Thank you to Stoke Reads and Kreative Foundations, who led a creative writing workshop with a group of Year 7 & 8 students from the Academy on Monday 21st November. With a range of tools and activities, the students developed their writing skills; learned that no idea is to odd to be useful and realised that sometimes the ideas we want to throw into the bin can lead to the most interesting stories! 

The Academy students will use their new skills to develop a creative writing competition for Year 5 and 6 children from across the city. Alongside developing a theme and designing all of the promotional materials, the group will deliver workshops to support the younger children with their ideas and with practical writing tips. They are really looking forward to the next stage of development in December – and to announcing the competition in January.

Year 7 have been putting their scientific skills to great use, completing a practical experiment investigating bacterial growth on an agar plate. With very obvious real world applications, the students focused on how the spread of pathogens are spread, and specifically how bacteria can be prevented by looking at the effect of sanitiser.

Mrs Woodward, our Head of Science, promotes experiments and practical lessons wherever possible across the curriculum, saying: “Practicals help students to develop important skills, understand the process of scientific investigation and enable students to learn scientific knowledge and how science works in the real world.”

“Practicals help students to develop important skills, understand the process of scientific investigation and enable students to learn scientific knowledge and how science works in the real world.”

Mrs Woodward, Head of Science Faculty

Learn more about our Science curriculum below:

Learn more about science at Co-op Academy Stoke-on-Trent

Our academy community came together on Friday 11th November, Armistice Day, to commemorate the anniversary of the end of the First World War and remember the sacrifices made in war.

Throughout the week, students had been reflecting on the contributions made to the war effort from soldiers and civilians across what was then the British Empire. Mrs Hodgkins, our Head of History, described both their immense role in the First World War but also the injustice of the 116,000 mostly African and Middle Eastern casualties from World War One “were not commemorated by name or possibly not commemorated at all” after they died fighting for the British Empire.

When you go home, tell them of us and say,

For your tomorrow, we gave our today.

The Kohima Epitaph

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning

We will remember them.

Members of our student council and Co-op Young Leaders programmes used their free time to sell poppies on behalf of the Royal British Legion, with hundreds of pounds being raised.

On Armistice Day, we came together for a short service before marking the national silence. The academy was represented at the Burslem War Memorial by Mrs Tatton, who laid a wreath on behalf of everyone in our community.

Our creative Year 8s have wowed industry professionals during a national competition day focusing on design and sustainability.

BIMA Digital Day is a nationwide competition which challenges 11-16 year olds to put the creative thinking to the test. This year’s challenge was in association with Primark, with the clothing retailer’s stores being the focus of the day. Working in groups, our students were asked to design anything which would meet this challenging brief:

How can digital play a part in improving these experiences, tools, and services to educate customers on sustainability, and make fashion kinder to our planet for you, and for future generations?

Throughout the day we were supported by professionals from This is Milk, a consultancy, training and technology business based in Glasgow. The team gave suggestions and posed critical design questions as our students worked in groups to design their ideas and prepare a pitch to explain their world-changing plans. The day culminated in a nail-biting wait to hear which group was the school winner, with their work going on to the national finals. Morgane and Jamie, representing This is Milk, had a challenging decision to make, with our students’ creativity leading to proposals which they said surpassed the thinking of some people currently working in the industry.