News

Congratulations Class of 2020!

Congratulations to our Class of 2020 who have now received their results following a tumultuous year!

We wish you every success for the future! We know that the resilience and fortitude you have shown during this uncertain time will stand you in good stead moving forward!

Results Day Gallery

Y11 Leavers’ Celebration 2020

Year 11 Celebration and Farewell 2020

We couldn’t let our Class of 2020 leave without a proper goodbye… Please enjoy the video below!

Once you have watched it through, please feel free to rewatch and take a moment to pause to read all the messages from our staff…

Key Tasks for Summer 2020

We are pleased with all year groups and how they have approached “home learning”. There have been many challenges with this, and we have appreciated your openness and support as we have worked to iron these out.

It is not our intention to set any further work over the summer break. We would encourage pupils to try and complete any “key task” work which they have not done. You can find a copy of the key task list for each year group by clicking the appropriate link:

Click here for Key Task General Information

It must be pointed out that teaching staff will not necessarily be available to respond to queries over the summer break as they are not at work during this period of time.

Summer Reflection

The video was launched at 10.00 am on Wednesday 15 July and can be found archived below.

VB and IR Pupils Feature in Online Worship

This morning, pupils from Venerable Bede and Ian Ramsey CE Academies featured in the latest of Oak National Academy and the Church of England’s ‘Faith@Home’ initiative, online assemblies.

The video, which centred around the theme of ‘patience’, along with a news release about the project, can be found below.

Church Schools Star In National Assembly

Two Secondary Schools in the Diocese of Durham have been featured in the Oak National Academy’s Assembly through the Church of England’s Faith@Home programme.

The Venerable Bede Church of England Academy in Sunderland and the Ian Ramsey Church of England Academy in Stockton-on-Tees, part of the Dayspring Trust, were approached by The Church of England Faith@Home team to take part in the national assembly following their pioneering work with Prayer Spaces in the Diocese and their contributes to Faith@Home.

The Archbishop of Canterbury led the first Oak National Academy ‘collective worship’ Assembly. Now in episode five, students from the two schools talk about the importance of developing patience in our everyday lives. The Assembly video is focused on secondary school-age children and uses a blend of young presenters, topical video and youth culture to gets its messages across to the audience.

The Oak National Academy was set up in response to the COVID-19 crisis to provide high-quality online materials for students, parents and teachers. Some of the assembly content comes from the Church of England’s Faith at Home programme which supports the faith development and pastoral care of children and young people.

Mrs Gill Booth, Executive Head for the Daysping Trust said:

“We are thrilled to have been asked to contribute to the Faith@home resources and the national assembly. This week’s theme is Patience – a timely topic in the current environment! Preparing the production was quite a challenge as we had to do all the filming ourselves, carefully considering the rules around social-distancing. However, 10 of our pupils jumped at the challenge and volunteered to come into school to be filmed, each taking a key role in the production.

We were asked to write and present the closing prayer. As a trust, we wanted to show how we work together so each pupil presented one line, alternating between each academy. For the prayer activities, pupils demonstrated 3 different tasks that can be used at home to develop patience, using gardening, timepieces and pebbles as inspiration.

I am extremely proud of our pupils and their achievement, especially their confidence and the way they demonstrate our Christian values, putting others before themselves and giving up their time to inspire others. We all need to develop patience at the moment and we hope that the activities show young people a way to do this.”

Both schools are part of the leadership team for the Faith@Home programme, contributing specifically on the theme of Wisdom and producing resources for teachers and pupils to use at home during the Covid-19 lockdown.

Andy Wolfe the CofE lead for the Faith@Home programme said:

“​We’re thrilled that student leaders from Sunderland and Stockton-on-Tees could play such a great role in this week’s films – they’ve done a wonderful job of leading, and will be an inspiration to other students and families across the country as part of our national Faith at Home campaign.”

The Rt Revd Paul Butler, Bishop of Durham and the CofE’s lead bishop on Education said:

“I am delighted to see these two schools from my diocese take part in the Oak National Academy’s collective worship assembly this week. It is great to see young people engaging in this way and helping to deliver such vital messages of patience not only in this time of COVID-19 but also for us all hear and reflect upon. They can be very proud of the work they have done on the assembly and in helping lead the Wisdom strand of the Faith@Home programme.”

Download the release here.

View an article about the event from the Northern Echo here.

A Message from the Staff at Venerable Bede for Mental Health Awareness Week 2020

Working together from their homes, the staff of VB has produced a short video message for our community. 

We hope to communicate our gratitude for how our community continues to pull together and exercise its determination, fortitude and grit!

We also hope it will make you smile!

Over the last several days staff have donated their own time and effort to create and send short videos clips and photos to our editor Mr. Irvine.

Our peripatetic music staff along with Mr. Exley and Mrs. Bonner worked hard to capture a unique recording of the ‘Friends’ theme tune.

Mrs. Birtwistle wrote a fantastic poem and several members of staff helped us to capture it, to help us to demonstrate how we are feeling at this time and the pride we have in our pupils!

We hope you enjoy it!

The video can also be found on our Well-being and Mindfulness page which has a wealth of resources for you to explore!