St Vincent’s School

St.Vincent’s offers the full National Curriculum and simultaneous ‘enrichment’ strategies highlighting and enhancing individual pupil strengths. These strengths we signpost towards friendship groups, employment, traineeships and apprenticeships in providing the best possible opportunities for the outcomes our pupils and parents seek.

Since 1850 we have had a tradition of excellence in the education and care of children with a visual impairment. We specialise in providing an all-round education maximising academic achievement, personal development, independence and self worth. We cater for pupils from Foundation Stage to Post 16, offering day, extended day and residential placements. We are the only Church school in England for Visually Impaired children and we celebrate and value the faith traditions of all pupils. Our pupils are from across the country including Wales. All pupils have a Statement of Special Educational Need or Education Health and Care Plan. Every pupil has an Individual Education and Care Plan.

Curriculum provision is broad and balanced focusing on the statutory requirements of the National Curriculum and the individual needs of our pupils. In addition to the Core and Foundation curriculum, our pupils access the ‘additional VI curriculum’ that enables them to realise their true potential. This is provided for by the specialist training that all our staff have received in visual impairment. The highly experienced Learning Support and Care Team work closely with pupils and teachers to ensure optimum access to the curriculum. The curriculum is enhanced by complementary working with Specialist Therapists.

These include individually programmed sessions in Speech and Language Therapy, Physiotherapy, Educational Psychological support and Music Therapy. The wide academic range sees pupils achieving well at GCSE and other nationally standardised examinations, to those whose progress is determined at P Levels. We are an inclusive school, working as a part of a continuum of provision, that both complements and contrasts the services available from local authorities.

‘Inspired by the example of St. Vincent we strive to create a safe and caring teaching and learning environment where all love, live, learn and grow in community so as to serve God and the Common Good’.

Our aims are that each individual in the community of St. Vincent’s can love and respect God and each other and be loved and respected, can live their life to the full, can learn from each other and from opportunities and experiences, according to their needs and abilities, Can grow in faith, confidence, wisdom and understanding and so reach their potential.

We work to make these aims a lived reality through daily collective worship, assemblies, school routines , curriculum and policies which reflect Gospel values such as faithfulness, honesty, dignity, compassion, gentleness, justice, forgiveness, holiness, tolerance, peace and service, by providing a teaching, learning and caring environment where the spiritual, moral, intellectual, emotional, physical, cultural and social needs of each individual can be nurtured, in welcoming all who come into our school community and in taking responsibility for each other, by taking an interest in and caring for the wider community and the environment we are privileged to live in, locally, nationally and internationally, By promoting an awareness of equal opportunities, social justice and our responsibility to work together and with others for the Common Good.

St. Vincent’s offers a broad and balanced curriculum supportive of individual needs. Our enriched and ‘value added’ curriculum offers scope to engage pupil voice and experiential, project and problem based learning to enhance employability skills, entrepreneurial learning and SME generation.