloe Allott; Deimante
Avdejeva; Millie Bateman; Owen Charlesworth;
Jake Cook; Natalie Duke; Harrison Edge; Gemma
Exley; Samuel Farmer; Charlotte Gaunt; Nordas
Glykofrydis; Sofia Gregoriou; Georgia Healey;
Ruby
James;
Holly
Juhasz;
Mandana
Mohsendokht; Jack Morffew; Danielle Murwisi;
Benjamin Peel; Amy Richardson; Leonardo
Rocha; Sadie Savage; Millie Schofield; Olivia
Senior; Bret Smith; Nicole Stott; Ellie Swift; Jack
Ward; Ali Khosravi.
Joshua Baker; Dylan Dobson; Adrianna Darlow;
Amy Darlington; Eleanor Hadfield; Jessica
Hamby; Olivia Hughes; Michal Pilarski; Jorden
Bennie; Owen Hirst; Harry Batty; Chloe Bramall;
Regan Brewster; Leanne Broadrick; Imogen
Butcher; Ethan Caves; Andrew Crooks; Eve
Deacon; Elle Dickinson; Jennifer Doran;
Benjamin Foers; Harry Gledhill–Carr; Darcy
Hancock; Ellie Hawcroft; Bradley Healey;
Bethany Keys; Caitlin Laing; Daisy Loach; James
Miller; Joshua Palmer; Louis Philburn; Thomas
Preston; Alex Rogers; Lucy Sayles–Balmer; Kenan
Smith; Robbie Stevens; Lauryn Tazzyman;
Matthew Townend; Faith Vellensworth; Aiden
Walker; Charlotte Williams; Kate Winder; Alexis
Brown; Olivia Clarke; Kane Firth; Danny Gaunt;
Lewis Goddard; Bradley Hodgson; Henry
Kendrick; Adam Livesey; George Reavill; Amber
Richardson; Dylan Round; Molly Schofield; Loren
Sidebottom; Tobey Smith–Hall; Isaac Vause; Leah
Devonport
Gracjan
Panchanathan–Dejneka;
Danielle
Hanlon; Joe Sheldon; Ben Firth; Fraser Meggitt;
Ethan Kitchen; Nathan Howarth; Muhammed
Demir; Colin Shires; Lauren Fretwell; Alicia Bates;
Megan Thomas; Laura Newsome; Nathan Adams;
Shannon Brookes; Oliver Creeton; Gillian FraserBarber; Kelly Gibson; Maisie Graham; Emma
Hawley; Sapphron Heppenstall; Alicia Hudson;
Jessica Medcalf; Rebecca Morris; Sofie Newman;
Reece Nicholls; Sian Sargesson; Aidan Stirk;
Olivia Watson; Chloe Wells; Karina Green; Sophie
Stuchberry; Laura Murphy; Luke Simmons
Year 7 Level 2 & 3 Achiever:
Year 8 Level 2 & 3 Achiever:
Charlotte Hollingworth
Eleanor Hadfield
Year 7 Level 1 Achievers:
Year 9 Level 2 Achievers:
Nathan Adams; Lauren Fretwell; Danielle
Hanlon; Alicia Hudson; Megan Thomas; Luke
Simmons; Jessica Medcalf
Year 10 Special Awards:
Jack Bray; Kate Pursley; Sebastian Garwood
Year 11 Special Awards:
Megan Lomax; Libby Dixon; Anna Firth; Eleanor
Manley; Eve Lodge; Rebecca Prigmore; Courtney
Mallinder; Kadah Glover.
The Mayor and Mayoress of Barnsley along with Dan Jarvis MP pictured with Special Award winners.
Chair of Govenors John Bostwick
who opened the awards
pictured with his wife Kathy.
Message from…
Mrs Manley
I have been delighted to see how well the
IKIC Awards have taken off since they
were introduced in October 2013. At our
last Celebration Event, Horizon’s theatre
was full with our students receiving an
award and parents helping to recognise
and celebrate their successes.
The Awards have definitely allowed us,
as a College, to recognise the community activities, commitment and enterprising skills of our students. For many students this gave recognition for the activities they were already participating in.
However, the award scheme has also
raised the awareness of ALL our students
of the need to get involved and have
some fun with community activities,
which will enhance their life experiences.
In addition they will, through IKIC, build a
competitive CV needed to get them into
college or university and progress them in
their future careers.
Our Patrons have now met on at least
three occasions, to help us celebrate our
young people’s achievements and
endorse the eleven students’ applications
for the Special Award. I’d like to take this
opportunity to thank our Patrons for
being so generous with their time and in
helping give this award scheme the high
profile it deserves.
Patron message…
Ashleigh Porter-Exley
The IKIC Special Award celebrates everything I am passionate about, young people going above and beyond the call of
duty to enhance themselves and help
others in the process.
I am thrilled to have had the opportunity to be an IKIC patron this year and
thankful for the chance to work with such
motivated, passionate and hard working
people. Horizon is keen on recognising
not only the most academic students, or
the ones who make most noise, but the
ones who are willing to do something different in their own time.
Not only does IKIC boost confidence, it
opens doors and promotes being the
best you can be, “You are all so much
more.”
Achievements of our Special Award Winners
By IKIC Special Award –
Sue Coffey, IKIC Patron
Jack Bray – Jack does a great deal of
voluntary work in Barnsley and is also a
peer mentor for an after school club. He
wants to work with disability groups in the
future and the award scheme has helped
him recognise the skills he has developed.
Libby Dixon – Libby has taken part in
many Horizon events that were outside
her comfort zone, helps other young people tremendously, and now wants to train
to be a primary school teacher.
Anna Firth – Anna has involved herself in
many extra–curricular activities including
sports, and says, “This helped me to see
that the more I put into projects the more
I got out of them.”
Sebastian Garwood – Sebastian is a
young man with exceptional abilities and
the determination to create and manage
a very successful video filming project
which has helped the campaign to make
Racecommon Road safer.
Kadah Glover – Kadah has been very
involved in Peer Mentoring and as a
Wellbeing Ambassador. She was part of
the group which developed a logo for the
Wellbeing Scheme and persuaded the
Senior Leadership Team to fund it.
Eve Lodge – Eve’s confidence and
empathy have matured as she has undertaken a wide range of activities including
running a very successful business
Megan Lomax – Megan has excellent
leadership qualities and has been enthusiastic about setting up an enterprise to
sell Japanese ‘cosplay’ accessories; she
has also been applauded for her work at
Barnsley Hospice
Courtney Mallinder – Courtney organised a large charity gig for Barnsley
Hospice and through sheer determination overcame many obstacles. She has
great initiative and problem–solving skills.
Eleanor Manley – Eleanor says it all
when she says ‘I have done all in my
power to become the embodiment of the
‘I Know I Can’ spirit’. She has worked
with different generations and in particular
helping children develop Maths skills.
Rebecca Prigmore – Rebecca has
been Youth Councillor, involved in
Guiding, and is passionate in making sure
young people have a voice on issues that
affect them.
Kate Pursley – Kate is a real communicator. She has written for the school
newspaper since its first edition, and has
interviewed Dan Jarvis among others!
She helps at local primary schools and is
part of the Dodworth Crime and Safety
Group.
AUTUMN 2014 Issue 9 The Horizon – 7
My first day…
By Jake Fennel 7T
one told me this was our block
just for Year 7 and our form room
I woke to a new day at Horizon, it
would be there. I asked his name
was my first day so I didn’t know
and he said I am called Scott.
what to expect. I ran to my
Our first lesson was Geography
friends and made it to the bus with Mr Osborne, personally I
stop with time to spare.
think he is a great teacher. Our
Once I got on the bus I was sur- second lesson of the day was
prised. I didn’t know what to Spanish which was at the top of
expect but it was really good, my the Year 9 block but there was lots
friends had sat downstairs and of support from teachers showsaved me a seat next to them. The ing us the way to go. I had a briltrip was bumpy but fun, I really liant lesson, we said our names in
enjoyed it as we talked about Spanish, then we had science
gaming and listened to music. with Miss Khan that flew by, as
Sadly the time went by abruptly did Maths and PE. Break and
but I enjoyed all of it.
lunch are brilliant for catching
The first period was form but up with friends and having great
not before we were sorted out meals.
into classes in assembly. As we
The school feels like home now,
walked to the Year 7 block some- I really like it here.
Achieving dreams through attendance
Last year in Year 7 was phenomenal
in terms of our students’ attendance.
To achieve an overall attendance
figure of 95% demonstrated our
commitment to ensure that our students could maximise their own
learning potential and avail themselves of the incredible opportunities
here in school.
This year will be no different and
we aim to better last year’s figure. We
are currently achieving just over 96%
and there are a variety of initiatives
in place to give ownership of this
important area to the students with
myself supporting them throughout
the year.
At last week’s assembly I asked the
students to check their attendance
level with me whenever they saw me
with a red clip board. The first time
this occurred over one hundred students bombarded me with requests
for their attendance score... amazing!
I make an appeal to you as parents
and carers to support us in this initiative. You too can call me for your
child’s attendance figure.
If at all possible make appointments outside school time and support your child to achieve their
dreams.
It is vital that we do this together in
order to show the children we care
about their journey at Horizon that
has started so well.
The initial signs this year are
incredibly encouraging; the year
group are very settled after the two
week summer induction and have
returned after the summer break
with great enthusiasm.
The foundation has been laid, I
look forward to it being built upon.
20 minutes per day = Road to success.
Accelerated Reader Programme
designed to improve skills
In order to promote the value of
reading, the college has introduced
the Accelerated Reader Programme. This programme has not
only been specifically designed to
improve students’ reading ability
and continue to raise their reading
age but also to encourage and nurture a love of reading that will continue into adulthood.
Reading is a local and national priority for a number of reasons: being
able to demonstrate competent
reading skills is essential for subjects
across the entire curriculum.
Research shows clearly that a student
who reads regularly for 20 minutes
per day is far more likely to be successful at GCSE level and beyond.
Students are tested to ascertain
their reading age and the level of
book that they should choose to
read. This is essentially a selection of
books that will not only match their
ability but will also challenge them
and develop their vocabulary.
Students then choose books from the
school library that fall within this
range and, when they have finished
the book, they take a short, online
quiz that assesses their understanding of what they have read.
Students earn achievement points
for completing a quiz successfully
and earn an extra achievement point
for gaining a score of 100%.
There is also a termly, tutor group
quiz league. The results of the league
are revealed in a lively assembly,
when the hotly contested title is
revealed.
The programme ensures that,
whatever a student’s ability, they are
able to succeed and therefore enjoy
reading.
Keeeeeeep Reading!
Leadership Team
report
Miss Vernon
Crime Scene Investigation – Mick Amos showing pupils the art of fingerprinting.
Summer school triumphs
with pupils and parents
This summer, over 90 Year 6 and
Year 7 students took up the chance
to try out an amazing range of activities and trips, courtesy of Horizon
Summer School.
The summer school, organised
and delivered by Horizon’s unique
Community Enterprise Department,
ran for the first two weeks of the
summer holidays. As Community
Project Leader, Mr Woodhouse
explains:
“Summer school gives our students – including younger pupils
from our partner primary schools –
the chance to work in and around
the college and get used to the
atmosphere of secondary school
whilst taking part in fun and engaging activities and trips.”
Horizon Summer School is completely free for young people from
our community and is a great way to
make new friends and settle into college life. Best of all, there’s always a
great range of activities available for
those taking part...
plex. The team from ‘HMP Not for
Me’ were in again, providing an educational Crime Scene Investigation
project – this time with their brand
new prison van. Smaller activities
such as outdoor inflatables and a
cave bus gave children the chance to
get outdoors in the sunshine. We also
worked alongside the winner of the
BBC’s Young Apprentice, Miss Ashley
Porter-Exley, working with students
on a roller coaster design project.
The winning design team were also
given a once-in-a-lifetime chance to
deliver a presentation about their
coaster to the Alton Towers board.
We also incorporated two trips
into this year’s programme; running
on the Friday of each week. The first
trip was an educational visit to the
Royal Armouries Museum in Leeds.
Then, to finish summer school off in
style and as part of our roller coaster
design project, we all paid a day-long
visit to Alton Towers. Each trip was
informative, fun and completely free
to all students.
“I’d just like to put on record
“Both my children have had
how much our daughter
an absolutely fabulous week
enjoyed the summer school
and couldn’t believe it when
and how much we
they found out they were
appreciated the
going to Alton Towers. They
organisation, effort and
have made new friends and
professionalism of the staff
have learnt new teamwe met during the two weeks
building skills along the
that it ran. It’s hard to believe
way.” (Year 7 Parent)
that this was all provided
Our Summer School will be runfree too.” (Year 7 Parents)
ning again next year so we recomThis year’s programme saw Mr
Copley, joint Head of PE at our
school, delivering taster PE lessons
taken from the current curriculum,
in our state-of-the-art sports com-
mend you keep your eye on our website and check out the Horizon newspaper for more information on a
great, free experience for students
from the Barnsley area.
Literacy hits Jungle Fever!
As part of our Jungle Book crosscurricular project, the children’s
author and illustrator Liz Million
spent the day at Horizon
Community College.
Liz began the day by delivering
a great, vibrant assembly to the
whole of Year 7 which captured
their imaginations with the use
of children’s art work. The students then split into smaller
groups and took part in workshops to develop their understanding of how characters are
created in fiction writing.
These sessions will help develop students understanding of
how small details such as: types
of eyes described/ drawn; body
language and colour can change
the way a character is perceived
by the audience. For example: a
villain may wear black and white
and have squinty eyes.
This development of understanding will allow students to
bring characters to life within
their
work
in
English.
Transferring this to adjectives,
adverbs and description will
allow students to make further
progress in developing their
writing skills.
I am very pleased to be working alongside Mr McInerney and Mr Woodhouse,
to lead a fantastic year group as students
begin Secondary Education here at
Horizon Community College.
Our journey began in July. It seems a
long time ago now since we welcomed
our new, nervous, smiling students.
There was a mixture of excitement and
anxiety as form groups were called out
and students began to make new friends.
By the end of the first day students
were leaving with big smiles on their
faces in anticipation of what the next day
would bring.
The first week in Year 7 saw new learning, new subjects and Ofsted! A chance
for students to show visitors what they
were capable of and they certainly did
Year 7 School proud.
The two weeks allowed all students to
meet new people and make new friends.
It helped settle fears and nerves over the
summer holiday and meant that from
Tuesday 2 September the full focus was
on learning and achievement.
We have already achieved so much in
a short period. It has been a fantastic
start and the lead up to Christmas will be
filled with even greater opportunities to
achieve, both in and out of the classroom.
Community
Enterprise report
Mr Woodhouse
It has been a very busy and enjoyable half
term of Community Enterprise in Year 7,
with lots of interesting projects and activities now up and running. 11 Student
Enterprise Coordinators have been
appointed to the Enterprise Team for Year
7, each excelling in a very competitive
application and interview process. So far
the Student Team has helped to support
our two very successful open evenings
and have been a great help.
Our students have had the pleasure of
working with children’s illustrator Liz
Million who came in as part of our English
Curriculum and delivered workshops in
our theatre. South Yorkshire Fire and
Rescue Service came into school to
deliver their ‘Heat of the Moment’ presentation around fire safety to the whole year
group and we all had a great time supporting Barnsley Hospital charity on the
Zombie run.
Throughout this year we will be continuing to work hard on the I Know I Can
(IKIC) Awards Scheme with all Year 7 students working towards their Level 1 certificates. The IKIC awards are a great way
for our students to record and be rewarded for their commitments to extracurricular activities both in and out of school and
help our students build up a great portfolio of skills and experiences to go along
with their outstanding GCSE results on
completion of their education at Horizon.
I would like to say a big thank you to
the Year 7 Leadership Team and students
who have supported the Enterprise Team
immensely so far.
To keep up-to-date with Horizon Year 7
please visit us @ www.horizoncc.co.uk
8 – The Horizon Issue 9 AUTUMN 2014
Local author book launch party
Here be Faeries!
By the News Team
Many readers will now know that
Miss Storey, Horizon’s Head of
Drama, is also a children’s author
and published the first book in her
‘Faery Tales’ fantasy series earlier
this year.
To celebrate the occasion, last
month she held her official Book
Launch Party right here in
Horizon’s own theatre. Over a hundred people showed up for this special occasion and the evening presented our students with opportunities to showcase their own talents
to the many visitors. Miss Storey,
who writes under the pen name
‘Melanie J Firth’, said of the event;
“I was keen for the evening to be
a celebration of writing and the arts
in general, and not just all about my
book. I was very honoured that so
many Performing Arts students
helped me promote that by singing,
dancing and reading. The Young
Writer’s Group which is based here
at Horizon had their own stall
where they displayed the stories
they have been working on and
they enjoyed having the opportunity to discuss their ideas and inspirations with a wider audience. Year
11 Enterprise students were also
able to promote their own businesses.”
Guests were in for a treat as they
walked into the school heart space
which had been transformed into a
faery wonderland. Live music from
pianists and singers set the scene,
and beautiful girls dressed as fairies
offered pink wine, sparkly cupcakes
and faery biscuits on silver trays. At
set intervals, pixie dancers performed in and around the visitors,
By the Design & Technology Department
During the first part of this
school year, Year 7 and Year 8
groups in Design and
Technology focussed on a
design and literacy challenge
with the themes of The
Jungle Book and The Tour de
France Grand Depart.
Students in Year 7 had to
design a survival kit or an
item that would help Mowgli
survive in the jungle, whilst
Year 8 students deigned a
piece of Tour de France merchandise.
Over several weeks students developed their design
and development skill whilst
having a strong emphasis on
grammar,
punctuation,
annotation and spelling. At
the end of the project students in each group were
awarded certificates for their
achievements during the project. Awards were handed out
for the following categories,
Spelling Star (for the most
improved speller), Prize presenter (best presentation),
Dynamite designer (most
unique design), Sketching
Star 2D (High quality sketching),
Super Sketcher 3D
(High quality 3D sketching),
Ace Annotator (High quality
annotation),
Language
Legend (Best use of subject
spec language), ‘Red hot’
Renderer (Highest quality
rendering). Students responses to the presentation was
extremely positive, one which
they hoped would take place
again.
and Miss Storey was of course at
hand to sign copies of her book
with personal messages.
The evening also featured a talk
and interview with the author,
where she elaborated on the plot
and characters behind her magical
series and her reasons for writing it.
She gave advice to other budding
authors out there and encouraged
everyone to pick up a pen and start
writing themselves.
You can order your copy of ‘The
Faery Tale of Rosie Quartz’ from all
good bookshops and online retailers, and to keep up to date with all
the latest Faery Tales news, be sure
to follow @the_faery_tales on
Twitter, and ‘Like’ The Faery Tales
page on Facebook. The official
interactive website of the books
www.thefaerytales.co.uk will also
be up and running soon.
Melanie J. Firth aka Miss Storey officially
launches her new book ‘Faery Tales’ to an audience
in the Horizon Theatre. Inset: Signing books.
Students answer design and literacy challenge
The Design and Technology
department would also like
to take this opportunity to
say how pleased they were
with the students
commitment and creativity
and to also congratulate all
of them for their hard work
and enthusiasm.
Well Done!
Above and Below: Students pictured with their certificates along with some of the Design and Technology staff.
BBIS – one year on and still inspiring students
By Andrew Lodge BBIS
Inspirational speakers from the
Barnsley business community
are again being invited into
Horizon College over the coming
months to ‘tell their story’ to students.
The
Barnsley
Businesses
Inspiring Students project (BBIS),
the brainchild of Dodworthbased financial management
company Lifetime, proved very
successful in the previous school
year at Horizon College, and
already a number of top quality
speakers have been booked to
talk to Year 11s this term.
They include Barnsley Football
Club chief executive Ben
Mansford, authors Milly Johnson
and Jonathan Lee, Doyle Security
Managing
Director
Andy
Nicholson, musicians Josh and
Jake Ingamells and former
teacher David Peckett, who cowrote a book about a trip to
Mount Everest, entitled ‘Everest
The Old Way’.
A representative of Horizon’s
Community Enterprise team
said, “This year at Horizon we
have set aside time on a Friday
afternoon where our young people have the chance to hear from
many different speakers, who can
inspire them in what is their most
important year.”
And the Barnsley Businesses
Inspiring Students venture is also
now up and running this term at
another secondary school in the
borough, Holy Trinity, while it is
hoped that Darton College will
soon follow suit.
Holy Trinity are certainly
thrilled that Staincross-born
Simon Biltcliffe, the managing
director of highly successful print
company Webmart, will be their
first BBIS speaker.
Simon will be going ‘back to
school’ in early November and is
sure to be a smash hit, having
wowed everyone with his marvellous presentation at the recent
Connected Business event at The
Civic in Barnsley.
And as well as appearing at
Horizon this term, Barnsley FC
chief executive Ben Mansford has
also agreed to be a BBIS speaker
at Holy Trinity, so too Stuart
Turner, who owns food company
SushiSushi.
AUTUMN 2014 Issue 9 The Horizon – 9
Attend today –
achieve tomorrow
By Mrs Laverack
Good attendance is so important
for our students to achieve success and in Year 8 we have high
expectations, which means that
we expect attendance to be 95%
and above.
If students are to achieve their
potential, good attendance and
punctuality are crucial and the
link between attendance and
achievement is well documented
year on year.
Students with irregular, poor
attendance…
Get behind with work
Lose the thread of topics being
taught
Become demotivated on return
to school
Lose friendships
Miss out on extracurricular
opportunities
Are less likely to feel part of our
Year Group
In Year 8 we are committed to
supporting students who are
experiencing difficulties which
prevent regular attendance, work
very hard to ensure that all our
students feel safe and happy in an
environment where they can
thrive. We monitor attendance
and punctuality very closely and
will always contact you if we have
concerns. Likewise we reward
good attendance through our
weekly Assemblies and Form
activities.
We value the support of parents/carers and hope that you will
not hesitate to get in touch with us
if you feel you need our support.
Norjam 2014
By
Charlotte Hollingworth 8U
As Norjam 2014 drew to a close,
people of all cultures and ages
came together for an unforgettable
evening. A night of music and fun
ended what had been an amazing
week.
Norjam is a jamboree in Norfolk,
held every four years at Norwich
Showground. A jamboree is an
amazing opportunity to meet new
people from all around the world as
thousands of scouts and guides
come together for a week.
Throughout the week there are
lots of opportunities for scouts and
guides to discover their sense of
adventure, skills and new experiences. From caving to circus skills,
high trapeze to abseiling, crafts and
team events. Off-site activities
included water-sports and a survival
camp, even a trip to a theme park,
Pleasurewood Hills. Every evening
there was great live entertainment,
musicals like We Will Rock You and
Mamma Mia, live bands and
Norjam’s Got Talent. There was
always something to do!!
The site is divided into sub camps,
this year they were named after eras
in history: Vikings, Romans, Middle
Ages, Stone Age, Tudors, Victorians,
and Saxons. We were on Romans our camp was great!
This was thanks to our leaders as
they made the week run smoothly,
their hard work and dedication
made the week a success. Thanks to
Paul Denton, Donna Hepworth, Jane
Hollingworth, Matt Muirhead and
John Middleton, without them the
week would not have been such a
success.
Year 8 Maths geniuses.
Football
Leadership Team
report
Mrs Robinson
May I take this opportunity to extend a
warm welcome to all students and parents
in Year 8. I am delighted to be working
with the year group and an enthusiastic
team of staff who will be working together
to support students on a daily basis.
I would like to introduce the following
members of staff who make up the Year 8
Leadership Team. Mrs Laverack, as our
Student Support Co-ordinator, will carry
out a vital role of monitoring attendance,
dealing with day to day issues and offering
support and advice in a number of ways
and helping the year group to make a
smooth transition from Year 7.
Mrs Morley and Mrs Knowles, as School
Support Officers, will be available throughout the day for general issues and Miss
Dix, Community Enterprise Co-ordinator,
will be leading and supporting students in
a range of enterprising activities throughout the year.
I have been pleased to witness the settled start that the vast majority of Year 8
students have made. I am expecting great
things from the year group, they demonstrate a desire to achieve and I am sure if
we all work together to create a positive
home-school relationship the students will
make good progress in Year 8.
We have a variety of activities to support
students in tutor time; numeracy and literacy play a key part in these activities. We
look forward to working closely with both
students and parents to ensure that students achieve the targets that have been
set this year.
A Parent’s View…
So pleased and proud of the way
Horizon is setting standards and
storming ahead with the vision to
give the young people of Barnsley
the opportunities, facilities and
passionate teaching they deserve.
Band together
By Kimberly Nyadongo 8P
The reason why we became a
band was because we all had a
passion for music for a very long
time.
When we met we decided to
put up a band, not just because
we like to play instruments and
sing it’s because we wanted to
share our music with everyone as
well. We practise every Friday
straight after school and get great
help from Mr Wilkinson and we
are very thankful for that. Also we
are best friends so it’s another
way for us to hang out as well.
We would not have had this
support had it not been for Miss
Dix!
By Neve Newsome 8P
We made this band because we
all have a love for music. Kim,
Alex, Lucy, Tegan, Amelia and I
are all best friends and we can all
link to music in different ways.
By Amelia Driver 8P
Why we want to make a difference…
We want to make a difference
to the music industry by bringing the talents and determination that we as a group have, to
inspire people to make music
and enjoy it as much as we do.We
bring a variety of different genres
of music and we add our own little twist in each song, we even
write some of our own songs!
By Tegan Battley 8J
We are here to show you our passion for music and hope you like
it. And before Christmas we
would be delighted to perform
for you at the school show.
Year 8 v Don Valley Academy
By Mr Joe Sidebottom
New team, new managers and one
nil down after 20 seconds, not the
best start to the season!
Things didn’t look too promising
for the Year 8 boy’s football team.
However a fantastic team performance saw them emphatic 10-2
winners over Don Valley Academy in
the English Schools Cup and will see
them face either Salendine Nook or
St John Fisher in the 2nd round.
The game, played in wet murky
conditions, couldn’t have started any
worse for Horizon when, without
touching the ball, they found themselves one-nil down after a great
shot from Don Valley’s striker into
the top right hand corner. The newly
formed team responded excellently
from this early setback and pressed
high up the pitch, causing the opposition defence to make mistakes. It
took until the fifth minute for
Horizon to get back into the game
with a great strike from Dan Selwood
and they never looked back from
there.
Horizon’s goal was never troubled
in the first half thanks to great performances from Dom Simmons and
Lewis Johnson and great work rate
from Rowan Briscoe and Joe
Herring, who kept breaking up any
counter attacks. Horizon were led by
captain Brandon Fearn who kept the
team going forward. He set up
numerous goals and also managed
to take home the match ball after a
fantastic hat-trick.
At half time Horizon had gone into
the break four goals to one up and
were well worth the scoreline. The
second half resumed and it was a
total onslaught with Don Valley
struggling to keep hold of the ball
and Horizon looking like they were
going to score with every attack.
Owen Hampshire scored a brace
after great work down the flanks
from Owen Charlesworth, Alex
Hutchinson and Ben Peel.
The goal of the game, which
sealed a convincing victory, came
from Wade Ripley who picked up the
ball 25 yards out, jinked past 2 players and found the top corner with a
great left footed strike. Don Valley
did score a good goal, rounding the
goalkeeper Max Lee who had not
had much to do all game, but it was
merely a consolation at 8-2.
The game was flowing nicely and
the icing was put on the cake when
the score hit double figures. It
rounded off a comprehensive victory for Horizon CC who should go
into the next round full of confi-
Community
Enterprise report
Miss Dix
I am very excited and pleased to be
working with Year 8. Having spent a very
successful first year at Horizon, Year 8
students are now geared up to continue
all their enterprising activities and have
already shown some real enthusiasm
towards getting involved and having a go
at new projects and activities.
Between now and Christmas I hope to
get lots of Year 8 students involved in
Zombie Run 2014. An event organised
by Barnsley Hospital Charity, Zombie Run
is a fun-run event which raises money for
charity. By getting Year 8 students to volunteer, we’re giving them the chance to
help a local institution, develop their creativity and get fit all at the same time! I
hope that Zombie Run might inspire
some of our students to volunteer their
time on a more regular basis as there are
lots of other opportunities and projects in
the pipeline that will require our students’
involvement.
Over the next few months we’ll be relaunching the Pogmoor Park Sensory
Garden project, which will see Year 8
helping with the design and construction
of a garden in our local park and there’s
also the Community Christmas Market to
look forward to. It will certainly be a busy
few months for Year 8!
10 – The Horizon Issue 9 AUTUMN 2014
Photographs of Students and Staff on Results Day
“ ”
Teacher –
It’s another stunning
accomplishment by all students
and all staff here at Horizon
Community College.
Yonas Fitwi
“
”
Parent –
I am so proud of
what my daughter
has achieved at
Horizon.
Ashley Potter
“
”
“
Amie Bassinder, Mr Clayton and Lucy Summerscales
Natalie Joseph
Parent –
My son had the
biggest smile I have
ever seen on his face
the moment he read
his results!
Mr Wilkinson
with
Alex Scott
Governor –
“ Well done to all the
students, they
should all feel so
proud of what they
have achieved.”
Megan Mellor
AUTUMN 2014 Issue 9 The Horizon – 11
Teaching and Learning at Horizon Community College
“
The achievement of the
most able students is good
and they also benefit from
specific interventions to
stretch and challenge their
”
We are a ‘Good’ school
“
”
“
”
“ “ “
thinking and to broaden
their experiences.
(Ofsted July 2014)
The college’s work to
keep students safe and
secure is good.
Relationships between
teachers and students
are good. Supervision
around the site at the
start and end of the day
and at break and
lunchtime is good.
(Ofsted July 2014)
Opportunities for spiritual, moral, social
and cultural development feature highly
in the life of the college. There are rich and
varied opportunities for community work
for which students achieve ‘I know I can’
awards. Community Enterprise is given a
high profile and recently a group of Year 8
students won for the college the accolade
of ‘Most Enterprising School in the UK’.
(Ofsted July 2014)
Students achieve well from their
different starting points. Students
make good progress in Mathematics
and English. Progress in other
subjects shows an equally positive
picture. Students’ achievement is
equal to or exceeds the expectations
for their age.
(Ofsted July 2014)
Attendance is above the
Attainment has
improved rapidly
in all year groups
since the college
opened.
(Ofsted July 2014)
national average. Students
and parents are made very
aware of the importance of
regular attendance and a
rewards system operates to
encourage excellent
attendance. (Ofsted July 2014)
12 – The Horizon Issue 9 AUTUMN 2014
Egg
heads
By The Maths
Department
In the weeks before the
summer break, two trips
went out within Year 11
Maths; one to a regional
competition, the other for
elite students to gain an
opportunity at experiencing Maths beyond GCSE.
Taking three teams of
four to Pontefract New
College for the day, they
were up against six other
local schools. This was
Horizon’s first entry to the
competition, and so neither students nor their
teacher, Mr Russell, knew
what to expect. Working on
a variety of maths problems to earn points, they
competed for 90 minutes
in the morning before a
‘pub quiz’ style afternoon.
All those students representing Horizon Community College’s Maths
Department were of the
usual high standard that
has become the norm.
After three hours of hard
mathematics, and a guest
speaker explaining the
basics of ‘knot theory’ the
results were announced!
Horizon made it into the
podium positions, with one
of our teams gaining third
place out of the 17 teams; a
highly commendable finish, and something for next
year’s HCC students to
match and, hopefully, beat!
In the final week of term,
whilst the rest of the school
was hard at work, eight students from Year 11 Maths
went to partake in the
‘UKMT Wakefield Maths
Circle’, hosted at QEGS.
Here they were treated to
the expertise of University
of Leeds lecturers who led
them through a variety of
questions, skills, problems
and techniques. The stu-
dents worked on topics
usually reserved for A level
or Degree, but coped well
with Logic, a range of
Mathematical Principles,
Geometry,
Statistics,
Ciphers and Codes, and
practical
mathematical
problems. The staff hosting
commented on how particularly keen the HCC students were, and were a
“pleasure to work with.”
There are many more
opportunities on the horizon for students in the
School of Maths across all
years over the coming
terms, with the walls of the
school providing plenty for
students to challenge and
grow their brain.
Egg head: Robert Jones
Doncaster Road Primary School
Making your
voice heard
in the
House of
Commons
By Mrs Manley
Summer Lane Primary pupils. Just one of the many Primary Schools taking part.
Co-operative Primary
Business Challenge
By Mr Powell
The Co-operative Membership is
proudly sponsoring a unique business challenge around the Primary
School sector in Barnsley.
Over 450 students have been invited to take part in the challenge
where they gain an understanding in
the world of business.This is a fantastic project that will focus on
entrepreneurial, literacy, team work,
communication and leadership
skills.
The project is delivered in two half
day sessions where the students
learn all about creating and starting
up their very own business enterprise ready for the market.
All of the children taking part in
the project have been involved in
cutting edge business workshops
that have been delivered by
Community Enterprise Coordinator,
Mr Powell.
Please feel free to come along to
our fantastic “Community Christmas Market” on Sunday 23
November between 10.00am and
2.00pm to buy lots of amazing gifts
whilst supporting our young entre-
Making more of afternoon clubs
By Keira Year 6
I have recently been made a member of the school council at
Doncaster Road Primary School,
which is a really exciting opportunity for me and my school.
In our school council, we look at
what needs improving in our school
and what we think is good. We make
sure our equipment is up to date and
the children enjoy coming to school.
We meet every Friday to discuss
exciting ideas and make changes to
improve everyone’s experience of
school.
Our school council is made up of
two children from each class, who
were voted in by other students. I
had to stand up in front of everyone
and read a speech I had prepared. I
was really nervous! But now I am on
the council I am excited to be part of
something important and I’m glad I
got the opportunity to make a difference to my school.
We have developed an idea of a
buddy system for break times, which
means if people have no one to play
with we have playground buddies
who will go and keep them company. So far it is a success!
We listen to what other children in
our class want to improve the school
and we take these suggestions to
council meetings. We have decided
we would like more after school
clubs which offer a range of activities, better football equipment and a
net which means the footballs can’t
get kicked out of the football cage!
Not all of these suggestions can be
met but it is nice to get involved in
making decisions which are important to our school. We have decided
the best things about our school are
the playground equipment, the delicious dinners and the creative
lessons our teachers plan for us. My
classmates look up to me and it gives
me good experience for the future.
I am looking forward to my year as
school counsellor!
Our Student Governors from all year
groups met on Thursday 11
September in the Horizon theatre to
hear our local Youth Advocacy and
Participation Worker, Louise Toon,
gave a presentation about her job
role and how she hopes to support
our Governors to have a ‘voice’ to be
heard within school and their local
community.
The Community Enterprise Team
and Louise will be ensuring that our
students have the opportunity to
come together to share ideas and discuss their education and experience
of living in Barnsley.
In the first week of October, Louise
and her colleagues came into college
at lunchtimes to ensure ALL our students had a voice. This was achieved
by setting up a constitution ballot in
the heart space. Students were given
a ballot paper where they were asked
to choose and vote on one issue from
a list compiled by young people
throughout the country.
The most popular issue will then
be brought to debate and decided at
the UKYP in the House of Commons.
At our next meeting we hope to
recruit new Barnsley Youth Council
representatives. We’ll keep you posted.
Angela Smith MP
Penistone & Stocksbridge
Constituency
“I am impressed by the work of the
student governors at Horizon. They
are clearly committed to representing all students at the school, ensuring they have a voice. Not only that,
they are working hard to ensure that
Horizon students have a say about
the topics chosen for debate by the
UK Youth Parliament.
“Their work is to be commended
and I look forward to meeting them
all soon.”
Councillor Donna Green
“It’s good to see Horizon develop
‘student governor meetings’, it’s a
good way to hear students’ voices.
Young people are our future, so it’s
fantastic to see them taking part in
democracy and having their say on
things that matter to them.”
Louise Toon –
Youth Advocacy and
Participation Worker
“I am looking forward to working
with the student governors at
Horizon, especially supporting
them to develop how they engage
with their peers across school.
Together we’ll be looking at how
they run their meetings and how
they can find out what issues the
students would like addressing.
Some exciting times ahead.”
AUTUMN 2014 Issue 9 The Horizon – 13
Student Enterprise Coordinator
This year will see the relaunch of the
Year 9 Student Enterprise Coordinator role.
Horizon News caught up with Kate Pursley
to talk about her experiences during the last two years.
Hard work but very rewarding
By Kate
Pursley 11U
When I became
involved
with
Student Enterprise in Year 9 I
had no idea what
it entailed but
having now been
a coordinator for
two years, it has
opened the door to many opportunities. I thoroughly enjoy my role
as a coordinator.
There are numerous staff in the
Community Enterprise team and
each year group has one person
that is dedicated to helping the
student enterprise coordinators.
There are a lot of aspects to the
role of being a student enterprise
coordinator. One of the main
things is that you are a role model
to other students and an ambassador to the school. One of the
main activities is that you attend
meetings and discuss what business venture your year group are
currently involved in.
At the meetings there are certain roles you may be given e.g.
accountants, the chairperson,
designers and secretaries. My role
was to be the ‘secretary’. This job
included writing up minute
sheets, retaining all the paperwork, doing all the research into
what we needed for our business
etc... We needed all these jobs to
work as an effective team. Also,
you could be asked to attend parents’ evenings, open days, school
shows and many more.
At these events you are expected to portray a positive image of
yourself and the school and you
may have to talk to different
members of the community. The
staff put their trust in you and rely
on you to be present at these
events. But it’s not just about giving, you get a lot back too. I have
been to Look North studios twice,
interviewed MP – Dan Jarvis, visited the Barnsley Chronicle, been
on TV and this is just naming a
few experiences I have gained
from this very important role.
You gain confidence, social
skills and business skills from getting involved in one thing. I love
being a student enterprise coordinater and I would recommend it
to anyone.
Nathan Padgett (pictured centre) with Mr Powell and the rest of the members.
Charity Gaming Club
Last term student Nathan Padgett
(9H) had the idea of setting up
Horizon’s first ever ‘Gaming Club’ at
lunchtime, the idea being that any
Year 9 students who enjoyed gaming would come along, donate a £1
to charity and spend their
lunchtimes battling against each
other through various levels of
Mario Kart!
The club has been running for
around six weeks and so far Nathan
Barnsley FC report
Championship hopes
for re-vamped team
By Bradley Healy 9K
Photo: Courtesy of Darcy Hancock 9L
Amazing event at
Swanage Folk Festival
By Imogen Butcher,
Darcy Hancock and
Lauryn Tazzyman Year 9
Fusion, Street Kingz and the
Hellbillie Rappers went down to
Swanage on September 5, 6 and 7.
After a long journey we laid out a
fantastic picnic and played some
volleyball! We then arrived around
teatime at Chatsworth House, our
home for the weekend!
We spent the first evening at the
amazing festival stalls and the
amusements. The next morning we
had an early start performing at
Prince Albert Gardens throughout
the day where we received lots of
compliments from the crowds who
were so pleased to see young people
enjoying folk dance and adding a
modern twist to styles such as
Morris.
We then headed to the Swanage
School which is a brand new building just like Horizon but with only
around 100 students altogether!
Again we gave some fantastic performances and were talent scouted
by a company who book performances for other folk festivals
and his friends have managed to
raise over £45. The charity that the
funds will be donated to is When
You Wish Upon A Star. If there are
any Year 9 students who are interested in coming along to the
Gaming Club they are held every
Friday at 1.45pm until 2.15pm. All
you have to do is bring your DS up
to the Community Office and sign
up with Mr Robson.
around the country.
On the Sunday we were up early
again as we were special guests of
honour at the local Folk Festival service at St Mary’s Church, leading the
procession into the building and
then performing for the huge congregation!
We finished our fantastic weekend with some free time to enjoy
the local shops, ice cream and lots
of sunshine before heading home.
We all thought the weekend was
amazing and exciting from start to
finish and we feel the trip made our
groups even closer as friends and
team-mates! We have already been
asked to attend next year’s event
and can’t wait to return for Swanage
Folk Festival 2015!!
Special thanks go to Chatsworth
House for looking after us so well
and to David and the Swanage Folk
Festival team for putting on such an
amazing event and allowing us to
take part! We totally loved our time
in Swanage and will be looking out
for our personalised plaque on the
pier that we bought as a team as a
nice memory of our time there!
It is a new leaf for Reds’ boss Danny
Wilson and another opportunity to completely re-vamp
the team to attend to his
needs in League One.
Following the unfortunate relegation from the
Championship in May,
Barnsley has seen the
departure of a significant portion of the club, including last season’s top scorer, Chris O’ Grady.
Wilson has responded by signing
players who he openly describes as
‘loyal to the club’ which is what
Barnsley have been lacking for years.
This loyalty was recruited from
across the nation, from the depths of
Scotland, to the most westerly county in the UK – Cornwall. These players have been mostly youngsters,
with the current oldest at the club
being Leroy Lita, also brought in this
summer, who is 29 years of age.
Barnsley haven’t just turned their
attention to other clubs for new talent, as academy stars Nana BoakyeYiadom, Brad Abbott and George
Smith have also penned deals with
the club.
Away from transfer news, previous
player of the month and fans’
favourite, Conor Hourihane has
announced his aspirations of gaining promotion to the Championship
and said that he has faith that
Barnsley will secure his ambitious
goal. Hourihane, aged 23, has been
the supplier of many spectacular finishes this season and has impressed
amongst the fans so far.
His outstanding performances
have boosted confidence within the
team and many people have
tipped Barnsley as promotion
favourites due to this.
Hourihane looks to be a
hidden gem; gradually settling in and showing his
colours at Barnsley.
Barnsley is in great form
so far and consistency is the
key under these circumstances,
so the fans remain ever hopeful that
the squad can continue to churn out
these positive results.
A Parent’s
View…
As you know,
at our
household
we are ardent
supporters
of Horizon
School and the
way you go
about your
business.
Dearne FM Presenter Lucy Doxley (centre) who will be kick-starting
a radio project with Year 9’s this year.
Leadership Team
report
Mrs Marriott
I am proud to be leading this year group
and hope to build upon the successes of
last year.
Our motto this year is to be OUTSTANDING, through behaviour, attendance, progress and commitment.
Year 9 have made a fantastic start to
this, with their positive attitude to learning
and getting involved in the extra-curricular opportunities provided.
Some students even went above and
beyond, giving up part of their holidays to
participate in a nationwide athletics
event.
This year also sees the return of the
Accelerated Reader Programme. This will
be conducted, in part, during tutor time
but with parental support. Ensuring their
child has a reading book aimed at their
level and spending time with them reading each evening will help all students in
Year 9 improve their literacy levels which
will help them achieve in all lessons.
Tutor time will also be used to improve
every student’s numeracy skills and a
weekly opportunity is provided to look at
career options and the necessary further
education requirements.
Let’s be outstanding!
Community
Enterprise report
Mr Robson
I am very excited to be given the opportunity to be a part of the Year 9 Leadership
Team and to carry on supporting the success of community enterprise in the
absence of Mr Powell.
I had the pleasure of working with some
students from last year’s Year 8 on a number of projects, most noticeably ‘The
National Enterprise Challenge’ where
Horizon picked up the award for ‘Most
Enterprising School 2014’.
This year will see bigger and better community enterprise opportunities being
offered to all students in Year 9, ranging
from ‘TNEC’, Zombie Run, Duke Of
Edinburgh Award, BBC School News
Report 2015, writing and reporting for
‘The Horizon’ newspaper, to working
alongside Dearne FM to gain experience
within the radio industry.
These are just a few to mention! I would
encourage all students to actively seek me
out and find out more about the kind of
things we have got to offer in regards to
Enterprise here at Horizon Community
College.
Getting involved and trying something
new can often be challenging but in the
same way rewarding. With our very own
IKIC Awards (please see page 6 for details)
now in its second year students are in a
position to celebrate all their achievements
whether it be at college or the wider community. I would love to see all Year 9 students completing Levels 1, 2 and 3 before
they get to the end of Year 11.
To me that would be some achievement
to celebrate!
14 – The Horizon Issue 9 AUTUMN 2014
Creative Writers Club
The Rush
The Anarchy
A Boy Called Finch
Who am I?
Jake Richards Year 8
Will Harper, Year 8
Eleanor Hadfield Year 9
Phoebe Rushworth Year 9
It was late afternoon: Danielle, Claire, John and
Noah were getting ready to go camping for the
week. Danielle was really excited and couldn’t
wait; she packed all her clothes so quickly. It
wasn’t just an ordinary campsite it was an
interactive campsite where you could interact
with the animals and plants.
“It’s the best in the world and we can finally
go!” said Danielle.
Soon after everyone had packed up, they got
their suitcases and got in the car to go to the
camp site. After 3 hours of a long, exhausting
car ride, they finally arrived at ‘Interactive
Camp World’.
As they slowly entered the campsite it was
like a dream was happening; everyone in the
car stared – agog and astounded at what the
place was like…
Friday 19th September 2045
13:00
The world is dead, no life but the un-living,
except us.
It all started back in the year 2020 when scientists thought they discovered the cure for
cancer, but they were all wrong. The first subject for the test was Jane Schofield who was
twenty four and diagnosed with lung cancer.
She was injected with the drug on the 23rd
October 2020.
After a few days in Australia, at the surgery,
she went home to Tokyo. She was fine for the
first days of her being home. Then one morning screams filled the air and hell was
unleashed. She rolled around in her bed
screaming in agony. Then it all went silent.
She rose from her bed and the world ended.
She turned to a zombie. I know, I was
there...
Now all that was left was me, Tyler Lake, my
friend Sky and my other friend Otto Oakley.
We had made a camp in my house and had
survived these many years. We salvaged what
we could off the land…
“There’s a fair down in Minehead today,” Finch
tells me softly, one day when we meet by the
picket gate.
“Wanna go with me?”
“Sure, sounds fun!”
We walk out of the village and over the fields
towards Minehead. When we arrive the fairground is already buzzing, thriving with life.
People I recognise from various trips here are
wandering round. Women in bright flapper
dresses with men in suits, or travellers with
their usual hippy-dippy style, walk around
admiring the rides or comedians and magicians.
Finch drags me up the hill to the Coconut
Shy and pays a shilling for 10 throws. He gives
me 5 of the balls then throws one of his, knocking down a coconut. He hits with all of his shots
except one.
“Come on, Clara!” he says, “I’ll help you...”
He stands behind me, steadying my arm.
I throw...
We are heading down through the woods,
one day, talking as usual when a Linnet drops
gracefully onto the branches of a nearby tree,
and Finch holds out his hand.
The bird hops on, then off again, flying up
into the clear, blue skies: exactly how I feel...
As I stumble down the street I hear the patter
of rain and see the umbrellas as they begin to
rise. I do nothing about it; the rain hits me,
rolling off and leaving me wholly unaffected.
The humans pass by, not noticing me and my
alarming appearance.
Slaloming through them all, I pray to any
powers-that-be they do not come into contact
with me. I don’t have enough time to deal with
it today; not with the book pulsing in my large
right pocket assuring me that the time is
close, the path is ending.
I reach the corner just as it happens, the van
speeding forward, the child in the road. The
people screaming about an act they cannot
prevent...
And so the child is struck, the parents cry,
the population holds its breath and I tenderly
walk forward.
Toward the boy, he follows me and now, he
is no more.
You don’t think when you are as I am, you
don’t have the time, too busy running around
with young boys and other such horrible scenarios as the one this morning.
Who am I?
Who knows…
A Parent’s View…
Just a note to say
congratulations for the
constant commitment,
effort and passion across
the school as a whole…
Young at heart
Students win places at the
prestigious National School
of Contemporary Dance
By Kate Winder 9H
On Wednesday 1 October, fusion dance group,
Street Kingz and the main cast of the most
recent Horizon Community College production,
‘We Will Rock You’, attended International Older
People’s Day hosted at Barnsley Metrodome.
The whole day was very exciting for everyone
involved and really brought all age groups together. It was nice to see two opposite ends of the age
range interacting and getting along to celebrate
what the older people of Barnsley have to offer the
community.
The dancers performed two pieces from the
Swanage folk festival (with a twist of hip-hop!)
and a title-winning cheerleading piece to an
astounding response. The singing was spectacular
and it was evident just how much it lit up the
room with smiles; it featuring songs from hit
musicals such as Annie,
The Wizard Of Oz and We
Will Rock You.
One solo performance
from Mila Whitaker didn’t leave a dry eye in the
room. “That was beautiful, I needed a tissue by
the end,” one man told
Mila.
Many
jokes
were
shared and the whole
day was truly memorable!
“”
It’s a day that’s celebrated all over the
world so that older people can be together,
working with Horizon and seeing the
students perform is something I have
dreamed of. They have put on a brilliant
show for us and I hope they can on more
shows for us over the coming years too.
Joan Horbury – a member of
Barnsley Older Peoples Forum
A special thank you to Age UK
for helping to organise the event.
By Miss Hunt
and Miss Martin
Joan Horbury (pictured in centre) with NHS Swift staff
and Horizon students and staff.
Photos by Kate Winder
Early last year we hosted a talent identification workshop
run by the National School of
Contemporary
Dance
at
Horizon College.
Several students were identified as potential candidates for
places as part of the Yorkshire
Young Dancers Scheme run by
the school in Leeds. These students were asked to attend an
open day and take part in
further workshops and
audition processes so
that the school could
make a selection of
only a few dancers
from the hundreds
identified.
We are so pleased
to
be
able
to
announce that three
of our students
have secured a
place on the programme, which
will see them
train with the
school
several
times a week and
receive
intense
physio and technique development
which will support
them
in
future
careers in Dance,
should they wish to pursue.
Chloe Eastwood (Year 10) Kim
Thornton (Year 11) and Jessica
Meegan (who left us this summer) have done an incredible
job to win these places and we
are extremely proud of their
achievements! Well done girls!!
We will also be holding the
Barnsley talent identification
workshops for 2014/15 in
October this year and several of
our current Year 9/10 students
will be given the opportunity to
take part. We wish them all the
best of luck!
AUTUMN 2014 Issue 9 The Horizon – 15
Duke of Edinburgh Bronze Award Assessment
By Mr Brammer
On Friday 12 September, our Year 10
Duke of Edinburgh students
descended upon the Peak District to
take part in their Duke of Edinburgh
Bronze
Award’s
Expedition
Assessment.
18 students, working in three
groups set off from Edale Train
Station early on Friday morning,
heading off to the village of Hope.
Their journeys took them over the
top of Mam Tor, up to the peaks of
Losehill and Winhill, and down into
the Hope Valley. Arriving at the
campsite for the night, students
were required to build their own
camp, cook their own meal, and generally look after themselves with little or no input from the supporting
staff.
As Saturday approached, students
were met by their Assessor, Mr Hunt
from Holy Trinity, who would assess
their camp craft, their abilities in
orienteering, and their team work.
Before long, students were off again
on another day’s walk, and back
onto the summits of Losehill and
Mam Tor, before descending back to
Edale Train Station.
The students were fantastic during this expedition and have been a
credit to the college throughout
their time doing Duke of Edinburgh.
What has been particularly impressive is that the students have come
together as a group, despite all being
from different friendship groups in
college. One of the highlights of the
expedition had to be the mass game
Left to right: Georgia Fearon, Lucy Beck, Jean Best (Peace Jam),
Holly Moffatt, Megan Dixon .
Rotary visit to Scarborough
The Horizon Interact Club started
its new academic year with a visit to
the seaside, but not for a paddle
and an ice cream.
They were invited to attend the
Yorkshire District Conference of the
Rotary Club, which was holding its
conference in Scarborough over the
first weekend of September. Four
Year 10 students represented the
Horizon Club throughout, meeting
delegates from the various Rotary
Clubs and from as far as India. The
group were invited as part of a
Rotary initiative to develop “Peace
Envoys”, whose aims are to build
peace throughout the world. The
students were invited onto the stage
as the speaker made her points
about global peace. In front of an
audience of several hundred, students were asked their opinions on
peace in the world, and told they are
the world’s future. After a “massive”
lunch (all included) the students
made their way into a workshop
where they received training on
becoming “Peace Envoys”.
Now, back at college, the students
have put what they have learnt to
good use as they begin planning a
“Shoe Box” appeal, which will go
into primaries and Year 7 over the
coming weeks. This appeal will see
students donate unwanted items to
families in Eastern Europe.
For more information, contact:
[email protected]
of Football and Frisbee played on
the Friday night with all the students. Thank you to all the staff who
gave up their time to support on this
expedition, without you it could not
be done! A huge thank you from
Miss Fellows and I to all the students
who have made this DofE experience very enjoyable!
The students will now complete
their Skills, Volunteering, and
Physical sections of DofE before
receiving their award, and then
potentially moving on to Silver.
Students face Dragons in pitch challenge.
Are you up to the challenge?
The new school year marks the
beginning of Horizon’s third
entry into the I Know I Can Big
Barnsley Challenge, and sees
our Year 10s create their own
businesses, in competition with
fellow youngsters all over the
country.
The challenge has already
seen Horizon collect a number
of awards, and seen notable student-run businesses carry on
post-school. This year hopes to
be no different, with students
from the current crop of Year 10s
beginning their own journey
into enterprise.
A massive variety of businesses
have sprung up covering a wide
range of areas. Technology, beauty products, decorations, jewellery, furniture, catering and
even “Handymen” are all areas
covered and students have now
proceeded to create their brand,
and prepare their businesses for a
Dragon’s Den style pitch in order
to narrow down our entries to 10.
Whatever happens, our students have proven to be fantastically entrepreneurial and have
really shown that they have what
it takes to be the next leaders of
enterprise in our region.
Ryder Cup experience for George!
European Ryder Cup Captain
Paul McGinley.
George Nicholson (10S) had a great
surprise in store when he was invited to
attend this year’s Ryder Cup at
Gleneagles, in Scotland, by some of the
sponsors!
George, who is a very keen golfer
himself, got the chance to meet a few of
the players and watch them take part
in the practise round the day before the
competition started.
The whole day was very exciting, as
you can see from the photos George
managed to catch Ken Brown (BBC golf
legend) Paul McGinley (Captain of the
European Ryder Cup Team) along with
Martin Kaymer who played for Europe
and sank the winning putt in 2012 as
well as being the current US Open
champion.
Europe eventually retained the
Ryder Cup with a 16 point to 11 triumph over the USA.
Martin Kaymer
US Open Champion.
George with golf legend Ken Brown.
Leadership Team
report
Mr Trainer
Welcome back from the Year 10 Team.
The rollover has paid huge dividends for
Year 10. Students having had the opportunity to meet their new teachers,
become more familiar with the expectations of Key Stage 4 courses before the
summer break secured a superb start to
the year.
As a Year group we have moved
accommodation and our forms are now
hosted in the vibrant learning environments created by History, MFL and RE;
with our School Leadership Team close
at hand. We have seen exciting changes
to the tutor team, drawing on the experience of two already established curriculum departments; Science and Modern
Foreign Languages.
Within Tutor Time, assembly activities
and speakers have prompted our year
group to already have an eye to their
future and to start to plan their own route
to success. Work is underway preparing
their first drafts of CVs and personal
statements in time for applications to college and other interviews. In addition to
this, all students have started to consider
and research their own work experience
placements for Year 10. It is time to get in
there quickly, before someone else does!
Lastly, we look forward to working successfully with you and your child through
these two crucial years.
Mr
Trainer
(Student
Learning
Coordinator), Mrs Heskett (Student
Progress Coordinator), Miss White
(Student Support Coordinator), Mrs
Whitehouse and Mrs Hewitt (School
Support Officers).
Community
Enterprise report
Mr Brammer
Here we go again! It doesn’t seem two
minutes ago that I was writing the
Community Enterprise article for the last
paper. Back then we were still Year 9s,
now we are back as Year 10s, and ready
to start our path down the road to our
GCSEs. The first few months back have
been what you could describe as
“intense”. So much has happened for our
year group that I am sure to miss something in this small column, but I shall try
my best. Duke of Edinburgh award finished the expedition season with huge
success as we took to the peak district.
The students were not only a pleasure to
be around, but they were also fantastic
ambassadors for the college, something
which made the whole experience for us
staff a whole lot easier.
And then there is the I Know I Can Big
Barnsley Challenge, and business challenge which has really caught the year by
storm. We have at least 14 budding businesses now in the year, all with their own
unique selling points and different items.
There is so much more, including
Zombie Run, dance shows, sporting
competitions, but to cover everything
would take me well over my allocated
word limit! Instead let me say that it is yet
again a pleasure to work with this year
group, and I look forward to our next year
together!
16 – The Horizon Issue 9 AUTUMN 2014
Students reflect on their experiences…
Choices project comes to an end
By Mr West
By Sasha, 11V
By Connor, 11O
I’m a Community Enterprise Coordinator at Horizon Community
College.
“The seven students have grown
so much over these last few months.
A number of them started off on
this project as two hours a week.
“Some of them didn’t speak at all
for the first couple of sessions but
opened up after that, once they got
comfortable with their surroundings.
“Seeing that everybody had made
a wrong choice, everybody was in
the same boat!
“As a school we hope to use this
film documentary, as a teaching
resource.
“We want to put it into some
social studies lessons, to open it up
to their peers, people who are on
the same wavelength, people who
could have made the same wrong
choices.”
Here the students reflect on their
experiences.
“I want to help people, like kids in
care or at home, like teenagers that
have been bad, or adults that have
been on drugs and need help.
“When I went into the prison I didn’t know the prisoners were the prisoners, I thought they had to wear
green jumpsuits, but they were just
the gardeners.”
“My name is Connor, I’ve really
enjoyed doing this project.”
“I liked visiting the prison and
seeing a real life environment”.
“What I’ve learnt is how to use a
camera, but the biggest thing I’ve
learnt is not to make wrong choices
to think before I do something.”
By Kora, 11K
“My name is Kora. What I liked
about this project was visiting the
prison, something I’ve never done
before, and knowing how to use
technology on a camera.
“I also like that I have got confidence, and I’m not afraid to talk to
people anymore.”
By Ellis, 11K
“My name is Ellis and I have enjoyed
this. The thing I have enjoyed the
most is the visit to the prison because
it’s a different experience and it’s different from what you see on TV.”
By Mathew, 11I
“My name is Mathew. I’ve chosen to
do this course because it’s a good
experience and will look good on my
CV.
“This young offender was from
London, obviously an offender, he
committed a crime, and he got sent
to Wetherby prison, and that’s really
far away from his family.”
“My brother offended and then he
got sent down to Liverpool, and so its
splits you up from your family so that
you can get your priorities straight.”
Top: Wetherby Prison.
Right: Students discuss issues with
Project Leader Jo Wilkinson.
Queens Road Academy
Horizon visits
Queens Road Academy
Photo courtesy of the Barnsley Chronicle.
Year 6 pictured with Horizon students during their transition visit.
Martin Craine and Dale Jennings from Barnsley FC pictured with
Richard Lowes (Goal Ball coach, left) and John Winstanley (second from right).
Raising awareness of the
hearing and visually impaired
Thursday 9 October, 2014 was World
Sight Day, and, to mark this event,
over 500 children and young people
in the Barnsley area took part in our
‘Sensory Heroes’ Day at Joseph
Locke Primary School.
The aim of the day was to raise
awareness of visual and hearing
impairment and its potential to
restrict learning and create barriers
in the lives of our young people and
adults. The latest RNIB figures suggest that only 1 in 4 adults who are
blind or partially sighted are in paid
employment and 1 in 4 also suffer
from depression or other mental illness.
The aim of the advisory service in
Barnsley is to ensure that the next
generation of young people are better
equipped to think of ways to modify
and adapt resources, technology and
facilities, so that people who live with
a sensory impairment are able to
access the equal opportunity to live a
full and happy life. Through holding
the ‘Sensory Heroes’ event, it was
clear that everyone involved gained a
deeper understanding of how to
think differently about disability and
develop the attitude of having high
expectations of everyone, regardless
of perceived differences.
The day began in an uplifting and
motivating way with an opening
speech from the Mayor of Barnsley
“
When I was younger very few
people knew about the
condition. I struggled at
school with work and was an
easy target for name calling.
However having days and
events like this today not only
help to raise the awareness
but they also help educate
and give people a better
understanding
of the issue.
”
Shoantelle Hudson,
mother of visually
impaired student.
who spoke about a ‘can do’ attitude
and the input from Keegan Caddick,
an 8 year-old blind boy, who spoke
about his varied interests and dreams
of being a Braille teacher.
Following this was a whole host of
activities, engaging all the children
and young people in experiences
such as learning to use Braille, sign
language, investigating life skills and
self-care without hearing and vision,
participating in inclusive sports, such
as blind football, and experiencing
ways of overcoming physical barriers
as well as raising a greater awareness.
The young people, which included
pupils from Joseph Locke Primary
School and Horizon Community
College, as well as primary and secondary schools across the borough,
worked alongside voluntary organisations, such as Guide Dogs for the
Blind, Hearing Dogs and Living
Paintings to develop their understanding of sensory impairment and
raise awareness; we were also joined
by the adult adaptation team,
Barnsley Football Club Disabled
Sports, Vision Express, the ‘Love
Bread’ company, and Yorkshire Blind
Cricket Team, who made invaluable
contributions to the purpose of the
day. We even welcomed Barnsley
football players, Martin Cranie and
Dale Jennings, who experienced
playing ball games with no vision. To
end the event, the young people
enjoyed a live, uplifting performance
from 14 year-old rapper Thomas
Seres from Shafton ALC; as a young
blind person, Thomas wants to raise
aspirations and expectations of
youngsters with Visual Impairment
but also of the next generation in
general. With Thomas’ final words
‘Give it your best shot!’ reverberating
through the air, the event ended in
the way it began – with a real sense of
motivation and purpose, and an
increased tolerance and understanding of sensory impairment.
AUTUMN 2014 Issue 9 The Horizon – 17
Leadership Team
report
Mr Wright
From Horizon to ‘OxBridge’
On Wednesday 24 September, 50
students in Year 11, along with Mrs
Daykin, Mr Harrison, Mrs Jackson
and Mr West, set off at 6.30am from
Horizon for a four-and-a-half hour
journey to the University of Oxford.
Arriving in Oxford at 10.30, students were first treated to a presentation on what life is like at one of the
most prestigious universities in the
world. Students were told how no
matter where you come from anyone
can attend “OxBridge” (Oxford or
Cambridge). Students were given an
insight into the wide range of subjects available to study at the famous
university. One lecturer told the students ‘if you want to study
Egyptology, Oxford is the place to be!’
After the presentation the students
had a chance to tour Magdalene
College, a part of the University. One
student described the building as
“something from Harry Potter”. This
was a brilliant opportunity for the
students to see a truly historical part
of England as well as witnessing the
amazing work that goes off to ensure
Oxford remains one of the most
famous universities around.
After lunch, which was eaten in a
building that the students could only
describe as “Hogwarts”, students got
a taster session in a lesson at Oxford.
An Introduction to Mathematics
was the subject; the taster came at a
useful time for the students as they
were due to take their Maths mock
exams the same week!
This was a great opportunity for
everyone involved and hopefully in a
few years time some of the young
people who visited may be studying
there!
Learning from
professionals
Left to right: Liam Schofield, Lucy Hopkinson, Jade Baker, Amber
Birtles, Jessica McKinlay, Luke Goodliffe and James Hutchinson.
Experience gained at
Locke Park event
By Caitlin Reynolds,
Teresa Doran,
Hannah Slack,
Charlotte Butler &
Emma Goulding
On Tuesday 7 October, our
RSCPA
Support
Group
helped out at the RSCPA
Locke Park event. We gained
lots of experience and got a
view of how the event is run,
in order to help us organise
our own RSCPA event in
future.
There were stalls, owls, dog
competitions such as waggiest tail, handsome hunk, gorgeous girl and best rescue
dog. Including a ‘Frozen’
bouncy castle, and pedal animals, the event was enjoyed
not only by the younger children but everyone, and the
money is going to help lots of
animals in need.
Year 11 have made an excellent start to
their final year at Horizon Community
College. Staff in the college have commented on their enthusiasm and motivation. We fully expect them, with continued
focus and support, to achieve excellent
qualifications that will enable them to have
successful and happy futures.
A skilled Careers team have organised
guest speakers from a wide range of professions to come in and speak to students about the opportunities in their
fields. They have been supplemented by
visits from inspirational speakers through
BBIS.
On 12th November we will host a ‘How
to Help Your Child Succeed Evening’ for
students and parents/carers. The evening
will include key note speakers, opportunities to speak to Subject Leaders and a
Careers Fair involving over 35 providers
including Cambridge University.
The college has high hopes for Year 11
students and is setting them challenging
targets. Students regularly take advantage
of ‘Extended Intervention’ sessions run by
staff before school and after the end of
their school day and are clearly making the
most from the world class facilities that
they have. It is pleasing to see so many
students working so hard and they clearly
recognise the significance of achieving
excellent qualifications.
Year 11 GCSE Hospitality had
great fun learning how to make
non-alcoholic cocktails for their
Event that they are organising as
part of their GCSE project work.
Our newly appointed DT
Technician’s husband Paul came
in to share his skills. Paul, in his
early career, was a professional
bar tender, winner of the Bacardi
Flair Championship 1997 and
has made cocktails for many
celebrities, such as Tom Hanks
and David Beckham, to mention
a few.
Tuscany awaits champions
By Mareks Pelcis
On Tuesday 28 October, two of our young people in Year 11 will travel to Tuscany in
Italy to fight in the Kickboxing Unified World Championships.
Mareks Pelcis (11L) and
Tommy Crossland (11R) who
both represent ‘The Combat
Academy’ will travel with
other members of their gym
with high expectations.
This will be the second time
that Tommy has fought in Italy
and will be defending the title
he won a year before. For
Mareks this is the first time he
has travelled with TCA and he
has high hopes in the tournament.
Mareks explained that he
was “ready” but knows he is
up against some “tough opposition” over in Italy.
Tommy said, “I am looking
forward to travelling back to
Europe to defend my title.”
Tommy has excelled since taking up the sport and, along
with Mareks, attends the
Academy run by his brother.
Horizon
Community
College would like to wish
both Tommy & Mareks all the
best!
Community
Enterprise report
Mr West
I am looking forward to what hopefully will
be a fantastic and successful year for our
Year 11s this academic year. Hopefully in
a years time I can be writing this piece
knowing that the hard work through
Community Enterprise has paid off and
the students have thoroughly got everything they deserved out of school life.
This Year in Community Enterprise for
Year 11 we are looking to continue the
projects that are up and running such as
the RSPCA Support Group, Barnsley
Business Inspiring Students & the
Barnsley Big Challenge.
The students involved in the RSPCA
Support Group have already prepared a
presentation that they are due to deliver
to our Year 9s later in the term. They will
be looking to pass on the baton, so to
speak, to our younger year group, to
ensure this project continues to grow.
Also as previously mentioned, our current Year 10 students are continuing with
the IKIC Barnsley Big Challenge. We are
looking to use our Year 11 students as
peer mentors for this project.
There are lots of other projects lined up
for the future and in the coming weeks
we will be looking to get students
involved in making decisions regarding
events such as the Year 11 Prom.
Look out for more information on our
website www.horizoncc.co.uk
18 – The Horizon Issue 9 AUTUMN 2014
Zombie Run
Saturday 18 October • Worsbrough Country Park.
On behalf of Barnsley Hospital Charity
Raised in the region of £20,000
Almost 90 Horizon students came along,
giving up 6 hours of their own time each
making a grand total of 540 hours donated by our students.
Students had built one of the obstacles for
the run – a Zombie Prison, designed by art
technician Mr Carr and our students and
built over two days. 27 students helped
build the prison which runners had to
cover themselves in blood to pass through.
Building the prison was a chance to get
creative and acquire some construction
skills.
Katie Cartwright, fundraising manager
for the charity was super impressed with
the professional job done by both our
builders and our Zombies. “They really
helped to bring the event to life and we’re
very grateful to the time and effort they’ve
given to such an unusual event.”
It was lots of fun and students really
enjoyed themselves. Best of all we got to
support our local hospital charity.
Summer Lane Primary School
Class 2
Learning to look after pets
By Georgia Year 2
During our Literacy unit on ‘How to look after
pets’, we have set up a Vet’s Reception to help us
learn about this. In our vet’s practice we write
prescriptions, take phone messages and help
each other look after animals.
“I like to play at making animals better.”
Year 5 & 6
Whitby Trip
By Joe Year 6
During our Whitby Trip we visited Whitby Lifeboat Station
How the Trent class lifeboat
operates
The Trent class lifeboat (named
after the river Trent) is an all-weather lifeboat operated by the RNLI and
was introduced to service in 1994.
Do you want to know how to operate
the Trent class lifeboat? This boat is a
brilliant lifesaving machine...
Moving the boat
Without the engine the boat could
not move, therefore the engine (situated at the rear of the boat) is one of
the Trent’s most valuable assets.
However if this vital machine breaks
down the cabin crew also carry oars
to allow them to row to safety.
Also the Trent has a condensed
hull which can operate in significantly constrained locations, so it is
easier to reach survivors. Above the
Nursery News
During the home visit, that all our new families
in nursery are offered, we take with us the
‘Bookstart Bag’. One of the books this term was
‘Chickens Can’t See In the Dark’. We then use the
story as a theme in nursery. Mrs. Scholes
approached ‘Optical Express’ to see if they could
help us resource an opticians for the children.
Optical Express kindly donated many items
which Mrs. Scholes used to create the opticians
in the classroom.
Bargain
Book Store
By Lilly Year 3
I like our school book
shop. Mrs Merrett
runs it every Thursday.
Books normally only
cost £1. Sometimes I
get a book every week.
hull is the bridge where the first aid
equipment is situated.
Comfort in the Cabin
A main part of the Trent is the
cabin which includes: a small
kitchen; small bathroom and comfortable pieces of furniture! Also on
the boat, there is first aid equipment
(so survivors of accidents can be
treated); tea and biscuits; spare life
jacket; flares and general first aid
equipment including sick bags and
bandages.
Controlling the Trent
Included on the Trent are two sets
of controls; one inside and one on
top of the boat, so in bad weather
the coxman has a better view to find
survivors. Also there are giant lights
to try and locate people in the sea.
Also on the top of the boat are signal
receivers to help receive a radio connection.
Now you know about the Trent
Class Lifeboat, we need to make sure
the RNLI keep reviving funding.
Don’t forget; the Trent class lifeboat
is a lifesaving machine!!
AUTUMN 2014 Issue 9 The Horizon – 19
Year 9 students have been rewarded with Barnsley F. C. tickets and vouchers for
their hard work and commitment shown during their PE lessons.
P.E. Bulletin from September to December 2014.
Ellie’s England call up
Words cannot
describe how
happy I was
when I
received the
call saying
I’d been
selected
for trials
with
England.
Rugby players sporting their new strip with members of the PE Department.
All England Schools Rugby Programme
Horizon Community College has
recently been awarded the All
England RFU rugby scheme, a project that will run over three years.
The project involves access to RFU
coaches during curriculum lessons,
after school clubs and a member of
staff to attend a level 2 RFU coaching
course.
Other benefits of the scheme will
be provision of equipment, coaching
resources and school kits.
The real highlight to the scheme
must have been when students
attended a workshop at Goole RUFC
on Tuesday 23 September
to design their own
school kit that will then
be made by Canterbury
for the students to wear
during matches.
Mr Clayton said, “It is a
fantastic opportunity for
our students and, with all
the benefits of the programme, it will provide
them with a really positive experience of rugby
at College. This experience will
develop interest and hopefully
Practice session.
attract more players to our feeder
rugby club, Barnsley RUFC.”
Ellie Hawcroft (with her letter) who has recently been called up to the
England Girls Under 15 Football squad after representing South Yorkshire.
Game, Set and
Match for Horizon
in Tennis Finals
By Mr Hewitt
Horizon tennis team Charlie, Mitchell, Greg and James.
Horizon Community
College Tennis Team
have had a busy term.
After dominating
the local and South
Yorkshire competitions, they produced
a fantastic display of
tennis to come away
winners
of
the
‘Yorkshire
Tennis
Finals’ at the John
Charles Centre for
Sport in Leeds on
Thursday
25
September.
Having qualified
for the competition
in first place from the
South Yorkshire tournament in Doncaster,
the boys went into
the competition in a
confident fashion;
the doubles pairs of
Charlie Patrick and
Mitchell
Parker
alongside
Greg
Dawson, and James
Finney played some
exquisite shots to finish the tournament
unbeaten with four
wins and a draw
against
the
five
schools from across
Yorkshire.
Well done!
Canterbury supply custom shirts
for Horizon girls rugby team
“We are a group of year 10 students
and Miss Kerr took us for a fantastic
opportunity to custom design our
very own Horizon CC Rugby Shirt,
sponsored by Canterbury manufacturers of sportswear.
We had a great day out and would
definitely do it again. Our new kit
will be launched and showcased by
us, on February 14 2015 during half
time at the England v Italy game in
Twickenham!”
20 – The Horizon Issue 9 AUTUMN 2014
Greg and Lauren ‘TIP’ped
to be future stars
By Jude Langdon,
School Games Organiser
gifted and talented athletes and hope
they use both the skills and knowledge
they acquired to help develop their
Barnsley previously nominated athsporting future.
letes from the Borough to attend
Running in parallel to the
the
Talent
Identification
Sainsbury’s School Games, the Talent
Programme when Sheffield
Inspiration Programme (TIP) will bring
hosted the 2013 UK School
together 200 young aspiring athletes
Games.
from across the country to participate
This year, the County
in a three-day residential learning
Sports Partnership had
experience in Manchester.
to nominate athletes
With young people at the heart of the
from across South
programme, the activities are specifiYorkshire to represent
cally designed to engage and inspire
the County. There was
young aspiring athletes and encourage
a large number of
them to start thinking about how they
nominations from
can reach their sporting potential and
secondary schools
the impact that will have on their
so Gregg Dawson
development as a young person.
and
Lauren
Consisting of theoretical workshops,
Fretwell
did
practical sessions and the opportunity
extremely well to
to experience what it is like to be an
be selected and
athlete at a top event, TIP will be a
attend the event.
dynamic learning opportunity which
School
Games
will help to highlight the talent pathOrganisers are comways available and support required
mitted to supporting
for young athletes at a local level.
A Parent’s View…
My highest praise is reserved
for the PE department.
They have gone out of their
way to help and encourage
students in so many
different sporting directions.
Forthcoming events
for this term
By the PE Department
The PE department is ready
and raring to go this year.
There are endless opportunities and events planned
for our students to look forward to.
We are excited to have lots
of links to sporting bodies
like England Rugby, primary
schools and local businesses.
Currently Barnsley Football
Club has been working with
Year 9 students during curriculum time. Students have
been rewarded with Barnsley
F.C. tickets and vouchers for
their hard work and commitment shown.
We have various Key Stage
4 classes attending squash
and racquetball sessions at
Barnsley Squash Club.
Bekki Youell has been
delivering the Cheerleading
Club which has attracted over
150 students from different
year groups.
Yorkshire Cricket Club is
working with us to develop
our Year 10 cricket leaders
through an accredited leadership programme.
10 students have been
selected for the Netball
Screening Day at the English
Institute of Sport, to develop
their Netball skills further.
We have entered competitions, not just at local level
but also South Yorkshire Level
and National Level, e.g.
English Schools Football
Association Cup.
If you want to keep up-todate with the latest news and
fixtures go to www.esfa.co.uk.
Other sports we are actively involved in this term are
Netball, Cross Country,
Rugby, Trampolining, Cricket
and Orienteering.
Kick Boxing Champ!
By Lauren Fretwell, 10J
The ‘Talent Inspiration Programme’ was an incredible experience,
for which I am extremely grateful
that Horizon College put me forward.
During my time there I met
some amazing, inspirational athletes as well as making plenty of
new friends from all over Britain.
The school and the TIP panel
selected me due to my current
success in my sport, karate.
Being on the England squad, an
International
and
National
Competitor, the current English
Champion and a black belt, I was
chosen to enter the weekend dedicated to young athletes, which
was an incredible opportunity
and experience I was able to
attend.
Lauren’s dad said, “Can I just
take this opportunity to thank
you for nominating her for what
was an amazing experience and I
have rarely seen her so enthusiastic and positive!
“On the final day of the talent
inspiration
programme
we
attended the performance parent
session which provided invaluable advice on how we, as parents
could best support Lauren in
order for her to achieve at her
maximum level.”
Led by four Athlete Mentors who will
bring to life the world of an elite athlete
and the journey it takes to reach the
top, TIP athletes will have the opportunity to:
Participate in stimulating and
engaging workshops
Hear the personal journeys of elite
athletes
Learn from like-minded young athletes from across the country
Try out exciting new sports and test
their skills
Experience what it is like to be an
athlete at the Level 4 event
Action plan to reach their sporting
potential
Understand what it means to be a
TIP Champion and the impact they
can have at school.
It’s not just the TIP Athletes who get
the support. During the event, parents
of the TIP athletes will be invited to
participate in a Performance Parent
workshop – specifically designed to
highlight the learning from across the
three days and showcase the role the
parents can play in supporting their
child as well as the support and guidance they need to continue to develop.
Streets apart at National Finals
After our brilliant Athletics
season, students were still
competing during the summer holidays!
On Saturday 30 August,
eight athletes from Horizon
CC competed in Manchester
at the Street Athletics
National Final.
To get to the National Final
the athletes had to be the
overall winner in their age
group at the Barnsley Final
which was held at Experience
Barnsley (Town Hall)
We travelled to Manchester
on an all-expenses paid bus
which was very posh and
made us feel like VIP’s! The
final was held at the
Exchange square where a 60metre running track had
been specially laid for the
event. Our athletes all did
exceptionally well!
During the final the competitors got the chance to
meet a former Olympic
Champion, Linford Christie
and
former
sprinter
Katherine Merry.
Throughout the day our
athletes battled against competitors from all over the
country over 60m sprints and
were competing for the
chance to be named champion and win some amazing
prizes. All of our athletes did
an amazing job with lots of
our team getting through to
the semi-final and final
stages.
A huge well done goes to
Fabio De Carvalho (Year 9)
who finished in 2nd place in
the boys U15 age group and
won a G-Shock watch! The
final race was amazing to
watch and Fabio missed out
on first place by a very narrow margin. This is fantastic
as he is currently one of the
youngest in his age category,
maybe a future Olympian in
the making!
Horizon students pictured with former Olympic Champion
Linford Christie doing the ‘Horizon’ salute.
We are looking forward to
attending this event next
year and would like to take
even more Horizon athletes.
A massive congratulations
to all!
Editorial by the students and staff at The Horizon Community College. Produced by the Graphics Team at the Barnsley Chronicle and printed by Yorkshire Web, 47 Church Street, Barnsley S70 2AS. Tel: 01226 734663.