Most Able and Talented Programme
The Most Able and Talented (MA&T) programme recognises students who have demonstrated exceptional academic or creative potential.
How we identify MA&T Students
Students are identified firstly from their CAT scores, which are given to subject teachers to plan effectively for the first term. Subject teachers will then be asked to identify students who they feel should be placed onto the MA&T register. This might be for a variety of reasons; accelerated progress in subject, outstanding work, physical talent, high test scores and visual and performing abilities. These students will then be placed onto a department register within the subject they have been recognised for. This way teachers can plan effectively to stretch and challenge the students in and out of the lessons as well as tracking how their progress is going on a termly basis. When students are recognised for more than 3 subject areas, they will then be placed onto a whole school register which will again be tracked closely.
Year 7 & 8
In Year 7 & 8, the MA&T programme is filled with lots of enrichment trips as well as opportunities to hear from visiting professional guest speakers. These trips and activities keep students engaged and motivated to continue with the progress they are making within the classroom and in the past have included:
We also run a leadership programme that is introduced within year 8; this aims to help students to improve their communication, teamwork and resilience skills. Students from all subject areas have the opportunity to put these skills into practice through assisting pupils at Skinners' Kent Primary School with their day-to-day lessons and art week.
We are also in partnership with West Kent ISSP which aims to provide high aspirational learning opportunities for students, involving guest speakers, higher learning days & fun adventurous activities.
Years 9-13
As students progress further up the school, the focus is more on raising the aspirations of students and looking at life after sixth form. We have programmes in place for students that look at different universities and what it is like to be a university student.
We have two programmes that run throughout Years 9-13:
Please see pictures below of some of the fantastic activities our MA&T students have taken part in:
How we identify MA&T Students
Students are identified firstly from their CAT scores, which are given to subject teachers to plan effectively for the first term. Subject teachers will then be asked to identify students who they feel should be placed onto the MA&T register. This might be for a variety of reasons; accelerated progress in subject, outstanding work, physical talent, high test scores and visual and performing abilities. These students will then be placed onto a department register within the subject they have been recognised for. This way teachers can plan effectively to stretch and challenge the students in and out of the lessons as well as tracking how their progress is going on a termly basis. When students are recognised for more than 3 subject areas, they will then be placed onto a whole school register which will again be tracked closely.
Year 7 & 8
In Year 7 & 8, the MA&T programme is filled with lots of enrichment trips as well as opportunities to hear from visiting professional guest speakers. These trips and activities keep students engaged and motivated to continue with the progress they are making within the classroom and in the past have included:
- Breakfast mornings
- Debates surrounding current news and affairs
- Quiz evenings going head to head with upper year groups,
- STEM competition against Skinners Hackney school,
- Visiting the University of Rochester for their fashion week,
- A trip to the University of Oxford for MA&T maths students
- A visit from author Jenny McLachlan who ran a creative writing workshop.
We also run a leadership programme that is introduced within year 8; this aims to help students to improve their communication, teamwork and resilience skills. Students from all subject areas have the opportunity to put these skills into practice through assisting pupils at Skinners' Kent Primary School with their day-to-day lessons and art week.
We are also in partnership with West Kent ISSP which aims to provide high aspirational learning opportunities for students, involving guest speakers, higher learning days & fun adventurous activities.
Years 9-13
As students progress further up the school, the focus is more on raising the aspirations of students and looking at life after sixth form. We have programmes in place for students that look at different universities and what it is like to be a university student.
We have two programmes that run throughout Years 9-13:
- The Brilliant Club which runs through year 9 and includes visiting different universities, sitting in lectures and having a PhD tutor visit the academy to teach a module of a university degree. This is then marked like a university assignment and the marks are given back to students.
- The Kent Academy Network runs through years 10 & 11 and this again looks at different university choices, sitting in lectures with guest speakers and communicating with other schools around Kent. As we go on to sixth form, we again offer huge support when students are thinking about life after SKA. We support with UCAS application, University choices and subjects to study and again provide many residentials at different universities.
Please see pictures below of some of the fantastic activities our MA&T students have taken part in:
Unfortunately, due to COVID-19 restrictions, the Academy is currently unable to run any MA&T enrichment clubs, trips or visits, however we are currently in conversations with our providers to see if we can offer an alternative programme. We are disappointed that we cannot offer the extensive programme that we usually offer, however we hope that during the year things will change and we can get back to some kind of normality.
Our Most Able and Talented policy can be viewed here.
Our Most Able and Talented policy can be viewed here.
