Summary of the Proposal

The Shape of the College Week proposal presents a positive change for pupils and teachers as daily routines will be transformed. There are many strengths in our current system that will be continued and built upon in the new school week, but the timetables for the school day will be quite different. This will help us deliver our curriculum content in a more effective manner and create more contact time for pupils.

Two-week Timetable

From September 2023, we propose both Prep and Senior Schools will operate a two-week timetable from Monday to Friday. This provides flexibility to deliver an improved academic and co-curricular schedule for pupils that offers greater breadth and depth as well as opportunities, now and in the future, for new subjects to be taught. 

The two-week timetables also allow for better deployment of subject specialist teaching across music and games and improved weekday sports delivery. 

Weekday Structure 

To ensure teacher contact time for pupils is maintained or increased across the two-week timetables, the school start and end times will be adjusted. By doing this, it also enables us to better align the school day between the Prep and Senior Schools, with start and end times more closely matched. 

Academic lessons will only be taught from Monday to Friday. No academic lessons will be timetabled on a Saturday. 

Lessons

Within the new timetables, the length of lessons will be extended to allow for more teaching time, greater variety of tasks and the employment of more varied learning styles. It will also ensure sharper academic focus. 

•    Prep School lessons will increase from 35 minutes to 50 minutes
•    Senior School lessons will increase from 35 minutes to 55 minutes

The revised timetable will facilitate some subjects being introduced to younger year groups, allow for greater optionality for pupils and create space for new subjects in the curriculum.

Sport Saturdays

From September 2023, the focus on Saturdays will be sport, with an increased fixture programme introduced, as well as training for selected team squads. 

The absence of timetabled academic lessons on Saturday mornings provides us with greater flexibility for our fixture programme. Start times for fixtures will vary depending on the opposition we are playing, with fixtures taking place on both Saturday mornings and afternoons.

Each term will have non-sport Saturdays which will be published in the College calendar, enabling parents to plan weekends away.

 

Other Saturday Activity

Key College events, such as Open Days and Senior School Speech Day will continue to take place on Saturdays and pupil attendance at these events is expected. Dates for these events will be communicated at the start of the academic year.