I hope you are all having a wonderful holiday and enjoying the extended break.

No doubt you will have seen in the media that the Government have decided to give all A-Level and GCSE students the grades that were awarded centrally by their teachers. This U-turn has been warmly welcomed generally by schools and colleges up and down the country. This essentially means that our students will receive their grades from the subject experts – their teachers, these are called centre assessed grades (CAG’s). They have been awarded by teachers, who have based each grade on the evidence they have gathered from students’ previous mock exams, internal teacher assessments and practice papers. We believe that the rigorous grading system has meant that each grade awarded is as close as possible to the grade that the students would receive if they had actually sat the exam.

Last week was a particularly stressful time for our eldest students in Year 13, many of whom faced an agonising time whilst waiting for universities to make decisions on places they had allocated earlier in the year. Our focus as a school has of course been on ensuring that all students have secured their next steps, no matter what their grades or initial plans for further study were. We are hopeful that we will never again experience a summer examination period like we have in 2020, with so much uncertainty, lack of clarity and reversed decisions.

This week we have the GCSE results day, and will look to be more flexible than usual with our approach to Bedford Academy Sixth Form admittance. We recognise that some students may not have achieved grades they expected or hoped for, but again we will have staff on-hand to support and assist students with guidance around their intended pathways into Key Stage 5.

Although there is a significant chunk of the summer holidays left, our senior teams’ attention now turns to the safe return of our school community in September 2020. A reminder that all of the information for parents and students is on our school website. We have a planned transition day on Monday 7^th September for Year 7 and 12 students only, all other year groups return in full on Tuesday 8^th September. This allows us some time with our newest members of the school community, who missed out on so much contact time with us due to Covid-19.

We are really excited about the prospect of having a full and busy building when we return in September. Please rest assured that we are taking every step possible to ensure the safety and wellbeing of your child whilst they are with us at Bedford Academy. If you have any specific queries that you feel have not been answered in the documents in the ‘School re-opening’ section on our website, you can email us at [email protected] and we will respond within 48 hours.

Chris Deller - Head teacher

Twitter: c_deller