January Newsletter
Date: January 2022
Chances - The Alternative Provision That Works!
The start of the 2021-22 academic year has been a successful period for Chances, despite all of the difficulties that the education sector continues to face.
Our aim remains to utilise a combination of education and youth work to re-engage disaffected students, helping them learn the skills and strategies they need to thrive in mainstream education. We work with students who are often facing multiple challenges but there was a noticeable shift at the start of this year whereby schools were referring children of a younger age, many of whom were struggling to adapt to secondary school life!
Children also continued to show heightened levels of anxiety and a number of mental health issues which our expert staff are able to support within a smaller, calmer learning environment.
In the first term of this academic year Chances has:
Supported 33 new students as well as continuing to provide a transition back into school from those who ended the last academic year at the provision
Worked with 22 partner schools across the county
Already started to transition 62% of the students attending the provision back into school (in keeping with ensuring we remain a short term provision)
Had a 94% success rate with students returning back to school
Chances always try to provide as many activities outside of the traditional curriculum to help students grow
We believe that school trips provide a great opportunity for students to gain new experiences and face a range of challenges that can contribute significantly to their personal development.
We often have children who have not been allowed on their recent school trips with their mainstream schools but we believe these experiences can make a major contribution to developing their skills. Developing confidence to deal with different social situations in the public whilst also improving their education and reigniting their self belief are at the core of our decision to make trips a regular part of our curriculum.
Last term our trips included a visit to Pipers Farm to look at sustainability and Paignton Zoo where we looked at evolution. As always our main aim is to offer a range of unique education and well-being support packages to help students re-engage with education, avoid exclusion and help de-escalate some of the challenges they may be facing. We continued to focus on high standards with an academic approach, but the excellent youth workers at the provision ensured the children felt safe whilst in our care.
Early Intervention remains key to Chances being effective in successfully supporting students back into mainstream education. If you have any questions about what we do and how we do it - please do not hesitate to contact us and speak to Gary Hayes, our Headteacher.
Email: gary.hayes@spacepsm.org
Telephone: 01626 864412
