THE INSTITUTE OF SERVICE AND PARTNERSHIPS A YEAR IN REVIEW have also visited primary schools to teach chess, creative writing, history, languages, drama, coding and reading. This year has seen the introduction of weekly debating workshops, run by our students at primary schools. They have proved very popular, and it was fantastic to see Penshurst and Chiddingstone primary schools progress to the semi-finals of the Cicero Cup, the national primary schools debating championships.
Service and partnerships remain a cornerstone of our educational philosophy at Sevenoaks.
Above: An art session with Valence students
Right: Dissection at STEAM Week with local primary pupils
EDUCATIONAL PARTNERSHIPS
We continue to organise our projects into three core strands: Environmental Sustainability, Educational Partnerships, and Equity, Diversity and Inclusion. With educational partnerships, our reach is wide, and we continue to foster strong links with schools both on our doorstep and throughout Kent, as well as internationally through charitable organisations that promote education and opportunity.
PRIMARY PARTNERSHIPS
This academic year, we have worked with over 6000 primary pupils through the Sevenoaks Partnership of Primary Schools, to enrich and extend their curriculum offering. Children have joined us on campus for events such as our choir collaborations and athletics afternoons, and Sevenoaks students have continued to deliver weekly workshops in technology, music, sport, art and science as part of the Thursday afternoon Service programme. Sevenoaks students
Over 2000 primary school children visited us in March for our STEAM Week, this year with the theme‘ Change and Adapt’. Visiting pupils enjoyed a variety of workshops run by Sevenoaks staff and students in Chemistry, Physics, Biology and Technology. James Tate, Head of Physics, delivered the ever-popular Liquid Nitrogen show, and we welcomed The Royal Institution who wowed audiences with their Explosive Foods show. Dr Louisa Preston, Head of Planetary Science at UCL’ s Mullard Space Science Laboratory, took pupils on an astrobiological tour to uncover where and what life might be hiding on Mars. Pupils also learned about the C60 molecule and the carbon revolution in workshops and talks by Dr Jonathan Hare. Sevenoaks students found this rewarding. One told me:‘ It was really great to see not only the students engage, but also their teachers, who were at times just as curious and eager as the children themselves.’
We also welcomed primary school pupils to our popular Holiday Activity Programme in August, for three-day courses in Art, Drama, Maths, Music, Science, Sport and Technology.
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