Pupils

Welcome to St Matthew's RC High School where we are proud to offer a first class education for all students in our community. Our aim is to help all individuals achieve their potential, not only in academic work but also in sporting, creative, practical and social activities. Our students have a voice and we value what they have to say. We promote hard work, respect, courtesy, good behaviour and service to others. Students are encouraged to respect each other and everyone in the school and the wider community.

Our students are really important to us, and we hope that you feel that you are at the heart of everything that we do. We want each and every young person to succeed at St Matthew's RC High School, knowing and feeling that they matter.  We aim to give you the power to take control, manage and direct your own learning in an environment which fosters positive relationships and develops your future career and aspirations.

Extra Curricular

St Matthew’s has a wide and varied extra-curricular timetable for all pupils to take opportunity of. We encourage all our pupils to get involved in activities outside of the classroom. There are many benefits to taking part, including:

• making new friends and meeting people with similar interests to you.
• trying out new physical, social and creative activities.
• showing colleges and employers you are a well-rounded student, who gets involves in lots of activities in school.
• gaining and building leadership skills and characteristics.
• supporting your studies across a range of subjects.
• increasing motivation, confidence and self-belief.

School Rules

The school rules help us focus on learning and treat our environment with respect. 

Following the school rules at all times means that everyone enjoys school, feels safe and allows us to learn new things all the time. 

We have very few rules to follow; all our rules are contained in the following three areas:

Respect your Learning   

Respect the Learning of others 

Respect any reasonable request made by an adult

There is an expectation that at all times pupils will push themselves to be the best that they can be.

Rewards

At St Matthew’s we look for every opportunity to reward pupils who follow these rules consistently.

Pupils who follow the school rules and provide a positive example to our community will be rewarded for their good behaviour.  

The top three ways which we reward at St Matthew’s …

Phonecalls home     Praise postcards      Star of the week

We also run reward trips throughout the school year. Look at each year group page for information and updates on these.

We have a culture of praise in our school and we will seek to reward your effort and improvement as well as your achievement. 

We will reinforce good behaviour by acknowledging it, praising it and rewarding it. 

Examples of good behaviour include:

• regular attendance/punctuality;
• consistent improvement in levels of academic achievement;
• contribution to form or year group;
• participation in extra-curricular activities;
• sporting and arts achievement;
   

Sanctions

Whilst the majority of pupils behave well, those pupils who break our school rules will be subject to consequences.  This is because poor behaviour affects the learning and life chances of everyone.

Sanctions are used to demonstrate to pupils concerned that what they have done is unacceptable; to deter the pupil from repeating that behaviour; and to signal to other that the behaviour is unacceptable and to discourage them from doing it.    

Sanctions include catching up on missed work, detentions and isolation. Pupils may be kept for up to 60 minutes on the same school day without notice, we will however endeavour to inform parents if we are detaining for longer than 15 minutes.  Notice for detention will either be given via the journal or by text / phone call.

For more serious or repeat breaches of the school rules, pupils may be placed in isolation. Here they will work all day away from the rest of the pupil community under the supervision of an experienced member of staff. As a last resort the school may have to exclude a pupil.

Behaviour For Learning Descriptors

As a school we use the following descriptors to enable you to identify strengths and areas for development in their behaviour for learning. 

Our minimum expectation is that each pupil meets the BfL 3 descriptor, however, we expect that everyone strives for BfL1 in all areas of their curriculum.

We will communicate these BfL grades to your parents along with progress data that is sent home termly. You will get both a progress grade and a BfL grade from each subject teacher.