Thorpe Hill Campus

I took up the post at the beginning of October, and have already had the privilege of meeting many parents of children currently here and at our feeder schools.  I have also met and introduced myself to all of our students in a series of assemblies and emphasised the importance of being respectful and responsible young people. 

These are exciting times for education in Loughborough and I am thrilled to be leading Garendon and Burleigh on our journey towards providing a seamless, all-through 11-19 education.

 I am in no doubt that this will transform the life chances of every youngster who comes here, whatever their background, by removing the disruption to learning that a change in schools at the age of 14 imposes and by raising standards at all levels. 

My aim is for the Thorpe Hill Campus to be the first choice for parents and their children in our community, because of the excellent education they get here and the outstanding care and support we give them.

Learning is at the heart of everything that we do and building on the outstanding foundations that students have had in their earlier years, our students will graduate from Thorpe Hill Campus with the qualifications, skills and attitudes they need to be successful adults.

 Students from both Garendon and Burleigh achieved the best ever results in 2011 across the whole ability range and that improving trend is continuing.

 I do expect very high standards from our students and the staff that teach and support them.  That means having high expectations about behaviour in and out of the classroom.  It means challenging students to work towards aspirational targets so that they achieve at the highest levels they are capable of.

By bringing Garendon and Burleigh together, we will be able to deploy the best teachers, the best teaching practices and the best resources across the whole age range. That process has already started - the teaching expertise for an all-through education is here on the Thorpe Hill Campus now.

We are a partnership of schools that is large enough to deliver the very wide range of courses that is necessary to meet the needs and interests of all students.   We are ready to go!

One of the next steps that we are taking is to consult with all interested parties about merging the two Governing Bodies together to form a single Federation.  You will be receiving a letter very shortly outlining the benefits that the Federation would bring, together with an invitation to a public consultation meeting on Tuesday 8^th November at 7pm.  I do hope that you will be able to come to that meeting to hear for yourselves the advantages of the Thorpe Hill 11-19 campus and to ask any questions that you may have. 

Mark Sutton

Campus Principal